rss_feedFirst Round Review ·10.01.2026 open_in_newОригинал

The best company building advice we heard in 2025

#Ai Adoption #Founder-Led Sales #Go To Market

auto_awesomeКраткое саммари

First Round Review открывает 2026 год традиционным обзором 30 лучших советов по построению компаний, собранных из статей за прошедший год. Редакция отмечает, что наиболее ценными оказались небольшие тактики и нестандартные подходы, дававшие непропорционально большой эффект. Среди примеров: со-основатель Clay Varun Anand применяет «обратное демо», когда клиент сам делится экраном и тестирует продукт под его руководством. Mihika Kapoor из Figma «мемифицировала» идею Figma Slides внутри компании, назвав продукт «Flides» и создав кастомный Slack-эмодзи. Farhan Thawar, VP и Head of Engineering в Shopify, идёт против тренда и нанимает больше джуниоров: компания взяла 1000 стажёров за год, считая молодых сотрудников «AI-центаврами», которые рефлекторно и креативно используют ИИ.

translate EN + RU EN RU

Sharing our favorite snippets of startup advice we published last year.

The 30 Best Pieces of Company Building Advice We Heard in 2025

Happy 2026!

We’re kicking off the new year with a tradition we’ve upheld ever since The Review was born in 2013. Every January, we comb through all the articles we published over the past 12 months to pull out 30 pieces of standout advice.

We spoke with some incredible founders and builders in 2025, filling out an archive that covered topics from launching out of stealth to user onboarding to landing your first design partners.

As we assembled this guide, the snippets that stood out to us were the seemingly small tactics and against-the-grain approaches that led to outsized impact. They came from folks who weren’t afraid to take risks long before their strategies became consensus, or before their companies became household names.

Here’s a taste of the advice that made the list:

Run a reverse demo. Clay co-founder Varun Anand architected the company’s breakout revenue growth. Just one of Anand’s clever GTM tactics: flipping the classic demo on its head by asking the customer to share their screen and give Clay a test drive, with his guidance.

“Meme-ify” your idea to build momentum inside your company. Mihika Kapoor rallied folks from across Figma to join her in getting a new bet off the ground: Figma Slides. To do so, she turned the product idea into a meme, even creating a custom Slack emoji. “It may feel random, but a big part of what made Figma Slides go internally viral was the fact that we called it ‘Flides.’ It was ultimately this meme that people were able to take and run with. That’s because being kooky humanizes your idea,” she says.

In the age of AI, hire more entry-level people, not fewer. We sat down with Shopify’s VP and Head of Engineering, Farhan Thawar, to find out how he’s brought CEO Tobi Lütke’s famous AI memo to life in his org. Bucking the trend to slash entry-level roles, Shopify has made hiring young people a key part of its AI strategy: the company brought on 1,000 interns last year. Thawar says young people are AI centaurs — they use AI in reflexive, creative ways.

We hope you’ll find something in here you can put to use to build an incredible company, whether that’s today or 10 years from now.

Thanks, as always, for reading and sharing!

-The Review Editors