AKTA Design Studio Chicago

The Psychology Of Design: John Roa Shares A Look Inside AKTA

“The cruel truth is that I’m not even a designer today,” said John Roa, founder of AKTA design studio. But if he was never a designer, then what made AKTA one of Chicago’s most sought-after design studios, and Roa one of Chicago’s most influential entrepreneurs? Roa’s journey was riddled with successes, failures and a carefully [...]... Read More

Archive for the ‘CEO Sundays’ Category

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CEO Sundays: Jackalope Jobs’ Sudy Bharadwaj On The Best Hiring Techniques For Startups
BY: Sudy Bharadwaj
Hiring for any startup is often critical to its success–but not every startup CEO is equipped or ready to be a hiring manager. The thing to remember is that your business is growing, and that’s a good thing. Throughout my time hiring for my startup, I’ve found three important factors hold true in hiring, creating, [...]
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CEO Sundays: How To Prepare For Your Tech Interview
BY: Alan Carniol
The IT job market is recovering at a much faster pace than other industries, with an unemployment rate half that of the national average. With more technology jobs available, there is a better chance for tech job seekers to be get interviews. The question is, will you be ready? Job interviews for technology-based positions are [...]
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CEO Sundays: Bhavin Parikh on Managing SaaS the Right Way
BY: Bhavin Parikh
That irritating spinning color wheel. An obstinate error message. A mocking frozen screen. Nothing is quite as frustrating as feeling like you can’t make your computer do what you want. When people experience technical issues, they want to talk to someone about it — fast. That’s why it’s so important to emphasize the “service” in [...]
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CEO Sundays: Ken Oboh on The Importance of Passion
BY: Guest Post
The world of business is often thought of as cold and heartless. Tall skyscrapers employing thousands of people in well-tailored suits set only on sealing the deal at any cost possible and profiting from it. Of course, this is not always the case, especially when considering entrepreneurs and industries that are seemingly oversaturated. In [...]
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CEO Sundays: IP and Corporate FAQ’s For Tech Entrepreneurs
BY: Guest Post
Tara A. Nealey and Charles C. Vos, attorneys in the St. Louis office of Polsinelli Shughart PC, give advice to entrepreneurs about corporate IP.
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CEO Sundays: Why Communication Needs to Be a Part of the Science
BY: Guest Post
Just because you work in the hard sciences doesn’t mean that you don’t have to use the softer skills like communication and relationship building.
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CEO Sundays: Make Your App Soar Over 700,000 Competitors
BY: Chris Luck
How often do you voluntarily see a movie that only earned one or two stars? Would you ever buy a new vacuum cleaner or coffeemaker that received a barrage of negative consumer comments? Customer reviews highly influence which products we choose to spend our hard-earned money and precious time on, and though apps may not [...]
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CEO Sundays: Abby Ross On How How To Amp Your Apps
BY: abbyross
While smartphones abound, apps are flooding the technology and social media gates. There are apps to pass your time, document your time—in an array of eye-pleasing filters, of course—and save you time. “There’s an app for that” is a mantra of truth, and amid the vast sea of applications, it can be daunting to release [...]
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CEO Sundays: How To Work With A Developer
BY: Edward Domain
Many years ago, I received a tidbit of advice that has stuck with me ever since: “Never settle.” Although most would apply that mantra to romantic pursuits, I apply it to my business practices. More specifically, “never settle” rings through my head when I negotiate with a new developer. How to find “the one” Finding [...]
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CEO Sundays: Video Interviewing Can Lead to Better Startup Hiring
BY: Guest Post
The startup hiring forecast is looking rosy. According to a recent survey, nearly 83 percent of all startup companies plan to hire in the next year. Considering the 8.2 percent unemployment figures and the lean June jobs report, more job seekers than ever will consider making the switch from an established company to the startup [...]
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CEO Sundays: Witness The Birth Of A Startup
BY: Guest Post
In the fall of 2008, I was entering my senior year of college at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. With a degree in economics and a passion for global markets, I thought that come May, I would be on my way to success as a commodities trader, following in the steps of my brother-in-law [...]
