Kerrest: Founders only need to make 3 to 5 key decisions annually
Frederic Kerrest · 20VC: Okta Founder Frederic Kerrest on Why You Want To Be A Monopolist In A Small Market, The Biggest Challenges in Scaling Okta To IPO and Being a16z's First Ever Fund Check · May 3, 2019 · at 29:56
Frederic Kerrest, co-founder and COO of Okta, shares his mental model on prioritization and focus for startup leadership.
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“And really at the end of the day, as a startup founder, there's probably three or five major decisions you have to get right every year. And that will really dictate what's going to happen with your company in the future.”
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“What he's looking for, and I agree with, is you want to become a monopolist in a small market with a lot of adjacencies.”
Kerrest: Two to four co-founders is the optimal startup team size
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Okta was Andreessen Horowitz's first fund investment check in 2009
“We were the first check that they wrote out of their first fund. In the summer of 2009 was into our seed round, and then obviously they led our series A in 2010.”
Okta pivoted from small businesses to mid-market and enterprise in 2011
“We went from focusing on small, medium businesses to focusing more on mid-market companies and a little bit upscale because those companies, A, had more pain, B, they had more budget, and C, they were looking for solutions like the ones we had”