Perspectives From a Serial Entrepreneur with Steve Hoffman—Episode 335 of The Action Catalyst Podcast - a podcast by Dan Moore and Dustin Hillis

Steve Hoffman, or Captain Hoff as he’s called in Silicon Valley, is the Chairman and CEO of Founders Space, one of the world’s leading incubators and accelerators. He’s also an angel investor, limited partner at August Capital, serial entrepreneur, and author of several award-winning books including Make Elephants Fly and Surviving a Startup.







Hoffman was the Founder and Chairman of the Producers Guild Silicon Valley Chapter, Board of Governors of the New Media Council, and founding member of the Academy of Television’s Interactive Media Group.







While in Hollywood, Hoffman worked as a TV development executive at Fries Entertainment, known for producing over 100 TV shows, acquired by MGM. He went on to pioneer interactive television with his venture-funded startup Spiderdance, which produced interactive TV shows with NBC, MTV, Turner, Warner Brothers, History Channel, Game Show Network, and others.







In Silicon Valley, Hoffman founded two more venture-backed startups, in the areas of games and entertainment, and worked as Mobile Studio Head for Infospace, with such hit mobile games as Tetris, Wheel of Fortune, Tomb Raider, Thief, Hitman, Skee-Ball, and X-Files.







Hoffman went on to launch Founders Space with the mission to educate and accelerate entrepreneurs. Founders Space has become one of the top startup accelerators in the world. Hoffman has trained hundreds of startup founders and corporate executives in the art of innovation and provided consulting to many of the world’s largest corporations, including Qualcomm, Huawei, Bosch, Intel, Disney, Warner Brothers, NBC, Gulf Oil, Siemens, and Viacom.







Hoffman has a bachelor's degree from the University of California in computer engineering and an master's of fine arts degree from the University of Southern California in cinema television. He currently resides in San Francisco but spends most of his time in the air, visiting startups, investors, and innovators all over the world.







Show Highlights:







To grow, you have to find a new, big need that no one else has found. That's the challenge for entrepreneurs. —Steve HoffmanThere are a lot of smart people out there, but they're not all designed to be entrepreneurs. You need three qualities to be a CEO: curiosity, leadership, and stamina. —Steve HoffmanThe biggest challenge in founding a startup is when the market turns against you. —Steve HoffmanThe key is not to dwell on your failures or ignore your failures. Look at what you learned and then move on. —Steve HoffmanWhen a crisis hits, you have to figure out how much cash you have before you run out and you have to figure out a plan to get to the other side. —Steve HoffmanUse your downtime to innovate. —Steve HoffmanYou don't have to have a billion-dollar idea to innovate. Many of the best innovations start small. —Steve HoffmanInnovating is about trying something and seeing if you can do it better to generate more demand. —Steve Hoffman







Steve's final thoughts: It doesn't matter what type of business you're in, you can always innovate.







The Action Catalyst is a weekly podcast hosted by Dan Moore, President of Southwestern Advantage, the oldest direct-sales company in America, and Partner with Southwestern Consulting. With more than 45 years in sales leadership and marketing management, Dan has a wealth of knowledge to share on how to make better use of time to achieve life, sales, and other business goals. Each week, he interviews some of the nation’s top thought leaders and experts, sharing meaningful tips and advice. Subscribe on iTunes and please leave a rating and review!

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