Each episode of How Success Happens gives me a front-row seat to stories from people who’ve built remarkable things, even while navigating the obstacles and calculated risks that come with entrepreneurship. The show is where ambition meets reality, and where the path forward is rarely straightforward.
What keeps me coming back is the honesty in those conversations. Behind every milestone is a series of choices made under pressure, and I’m always interested in the moments that reveal what truly separates progress from preventable setbacks.
This week, I sat down with Kim Perell, whose career spans multiple ventures and roles across the startup world. She’s a nine-time founder, a best-selling author, and an investor with stakes in more than 100 companies.
She also spoke as a parent, proudly noting she’s a mom of four. It’s a detail that frames her perspective in a grounded way, especially in a space that often measures success only in headlines and numbers.
Why her perspective stands out
Kim’s experience sits at the intersection of building and backing companies, which gives her a distinctive view of what entrepreneurs tend to get right and where they tend to go wrong. She has seen the pressure from the inside, and she has evaluated it from the outside.
That combination matters, because the “one mistake” founders should avoid isn’t just a theoretical lesson. It’s the kind of insight that comes from repeated exposure to the same patterns across many companies and many pivotal decisions.
