Robin Held

How to spot a rubbish influencer 🔍 It's easy, really. Look for hollow, populistic statements. The one doing the rounds now is that years of experience mean nothing. This is, of course, utter nonsense. It's meant to appeal to the masses of junior developers, selling them false dreams. Saying that you only need to be a problem-solver to be a good software engineer is like saying that someone who only read about cycling can complete a marathon and maybe even win it. What years of experience give you is depth of knowledge. It gives you familiarity with more quirks of your domain, pitfalls you could avoid, ways to do things better... Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. #developerlife #softwaredevelopment #softwareengineering #developers

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And it's a wrap... After just over 1 year heading up product development at Cartelux, my journey came to an end and I couldn't be prouder of what our team delivered during this time. My greatest contribution has been bringing together an exceptional team and giving them the tools to succeed. As Richard Branson says, "Take care of your employees and they will take care of your business. It's as simple as that." Some of our team's achievements: - Rolled out the beta program, which allowed us to be faster to market, get early feedback from customers and reduce wasted resources 🚀 - Increased our product ops efficiency by 99.92% through automation and streamlining of processes 🤯 - Boosted conversion rates by up to 11x 📈 - Enhanced campaign efficiency by up to 79%, allowing campaign budgets to be effective in bidding on audiences with higher propensity to convert 💸 - Delivered a brand new analytics page that allows national sales companies (franchisors) to have full visibility in a glance of the performance of their network broken down by location, product and campaign type across all channels 📊 - Beta launched our very own proprietary generative AI that produces ad copies that follow best industry practices and are brand compliant 🤖 - Developed a 1+ year roadmap that will make our platform even easier and more powerful - Reduced internal operational costs by $xxK through AI agents 🤖 Special acknowledgments: • Joshua D. Williams: Heartfelt thanks to our CEO, who took a bet on this bearded Brazilian, bald father of 7 kids! 🚀 • Triad partners in crime: Thank you Prashant Maheshwari and Patricia Parrela PhD for putting up with me and my stubbornness. ❤️ • Operation leads: Jake Soper and Eduardo Cortez your leadership, expertise, professionalism and customer centricity have been key for our success. 👨‍💼 • Our A-M-A-Z-I-N-G software engineers: Thank you Dale Ramirez and John Manuel Aquino, for your technical expertise, agility and high quality work. You truly embodied the company values. No job is too big or too small for you. 👨‍💻 I’m grateful to have been part of this incredible journey and can't wait to see what the future holds for Cartelux. Hervé Genin Kae Hum Kristin Harder Stephen Burns Rose Ann De Guzman Valery Philippe Blumereau Carla McAloon —your hard work and dedication have been instrumental in our achievements.

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Imagine if you could just hire me for a day and get all your shit sorted out?👀 You have a few different things you want just to get done RIGHT NOW You are sick of looking at them and want to get them OFF your to-do list, but also don't want to create a shit tonne of more work or have projects dragging on... You are ready to take your business to the next level, but you know some areas aren't running as smoothly as they could be. This is leaking money in your business. (and we do not want that!) You also feel that your client experience doesn't really match your incredible offer and expertise! All of this is holding you back from moving forward and taking action. You know exactly how you want things to look in your business; you can see it in your head, but you just don't really know how to make it happen or what the best options are for you. You are SO done trying to figure things out for yourself and just want the finished product! Imagine if you could just hire me for a day and get all your shit sorted out? Allowing you to get moving and finally take action. ☁️ Send me a message, and let's chat about getting your business to the next level in a day with me!

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Rant time: I HATE calling government agencies. They do everything wrong, which startups get SO right! Today I tried to call HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) to change a phone number on my account. Their security questions were: - Not set by me, but by then - Super oddly specific - Tedious and long-winded All whilst your struggling to understand an outsourced call agent over the phone. What TERRIBLE UX. - I mean seriously, why does it all suck? It’s like when you go to renew your drivers license, and they ask you to bring; - Your birth certificate, - Passport, - Proof of residency. So you go there and after 30 minutes of waiting, they inform you that you forgot to bring an original signed copy of the Declaration of Independence! What more do you need? The 10 commandments? On the two stone tablets? Startup founders, take this as a “what NOT to do.” Everyone knows government agencies suck, and even though they have all these questions, their security SUCKS too. We can develop 2FA and even 3FA security systems, using biometrics and CHOSEN security questions, to make an easier experience for our customers. What do you guys think?

