I know how to get us there. I'm Mash — for 25 years I've been getting important things moving: ventures, products, programs, books, people. Sometimes the path is obvious. The interesting ones aren't.
You don't need to see the whole path before you start. Nobody can. Action produces information that thinking never will — customers respond, assumptions break, the real obstacle finally shows itself. So I don't sell plans. We agree on where you want to go, and we move. Movement is my driving force.
How I work →None of these started with a plan that survived. They started with a direction.
Twelve weeks, four 3-week sprints. We agree on where you want to go, then we get moving — and every three weeks, what we've learned decides the next move.
A new venture. A product that won't launch. A program that's been "about to start" for two years. You know the direction — it just isn't happening. I get inside it with your team.
Organizations →Start the company. Write the book. Become someone who can. I know the territory, and I'll guide you through it — twelve weeks together, instead of another year of getting ready.
Start the adventure →I won't promise the exact destination — nobody honest can. We may find the path is different from the one we pictured at the start. That's part of the work.
Companies, products, classrooms, books, countries, music. I'm not exclusively a consultant, a coach, or a fractional executive — I'm an operator. I'm the builder when building is required, the coach when coaching is, the advisor, the trainer, the professor when that's what moves us.
Four exits — one as a founder, three as an advisor. I founded FastPencil and sold it to Courier Corp in 2011, then built a consulting practice of my own; three of those clients went on to billion-dollar exits — an IPO, a merger, and a private-equity deal. I was on the team, not the reason it happened. I launched the startup incubator at San José State and have taught there since 2018 — thousands of students so far. The principles are in my book, What Holds Up the Roof.
More about me →
My book What Holds Up the Roof is a business fable — the four principles of entrepreneurship, drawn from 25 years in startups, told through a founder learning what actually keeps a business standing when the plan falls apart.
Occasional essays and field notes — written the way I'd say it in a working session, sent straight to your inbox.
Read on Substack →Every Thursday I sit down with builders and leaders — from people shipping their first thing to CEOs scaling past $10M — to unpack what really works.
Listen in →The community I run for people building things — live workshops, meetups, and honest conversation about what's actually working.
Join for free →Thirty minutes to figure out whether I'm the right person to go there with you. Bring the direction — you don't need the plan.
Book 30 minutes with meJust want to follow along? Connect on LinkedIn.
