Interview with Parker Conrad (From Cartoon Avatars EP 18)

Logan talks with Rippling co-founder Parker Conrad about his personal history, building a company, being forced out of Zenefits and the founder/VC relationship. 00:00 Intro 00:15 Parker Conrad Intro 00:38 Working on Harvard’s Crimson 03:09 Left School for a Little Rock Newspaper 05:37 Cancer Diagnosis 07:41 Starting SigFig 09:16 Raising Money Pre-2013 15:53 Challenges in Automating 19:00 The Public Narrative 21:01 Forced Out of Zenefits 30:14 VC’s Role in Narrative 33:24 What Do Founders Want From VCs? 36:10 Do VCs Increase Success? 40:34 Discussing Rippling 48:41 Building a Compound Company 57:20 Hiring People With a Chip On Their Shoulder 59:26 Most Important Job of a CEO 1:01:29 Raised the Next Round 1:05:12 Determining the Valuation 1:08:34 San Francisco