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❗ "We only hire A Players" When I hear this it's usually a red flag that a company doesn't really know what qualities they're hiring for. They often default to looking for big logos on a CV as a signal for capability, rather than putting the hard work in to finding people who are right for their business. "If Amazon hired them they must be great, right?" Wrong Just because someone thrived in one environment, doesn't mean they'll do the same at your company. There is no shortcut to hiring. You have to put the effort in. Define and find your 'tribe.' People who can: * Work as a team * Trust their colleagues and be authentic at work * Get things done (without p*ssing everyone else off) * Challenge the prevailing view (without p*ssing everyone else off) * Can be a diplomat * Communicate really well * laugh with their colleagues * Get excited about learning and developing themselves These people are hiding all over the place. Mostly in companies you've never heard of. They've done amazing things and are hungry to do more. But like all things that are valuable in life - you have to work hard to aquire them.

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There we go: Apple iOS 18's new P2P payment feature 'Tap to Cash' 🤩 This new feature is set to roll out to all iPhone users Autumn 2024. ‘Tap to Cash’ does not even require users to have each others’ phone numbers, and can be used to effortlessly pay someone back at dinner, or buy something at a garage sale or local market. The P2P payments feature will come as part of iPhone’s iOS 18 update, starting in the US. Find this helpful? [ 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁 ] Anything to add about this subject? [𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁] Nice story, Marcel. Next! [ 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 ] hashtag #apple hashtag #applepay hashtag #ios18 hashtag #payments hashtag #paytech hashtag #fintech

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£44bn, that's one sweet pay day. Let's take a closer look at the numbers... Denise Coates of Bet365 was paid £221m in 2023 which means £44bn could reward her for nearly 200 years! The FTSE100 median salary (not including bonuses) is around £3.81m which means for £44bn you could get 100 average CEOs for a little over a 100 years! The average salary in the UK is £35,724 which means £44bn could employ over 1.2m people for a year! At 52 years old, if Elon Musk lives to 100, that means he'll have over £1bn (bearing in mind other wealth already accrued) to spend per year which equals: Over £2.7m a day Over £114k an hour Over £1900 a minute Over £31 a second to spend!! This kind of wealth in one payout could see him challenge Bernard Arnault of LVMH for richest person on the planet. So, if you're worried about asking for a pay rise...don't! There's plenty of money in the world that isn't being distributed fairly or evenly to those who are helping individuals hit earning milestones that are incomprehensible.

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Molly Macgregor and I are going to be out and about quite a bit more over the coming months (including London for several days next week) showing people Juralio and its newest, financial functionality. A few notes on what it's all about: - Juralio is software which has for a while now helped people to capture legal work as structured phases and tasks in ways that can be as layered, rigid or flexible as required. It's highly visual - work is presented as easy-to-understand maps. - You can also capture your maps as templates, to the level of detail required in your context. You can link this up at whatever level is useful to documents and other knowledge resources. This helps people to come across them naturally when engaging with the relevant work. It also makes their lives easier by making the latest process immediately available to them without having to read docs, flowcharts etc and figure it out for themselves. - Our design approach emphasises simplicity - 'minimum valuable structure' as it were. Just enough to enable people to see the forest as well as the trees but without becoming micro-managey (ick) and generally tedious. - And maps can be quickly built up by anyone, without the need for specialist training. Importantly, Juralio's maps aren't rule-based in the usual sense (which has a certain overhead and rigidity making it unsuitable outside 'volume' work and highly repeatable tasks) - Our financial functionality allows you to plan what work is going to take to deliver and apply different pricing models. Unlike a spreadsheet or purely financial tool, it's linked up effectively to how the work actually develops. - With this in place, you also have the basis for creating much better information for analysing what happened in matters so that you can reinforce success and deal with problems. The fact it's simple, structured and joined-up allows you to see that directly as well as giving you better data for analysis elsewhere. - A final thing to mention is that Juralio isn't about maximising positions for just one side (law firm or client) in the familiar rather adversarial way. It's about breaking away from that world, increasing meaningful collaboration and conversations about what needs to be done by whom and the financial implications of this, capturing it all conveniently and then keeping on top of it when things change materially. That can be a real win-win, reducing friction and improving financial and other outcomes for firms, clients and the individuals working for each, all the while helping with the sharing and improvement of knowledge of what's going on, and how to do things. We're mainly focused on UK medium and large law firms and legal departments at the moment. We've also recently announced a partnership with GUIRBADEN (Eric Eck) to promote Juralio's adoption by similar organisations in continental Europe. Please DM Molly, Eric or me if interested in discussing. Juralio website - https://www.juralio.com/

