Startup CEO

A number of people have asked me "what do you do as a startup CEO" ?

The simple answer is "whatever it takes".  A more useful answer will vary from business to business and person to person but for my recent efforts around Asylum Labs, I can divide the work into two categories.  Efforts related to the company, and efforts related to our flagship title, Wild Party Bingo.

They roughly break down like this:

Company

  •     Vision / market position / strategy
  •     design name / logo
  •     legal
  •     stock purchase agreements (SPA)
  •     financial management
  •     branding (games & tech)
  •     business development
  •     attend conferences
  •     investor relations
  •     team building
  •     pitch documentation

Product

  •     product owner / scrum-master / producer
  •     marketing
    • social channels (facebook, twitter, etc)
    • website (design, creation & Maintenance)       
    • push notification design
    • paid UA strategy
    • creative 
  •     game design*
  •     economy design & tuning*
  •     analytics (design & interpretation)*
  •     artwork (logo, characters, backgrounds)*
  •     sound design
  •     music selection
  •     UI design (wireframes)
  •     testing department (survey monkey, testflight, bug database etc.)
  •     art outsource documents
  •     Rewards/Earn offers design
  •     customer support / FAQ / help docs

* indicates work with others on the team.

As you can see, there's a lot of disparate functions happening here.  Some of it is inside my 'comfort zone', and some of it is new.  I am not the ideal person to be doing many of these tasks but as a start-up we all must wear many hats.  Unless you thrive on a challenge, mental diversity and systemic complexity (like I do!) then I don't recommend it.  If you DO, then there are few things more rewarding.