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CEO Sundays: How To Land A ‘Startup 180′
BY: Guest Post
Many “want-to-be” entrepreneurs find themselves riding down a confined vertical. They push along on a never ending quest to define “the problem” their product solves. In order to develop a game-changing new offering that disrupts a market, you need to take an approach 180 degrees from anything that already exists. That’s right, posers don’t count. [...]
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CEO Sundays: Maker Movement Exemplifies America’s Entrepreneurial Edge
BY: Guest Post
Contrary to popular belief, America is still a world leader when it comes to manufacturing. We are neck and neck with China. Both nations account for about 20% of the world’s manufacturing output. We produce such an impressive output with about 10% of our economy; whereas, China uses nearly 40% of its GDP to match [...]
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The Start To Success: Landing Your First Few Customers
BY: Guest Post
As a startup prepares for launch, the question on every founder’s mind (and investor’s lips) is “Where am I going to get the first few customers who will actually pay for this product?”
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Boots To Business: Veteran Entrepreneurs Succeeding At High Rates
BY: Guest Post
A 2011 SBA study found that “veterans are at least 45 percent more likely than those with no active-duty military experience to be self-employed.” Veterans are also flourishing economically relative to their non-veteran peers.
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Resist The Allure Of The ‘Sexy’ Startup Idea
BY: Guest Post
In this week’s CEO Sunday, the CEO and founder of Zencash discusses resisting the allure of founding a ‘sex’y startup. While it might not be sexy and cool as creating the next Path or Airbnb, it’s a more reliable strategy for creating a successful company and making money.
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Crowdsourcing: Trusting Your Loyal Community With The Task At Hand
BY: Guest Post
Startup businesses are always looking for new ways to grow. Whether you’re trying to grow your audience or grow creatively as a company, crowdsourcing is becoming more relevant in the business world.
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CEO Sundays: 3 Disruptive Startups That Are Revolutionizing Traditional Industries
BY: Guest Post
Entrepreneur Ryan Croft takes a look at the new crop of startups that have emerged to dethrone certain industries that have gone seemingly unchanged for decades.
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CEO Sundays: Secrets To Making Great Hires
BY: Guest Post
Finding good employees is one of the toughest challenges that C-level executives face. Kevin Watson, CEO of Unrabble, a cloud-computing hiring software solution shares a few tips in this week’s CEO Sunday series.
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CEO Sundays: Why Your Company Doesn’t Have To Be The Next Instagram
BY: Guest Post
Odds are, you’re not going to build a $100 million business. And that’s more than ok.
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CEO Sunday: Running Your Business In The Cloud
BY: Guest Post
Technology is finally at a point where entire businesses can be run in the cloud. Gone are the days of servers, firewalls, desktop computers and armies of IT staffers â€” if youâ€™re a startup that is.
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Accelerator Scorecard Part II
BY: Guest Post
Excelerate has been very successful in finding, funding and supporting young Chicago companies. But as successful as Excelerate has been on that front, there haven’t yet been any grand slam successes.
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CEO Sunday: The Importance Of Differentiating Your Startup
BY: Guest Post
A guest post by Blake Shipley, founder and CEO of CoupSmart, on the importance of differentiating your startup.
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CEO Sundays: E-Publishing, My Un-Business
BY: Karly Kirkpatrick
DarkSide Publishing was born in January, 2011, shortly after I e-published my first novel. As a fledgling e-publisher, I had to figure out just how the e-publishing game worked all on my own.
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Integrating PR Into Your Product
BY: Matan Talmi
A startup’s biggest challenge is marketing. Surely financing, hiring a great team, building a killer product among other challenges startups face are hard to pull off, but once you’ve got that product, you face the greatest challenge of all. Getting people to sign up to your service, download of your app or purchase your product [...]
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