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These two founders of a FinTech start up were struggling to hire their final software developer.... This was a critical hire to help the development team execute on their road map for the coming months. But no success, and time was ticking. We were invited in after their current chosen agency had shared 8 (!!) candidate profiles, none of which had been successful. The result? 🏆 1 CV sent in total. ⏰ A 26 day turnaround from CV sent to offer (holidays and 4 stage process contributed to this) Here's how we saved them time and effort, but not necessarily money... → Understood how important it was to find the right culture fit. Someone who was ambitious, self motivated and proactive in problem solving. but could also hit the ground running. → Advised that whilst 4-5 years experience was, in their opinion, essential, someone with the right attitude at 2-3 years experience could also work (the developer hired had 2.5 years experience) → This wasn't going to be a financial move for a developer, so we took time to understand their vision, their mission and the culture they were trying to create, so we could sell this back to potential candidates. It's no surprise that we were more expensive than all the other agencies in the mix. But wouldn't you rather have full trust in agent for the sake of a few extra ££. Having faith that you will make that business critical hire so productivity can be increased where it matters - actually coding and building your product - is priceless. Here's what the software engineer had to say about working with me? 👇 Place.

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A QA engineer walks into a bar. Orders a beer. Orders 0 beers. Orders 99999999999 beers. Orders a lizard. Orders -1 beers. Orders a ueicbksjdhd. First real customer walks in and asks where the bathroom is. The bar bursts into flames, killing everyone. A QA engineer walks into a bar, WITH a team of QA AI agents. Asks AI agents to test the app while drinking an ice-cold Modelo Especial. Trained AI agents order X factor of Y elements in Z universes, in parallel using customer behavior data to identify common patterns in the test coverage. The QA engineer keeps drinking and curates the strategy. Real customer walks in, and shares a Modelo with the QA engineer. Lessons: 1. AI is here to help QAs, not just replace them 2. Modelo Especial es muy deliciosa y refrescante

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I'm throwing in the towel. Overdramatic? Maybe a little 🤏 but let me explain. Since discovering Monzo in 2018, I've been obsessed with startups, especially the early-stage chaos. As I've moved earlier and earlier in the startup lifecycle, my love for the pain and challenge has only grown, even if it sounds a bit sadistic in retrospect 😅 At the start of this year, being in a fortunate position to do so, I decided to take a stab at something completely new. An attempt to be the visionary founder I'd seen so much of over the years. Now I didn't have any areas of my life where there were unsolved or poorly solved problems, so I looked outside myself. There I found problems that most definitely would be worth solving and currently lacked attention i.e. no-brainer. So as you do I started speaking with people who were living with the problems. Designed mockups and tests to gauge interest, hone in on propositions and start piecing the puzzle together. In that time I also started networking with more founders, all of whom had a very clear fire for the problem they were focused on. Something I accutely noticed that I didn't share, and stuck with me like a stone in your shoe. But I'm a believer that action creates evidence, so I just needed to keep cracking on. Now another interesting thing happened during these conversations. Something I was too blind to really acknowledge at the time. This was that whenever the founders and I walked through the pain and fires they were currently dealing with, I lit up like a Christmas tree 🎄 Seems like such a small, insignificant point at the time but looking back I now realise was actually the key all along. I'm not leaning in to what uniquely is me. Now don't get me wrong, I definitely have traits common to the visionary founder but my idea of a good day isn't smooth sailing, it's fire and pain. It's uncertainty. It's being asked to solve a 10,000 piece puzzle using one arm with puzzle shapes that have never been seen before. So, I'm embracing my inner firefighter. I'm throwing in the towel on finding a problem to obsess over and leaning into the challenges that other, problem passionate people, dread. And that's where you come in. I'm looking for the most ambitious, fired-up, visionary founders you know who need another glass eater on their team. If they (or you) are facing a mountain of challenges and need someone who thrives in the trenches, let's talk. If there's anyone who springs to mind, I'd appreciate an intro either by tagging them below or sharing this post. #startups #founders

