Ambition Today

What an event episode ten of Ambition Today is as Jon Federico, co-founder of Event Hero and @GadgetBoy himself comes on the show all the way from the warm and sunny Austin, Texas. Ever wonder why most podcasts are sponsored by Audible.com? Today we a speaking with John Federico who years ago worked at Audible and invented the podcast sponsorship program. Through the years he also worked at Advance Internet, Blog Talk Radio, and more. He is now the co-founder of Event Hero which is the first integration Platform-as-a-Service for event technologies. He also hosts the EventTech Podcast is all about event technologies where John interviews EventTech company CEO’s and product managers, industry thought leaders and event organizers. If you are a new startup founder or just want to better understand the world of podcasting, audio, and marketing this episode is for you. + How experiencing an economic crash can influence you. + Why the medium of Audio matters. + Recognizing when life deals you an opportunity and capi

Episode nine of Ambition Today finds us with the King of the DJ's, Rob Principe, the Founder & CEO of Scratch Music Group. Growing up on Long Island as a child Rob loved music, especially Run D.M.C. One day the popular music group happened to sit down next to him on a plane as he was traveling to a tennis tournament. Afterword he took a picture with the group. Fast forward years later Rob had founded Scratch Music Group and after some hustle, Rob would show this very picture to Jam Master Jay of Run-D.M.C. in a greenroom at the Letterman Show in New York City while pitching him his vision. Jam Master Jay was in and together they co-founded the Scratch DJ Academy. I found Rob's story to be pretty incredible. During this episode we go over the history of Scratch as well as: + What is it like meeting your childhood hero's. + How Rob and Jam Master Jay of Run-D.M.C. co-founded the Scratch DJ Academy. + The importance of building credibility when building your initial startup's team. + Recognizing that definin

On episode eight Jeff Wald, Co-founder and President of Work Market joins Ambition Today. "The only thing I know with 100% certainty is that it ain't going down like this." - Jeff Wald Jeff's background is nothing short if impressive. He started at Cornell University and then went to J.P. Morgan. He then went back to school at Harvard for an MBA. After Harvard Jeff spent time at Glen Rock Group before going on to Co-found Spin Back. The wild ride of Spinback, his first startup, took Jeff to almost moving back home after coming close to running out of money. The answer was to rebuild the business which later ended up getting acquired. After acquisition Jeff went to Barington Capital Group, and finally to his current company where he is the Co-founder and President of Work Market. Did I mention he was also an auxiliary member of the NYPD as well? This is an episode packed full of insights: + Is getting a Master's of Business Administration worth the return on investment? + Should you start a company or get an M

On episode 7 Beatriz Helena Ramos, Founder and CEO of DADA & Dancing Diablo is with us. Her most recent startup, DADA is a visual conversation platform for artists and art enthusiasts. Her other company, Dancing Diablo is is live action and animation production company based in DUMBO, Brooklyn. After moving from Venezuela to find success in America, Beatriz thought that would be the hardest thing she ever had to do. Then she started her first business and learned that was not going to be true anymore. During this episode we go through: + Starting a brick and mortar Comic book store in Venezuela + Moving to America to find success + Working for MTV and Disney + Who would win in a fight, Batman vs Superman? + Running a remote office in another country + How to restore power to the artists + How to find impactful Mentor's and Advisors The Ambition Today Question of the Day: What is Ambition to you? Be sure to listen and subscribe to Ambition Today in the iTunes Store for iOS and on Stitcher for Android.

