Steadfast in the goal, but flexible in the approach
Issue 15 - January 15th, 2021
A mentor of mine shared some great wisdom with me this week that I wanted to share with you today. On the topic of "business building", he said that the most successful entrepreneurs and business builders are "relentlessly steadfast in their long term goal, but extremely flexible in the method and approach to reaching that goal."
This simple statement had a big impact on me as it simplifies the crazy and sometimes overwhelming task of building a successful business. It is very easy to get bogged down in the details and overcomplicate things with work, but this statement reminds me to not get too caught up in doing things perfectly. Instead, one should always be willing to learn the best method for the particular situation, and one should always be willing to look at problems from various angles. There are a million ways to build a successful company, and you only need to be right once to have a big success. Teamwork, flexibility, and agility are just as important as ever in today's crazy world, and I know entrepreneurs building companies in 2021 need to think and act quickly to take advantage of massive opportunities presenting themselves as we all enter a new year. Flexibility in your process and agility to move quickly go a long way in today's world.
Newsworthy Links To Share
On Monday, Compass filed paperwork with the SEC to enter the public markets. The S-1 document is still confidential at this stage, but their last valuation was at $6.4 billion, when it raised $370 million, with SoftBank leading the way, in July 2019. Read more HERE.
Landing, the company behind the first membership for flexible, long-term living, announced Tuesday it secured $100M in new funding: a $45M Series B led by Foundry Group with participation by Greycroft and Maveron, alongside a $55M debt facility. With an influx of fresh capital and a rapidly growing membership base, the company will continue expanding its growing network of apartments to new markets across the country. Read more HERE.
General Motors unveiled a new business unit called Brightdrop which will offer an ecosystem of electric products, software and services to help delivery companies transport goods more efficiently. As electric vehicles and real estate become more intertwined, I love to see an old school automotive company making such a bold move into this space. Read more HERE.
Agents in Houston,TX were caught on recordings steering clients away from REX listings offering lower commission payments. “I’m not even going to show it to them, to be honest with you,” one agent is recorded saying. “I can’t help you to sell something that’s wiping out my profession.” The commission debate in America will become even more prevalent in 2021 as we have seen in 2020, but I predict more and more lawsuits like this to come this year. Read more HERE.
Real estate securities marketplace LEX has raised $6 million in additional seed funding, the company announced Wednesday. The LEX marketplace lets both accredited and unaccredited investors obtain minority positions in commercial real estate properties through single-asset IPOs, according to the company. Investors can buy and sell shares of commercial real estate assets without lockups through LEX’s platform, which is powered by Nasdaq. Read more HERE.