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I should’ve made this hire sooner. 🙈 I’m delighted to share that Bethan Tabram has recently joined Jumpstart as Ops Director, and she’s already proving invaluable. The BIGGEST benefit of hiring great people is a.) they get shit done ✅ b.) they find loads of opportunities to optimise and improve things that you hadn't even thought of 🤯 For example in just a few weeks, Bethan has taken over a lot of the day to day operations of the business (i.e giving me massive leverage) but has also: ♻ Created better feedback loops between both sides of the business 📈 Crunched the numbers to worked out how we can better calibrate the types of candidates we select Moral of the story - hire good people and they will work out what needs to be done. #startups #hiring

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Had a very interesting conversation with an investor last night and realised a few things about Spot Ship We have industrialised fast. Unbelievably fast. Emails processed are up 15X from December Team size up roughly 2X Very crudely that means productivity per head is up 7X in a quarter. These are crazy numbers driven by constant AI improvements (thanks to Anh) as well as process and structure improvements (primarily Henry Waterfield). Also obviously incredible dedication and hard work from the whole team. Working with Gardie, knee deep in spreadsheets, looks like we can handle a double in volume without any more headcount increases or further improvements in AI, which is rather exciting #shipsandshipping #maritime #founder #shipbroker #vc #seriesa

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It’s been a little while since I’ve given a CDM update and I’m sure you’ve all been chomping at the bit… so here goes!  https://lnkd.in/ejKaYjJv There has been a lot going on in the world of the CDM over the last few weeks. International Securities Lending Association (ISLA) have contributed new documentation and updated existing documentation on the CDM section of the FINOS website:   - A new Securities Lending landing page, to help FINOS & ISLA members understand the core components of a securities lending trade and how to represent them in the CDM: https://lnkd.in/eGecch5M - A Pre-trade Processing page which includes a guide on how to use the structures we created in the ISLA CDM Trading WG for availability broadcasts and borrower requests: https://lnkd.in/eGDKAG3E - And a new Use Cases page, which acts as an index for possible ways to use the CDM across various industries and sectors: https://lnkd.in/e48qVsNw - We also updated the FINOS CDM Legal Agreements page, adding a description of how to use the latest Master Agreement structures: https://lnkd.in/em8zKmwa   And a little closer to home, we have updated the following documents that are all available from the ISLA Common Domain Model page:   - The ISLA CDM Securities Lending Coverage document has been updated to reflect the current state of the model (as of April 2024): https://lnkd.in/eH-2aAEF - Attached the newly formatted ISLA CDM Framework for Event Negotiation: https://lnkd.in/ecYkfhvj   As ISLA’s Geneva Annual Conference rapidly approaches, I’m very much looking forward to the Making Sense of Digital Transition & Transformation breakout session, scheduled for Tuesday 18th June. - To find out more, visit the ISLA website here: https://lnkd.in/eM5giYEj   #CommonDomainModel #OpenSource #FINOS #Digital #LegalAgreements #SecuritiesLending #SecuritiesFinance

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There is no such thing as a saturated market. Just badly positioned products. It’s true. Too many people enter mature markets and try to look and sound like the leader. They exit a year later with an empty Monzo account complaining the market is saturated. Example: Tinder launched in 2012 and dominates the UK dating app market. Just competing with them for demand would be like sitting at your desk ripping up £50 notes. So how do you compete? Like this: Bumble – their spin on it? The app where ladies make the first move. Grindr – the app for the LBGTQIA alphabet mafia. Christian Connection – as conceptions go, this one should be immaculate right? Pure Hook-up – Hello, take your clothes off and let’s have sex. Hinge – Hello, keep your clothes on and let’s have a relationship. Spot a pattern? Exactly, there is no pattern. They’re all doing something different. They’re doing something the leader can’t do effectively. And they’re appealing to a very specific and easy to identify audience. But here’s the thing. The tech all these companies are using is fundamentally the same. What’s different is how they place themselves in the market. It’s not about the product. It’s never about the product. It’s all about the messaging. So if you're struggling to get noticed in your market. Stop tinkering with your product and start tinkering with how you want people to place you. Or DM me if you need help tinkering.

