Passion provides purpose, but data drives decisions.
Andy Dunn
Tolerance, diversity, and inclusion are not political opinions. They are non-negotiable human rights – hard fought and secured in America.
Andy Dunn
Why should men be constrained by antiquated stereotypes of masculinity? What does it even mean to ‘Be a Real Man’ anymore? Shouldn’t we all be celebrating a wide range of definitions of manhood?
Andy Dunn
Taking risks and being focused, sometimes, are at odds. Both are required to build a great company.
Andy Dunn
From Nike, we buy victory. From Under Armour, we buy protection. From Lululemon, we buy zen. From Patagonia, we buy conservation. From BMW, we buy performance.
Andy Dunn
The history of innovation is the story of ideas that seemed dumb at the time.
Andy Dunn
Leadership is inspiring people. Management is keeping the trains running on time.
Andy Dunn
Not all Millennials think alike. A demographic is not a psychographic.
Andy Dunn
I have always loved the Day of the Dead – a chance to celebrate death rather than to treat it like that awful scene in the cemetery.
Andy Dunn
Tenacity is not about avoiding being overwhelmed but being indomitable in the face of the overwhelming odds of your venture’s failure.
Andy Dunn
Honesty is love.
Andy Dunn
Being a founder is about being so driven to distraction by the world that you want to put something new in it. It’s an act of creation, of irreverence, of defiance, of hope, and arguably one of narcissism.
Andy Dunn
Money talks, and when it starts to say goodbye, humans listen and act accordingly.
Andy Dunn
A great merchant delivers both joy and profit. Then profit gets reinvested in more joy.
Andy Dunn
The loudest voice in the room, sometimes, is the absent voice of the silenced.
Andy Dunn
To an entrepreneur, closing a financing often feels like the end of a marathon. It’s actually the starting gun.
Andy Dunn
A protective self-narrative during conflict and duress sometimes obscures us from seeing the worst in ourselves. When the self-sustaining haze lifts after that conflict has subsided, we may recognize in ourselves the flaws the other saw in us at the time that we didn’t have the emotional bandwidth to examine in the moment.
Andy Dunn
Too many entrepreneurs think their valuation is the real economic price of their company. It’s not. It’s not a real economic price unless you are selling 100%.
Andy Dunn
I’m sorry, honey. I was wrong.’ Are there six more magical words you can say to your wife?
Andy Dunn
The story of the merchant is told by the marketer. They need each other, and if they get along, it’s peanut butter and jelly. If they don’t, it’s oil and water.
Andy Dunn
A little narcissism is good. At least that’s what I am telling myself.
Andy Dunn
Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) cannot be medicated. It is treatable only through therapy. The problem is therapy is rarely sought by the afflicted. It cannot be cured.
Andy Dunn
Empathy is the bridge to understand those who you may be lucky to one day lead, and it is – in my opinion – the most under-appreciated human skill in business.
Andy Dunn
As a society, we must not allow human rights abuses to go unnoticed and undocumented; it is a vital mission to fight ignorance of these tragic events.
Andy Dunn
Culture is an output of a bunch of inputs that have to come together the right way. Specifically, it is the collision of people and their context, how they interact with each other in that context, and then how that context evolves based on those interactions as they multiply.
Andy Dunn
I’ve been in thousands of conversations dripping with misogyny. I’ve initiated many of those conversations myself. From my fraternity roots to my bachelor days in New York, I know I have not always shown up in ways that I am proud of.
Andy Dunn
Bonobos are not monkeys! Bonobos are apes.
Andy Dunn
Only by being obsessed with little things do amazing things emerge.
Andy Dunn
The American lionization of the entrepreneur is to ignore its foibles – the narcissism, the workaholism, the neglect of family, the imbalance, the obsession. These are not universally good things, though they are frequently universal to building great companies.
Andy Dunn
When the forces of liberalism and capitalism converge, change happens.
Andy Dunn
The digitally-native vertical brand drives a lot more customer intimacy than its competition. The data is better because every transaction and interaction is captured.
Andy Dunn
Sometimes, to move into the future, you must go back the past.
Andy Dunn
Everyone knows robots write the best books and make the best music. Just look at Daft Punk.
Andy Dunn
There are five kinds of great apes: bonobos, chimpanzees, orangutans, gorillas, and the one which people always think of last: Humans!
Andy Dunn
It’s easy to be cynical about American politics. It’s more important not to be.
Andy Dunn
The life of an entrepreneur is the life of a human. Some days are amazing. Some days are a struggle. A lot are in between. It’s the same for all of us.
Andy Dunn
The more defensive and angry I get, the more I later discover those feelings are usually just projections of feelings I am having towards myself.
Andy Dunn
A founder is the emotional energy aorta of a company. The energy that emanates from a founder attracts people and capital to the endeavor. When that energy goes away, it can feel impossible to do the job.
Andy Dunn
Oddly, I believe that emotional proximity we feel to close loved ones makes it hard to be honest with them about feelings of depression.
Andy Dunn
It’s now arguably over-written about and over-discussed how hard it is to be an entrepreneur. Of course it’s hard. So is being a parent. Let’s stop over-congratulating ourselves and let’s just do our work.
Andy Dunn
The act of founding a company is its own act of narcissism: ‘I alone can do this.’
Andy Dunn
Maybe everyone lives forever. Or maybe, like in the animated movie ‘Coco,’ only those whose stories get told by the living definitely do. It takes a story worth telling.
Andy Dunn
Marc Lore has been a mentor of mine for a long time. He taught me how to hire people and how to do the hardest thing in business, which is to make a great culture. I believe Marc is the most innovative and ambitious e-commerce entrepreneur on the planet.
Andy Dunn
‘Hamilton’ is not just the best musical I’ve ever seen. It may be the best thing I’ve ever seen.
Andy Dunn
I don’t feel I’m better than any man out there or that I have anything to teach, and the more I learn about myself, the less comfortable I feel saying anything at all.
Andy Dunn
In a conversation with a male executive, he tells me that he doesn’t hire women because ‘it’s not worth the trouble.’ I mentally blacklist him.
Andy Dunn
My definition of gender expands beyond just two genders.
Andy Dunn
Good parents are always on time. So are good CEOs.
Andy Dunn
What Americans do is we come to each other’s aid.
Andy Dunn
Entrepreneurs are not that special. If you are one, stop drinking the Kool Aid, and if you aren’t, definitely don’t drink it.
Andy Dunn
We all have an entrepreneur in us; it’s just whether we choose the tradeoffs to become one.
Andy Dunn
The youngest boy in an Indian family has a good life. Growing up in a matriarchal family where my Indian mom’s culture was dominant, I experienced this first hand.
Andy Dunn