Eric Duffy, Co-Founder and CEO of Pathgather, a beautiful and engaging learning platform for the modern workforce joins us on episode 6 of Ambition Today. We get into the insights fast on this episode: "What do I think will allow me to have the most impact on my short time on earth" - Eric Duffy For Eric, after some time abroad in Africa, the answer to his question was to start Pathgather. We discuss how traveling the world can lead to inspiration for new great ideas. From there Eric moved back to Silicon Alley and joined the Founder Institute in New York to launch Pathgather. His journey through founding a startup takes us through: + How a great MVP tests user behavior and can attract your first customer. + Graduating the Founder Institute New York. + How to position yourself to enable meeting your Co-founder. + Joining Techstars New York City. + Disrupting a stagnate industry such as the Learning Management System (LMS) space. + Fundraising your seed round and how a convertible note works. + Attracting inve

Kevin Siskar was joined by Cory Crosland on this episode of Ambition Today. Cory is the founder of Croscon, an engineering company which partners with big thinkers to plan, engineer and support their digital business. Today we talk about how to bootstrap a startup company from one person just doing freelance work to a growing team of almost 20 people. How you can stay motivated years into your company. What it is like being nominated for a Grammy and winning a Webby Award. Also, what is the future of mobile now that Android has 1.4 billion users and much more. Be sure to listen and subscribe to Ambition Today in the iTunes Store for iOS and on Stitcher for Android.

On this episode of Ambition Today, I was joined by serial entrepreneur Shahab Kaviani. Shahab is most notably the co-founder of CoFoundersLab, a global organization helping entrepreneurs find their co-founder and launch lasting new businesses together. Previously he cofounded Hyperoffice and recently he is the co-founder of a new company Breezio, which is a collaboration platform for research scientist to accelerate discoveries through team science. Today we discuss Shahab's journey through serial entrepreneurship. We explore some questions such as: When is the right time to replace yourself as CEO? What to do when Google decides to enter your market? How to test your companies MVP offline without even building a website? Who could be the right company to merge with? And the new Ambition Today Question of the Day ( Q.O.T.D.™ )

Joined today by Clark Dever, the founder of Head Up Display, a visual notification system for workers in hazardous environments. Today we discuss how to travel the United States of America for only $600, the future of e-sports entertainment, and how to compete with Google Glass and Oculus Rift. Also, how do you grow a startup ecosystem out of a an industrial renaissance? Buffalo N.Y. may have the answer. Elon Musk's Solar City, ecosystem driving programs like Z80 Labs and 43 North, and affordable cost of living are some of the things driving Buffalo forward as a startup city. Be sure to listen and subscribe to Ambition Today in the iTunes Store for iOS.

Today's guest is serial entrepreneur Hans Bakan. Hans is the founder of Open Dreams, a non profit working to provide education and mentorship to young students in global emerging markets. We discuss what it takes to avoid failure in your first company and carry those lessons learned with you to make your current company more successful. Also, how you you can use a company to improve the world. We discuss how Open Dreams is working to do just that in emerging global markets.

Joined today by Ramphis Castro of the Founder Institute, we explore some of the recent news in the technology, business and startup industries. Today's news includes: Google Changes It's Name To Alphabet, Zirtual Goes Dark Overnight, & NBC Invests In A Large Chunk of Buzzfeed.

Ambition Today started as something out of nothing. It has since grown and evolved over time to explore how people build their legacy throughout their lives. With this special “prequel” I wanted to provide some background on why Ambition Today exists as well as some direction on where to start with the show for those who were new to Ambition Today. I really hope you enjoy all our episodes and find them helpful in your own life. Thank you for being here. I really appreciate it and hope to be with you during all the future episodes of Ambition Today! ========== Follow Kevin Siskar on Twitter: twitter.com/TheSiskar Add Kevin Siskar on Snapchat: snapchat.com/add/krsiskar Visit Ambition Today on the Web: www.siskar.co/ambitiontoday Kevin Siskar brings you ambitious entrepreneurs inspired by Tim Ferriss, Entrepreneur on Fire, NPR, HBR, TED Radio Hour, the StartUp podcast, Pat Flynn, Tony Robbins, The Uncertain Hour, Bigger Pockets, Art of Charm, Dave Ramsey, Planet Money, Jocko Podcast, EntreLeadership, Zigler, APM