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💡 The good reasons your developers are bad at POC.   Headforwards has been enabling high performing teams to deliver solutions for our clients for more than 13 years. One of the things we’ve spotted over the years is that in-house teams aren’t always that good at delivering proof of concepts. But the reason for that is wholly positive. Developers want to do a good job. They want to write good, clean code that works perfectly.   As an industry we have embraced this and actively encouraged it with our increased focus on a 'You Build It, You Run It' mentality and Agile practices that focus on teams being more responsive to changing requirements. Together these have heightened developers focus on architecturally decoupled, horizontally scalable systems, that are easy to modify, troubleshoot and operate in production.   The problem with this approach when it comes to testing innovative ideas with MVP and POC, is that you’re just working out whether something is feasible. Your goal is to establish whether your project is a go-er. You just need to know if it’s going to fly.   POC and MVP can deliver serious value to your organisation. They can save a lot of time and resources by nipping things in the bud early if they’re not going to have the impact you need. And they can help you shape a product or process change with your users at the centre. It’s a low risk approach, and if gives you evidence to share with your stakeholders that either justifies your pitch for investment or demonstrates why you’re changing tack.   On Thursday, 20 June I’m joined by Raphael Hewett from John Lewis and Lewis Poe from Caspian One who had two very different requirements, but both required a test and learn approach. I’ll be quizzing them about the approach they took and why it added so much value to them. It’s not too late to sign up here: https://lnkd.in/eB7Vnfq3

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💡 Does anyone want a side project? (there is a bounty) Here is the idea: Every day, unsolicited emails slip into our inbox. They make it through the spam filters. Sometimes, that's okay. People call this a cold email. Other times, we don't want it. Some call this spam. The internet is divided. Well, let's have some fun with it?! The domain: spamnotspam.com How it should work... Users can forward emails to EITHER: - spam@spamnotspam.com (if you think it's spam) - notspam@spamnotspam.com (if you think it's NOT spam) They receive a reply email with: 1. shareable campaign URL where people can cast their vote. 2. feedback (from AI) about which spam standards it violates (if any) 3. a 'loser board' with companies with highest rated spam content. 💜 Will Allred would Lavender 💜 sponsor? Tagging all the people from my last SPAM post... Chris Ames Trey Sheneman Crawford McCarty Andrew J. Mason Kevin McIntyre Marilynn Barber Shama Hyder

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Last week I tried something new made a BIG MISTAKE.... I waffled on far too much on my Masters of Scale series. Because who has time for long posts, right? 😅 So this week I've condensed it down into 𝟱 𝘀𝗹𝗶𝗱𝗲𝘀! So here's the essentials: 🔍 Finding Your North Star 🛠️ MVP Framework 📈 User Acquisition & Growth 🌍 Market Dynamics & Scale Dynamics 🌐 Product Ecosystem Framework Want the full waffle? Check out last week's posts for the full uncensored drivel! Ready to scale your business? Let us know which part hits home for you! 🚀 #Startup #Scaling #BusinessGrowth #Entrepreneurship #MastersOfScale

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📱Tram: A Fresh Perspective on Investment Apps📱 Lately, I’ve been raving about Tram, and it’s not just because it’s brand spanking new! Tram tackles issues that have been on my radar for a while now and I think they should be on yours too🕵‍♂️ 🔍 Direct Platform Apps. I've spoken to a lot of advisers saying they often grapple with direct platform apps that clients use. These apps are incredibly convenient and powerful, but they sometimes drown users in data. It’s not always about having access to all the data - it’s often about presenting the right information effectively. 📈 Seeing the Numbers in Real Time. When I log into my platform app to check my ISA or SIPP, I get a real-time view of my chosen investments. Those little green and red flashes—impressive, right? But here’s the catch: when a fund underperforms, I can start searching for alternatives. Often within the app! That's a sure recipe for FOMO! ⏳ The Temptation of Timing the Markets. Let’s be honest - it’s tempting to think we can time the markets. But even on the best days, predicting top performance is a wild ride. So why present this rollercoaster to clients who’ve committed to a long-term plan? 📝 Tram’s Focus: The Plan. Tram takes a different route. It’s not fixated on performance stats. Instead, it zooms in on clients’ agreed-upon plans, considering risks and goals. No more FOMO-induced market timing—just strategic alignment. 🗣️ Let’s Connect! I’ve had fantastic conversations with advice firms about how Tram can enhance their offerings. If you’re curious too, shoot me a message! 📬 Dynamic Planner #InvestmentApps #ConsumerDuty #FinancialAdvice

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