We started The Review back in 2013 to go deeper on the advice tech entrepreneurs need to build better companies. More specifically, we had two goals:

1. To share the advice that usually only gets passed down through mentorship, coffee chats and coaching sessions.
2. To make sure readers walk away not with high-level, generic advice they’ve already heard before, but instead unique, incredibly actionable tactics they could use today.

After publishing nearly 500 interviews and attracting millions of readers, we’ve learned a lot along the way about what makes for compelling conversations. Whether it’s an interview with a big-name CEO or a VP you’ve never heard of, there’s been a common thread across all of the most popular Review stories — a willingness to go deeper.

Today, we’re excited to announce an extension of this work: We’re launching our very first podcast, In Depth, and the first epsiode is out now.

In this new show, we’re taking the very same signature style we’ve cultivated over the years here on The Review and delivering it in a new way, giving you a chance to listen in on these deeper conversations firsthand. Head over here to listen to our first episode on your favorite podcast app and be sure to subscribe!

First Round Review Presents: In Depth

You’ve come to expect the weekly(ish) long-form profiles that we publish on Tuesdays. Now, every Thursday, we’ll share a new episode with an incredible founder or builder. We’ll cover a lot of ground and a wide range of topics, from hiring executives, to the importance of storytelling inside of your organization. But every interview will hit the level of tactical depth where the very best advice is found.

For our very first episode, we’re chatting with none other than Molly Graham. If you’re a long-time reader, you’ll probably recognize her name from a number of interviews we’ve done with her, most notably her classic startup advice in ‘Give Away Your Legos.’ We thought Molly made for the perfect first guest, because the advice she has to share and the experiences she can draw from are unbelievably helpful to founders and startup leaders. (She helped build and scale Facebook, Quip, The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative in their early days, and is now the COO of Lambda School.)

As she puts it, Molly loves the messiness of scaling and figuring out what it takes a startup to go not from 0 to 1, but from 1 to 2. On today’s episode, we’re digging really deep into what that looks like from the manager’s perspective. This is a topic Molly has strong opinions on—she’s seen time and time again across her career how so many startup mistakes come down to general management issues. 

From the traps that managers can fall into, to why you should be spending more time with your highest—not your lowest—performers, to the managers she’s learned the most from, Molly shares tons of insightful advice and practical tactics for stepping up your management game. And as always, she shares some colorful metaphors along the way, touching on everything from playing Mad Libs to practicing emergency medicine.

Hope it’s a great listen! You’ll find In Depth on all the go-to podcast apps, including Apple, Spotify, Google, Amazon, TuneIn, and more. Stay tuned for upcoming episodes with Carbon Health’s Ayo Omojola, Drop’s Steve El-Hage, Notion’s Cristina Cordova, Drift’s David Cancel, and many more.

We always sign off by saying thanks for reading — happy to add thanks for listening to the mix. If you have any feedback or suggestions for guests we should have on, let us know by replying to this email.

-The Review editors

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