Martin Babinec founded the HR services company Trinet in 1988, serving as its CEO for 20 years and as chairman for 10. Since he founded the company 32 years ago, Trinet has grown to annual sales of $4 billion and is now listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
Martin founded and built Trinet in Silicon Valley while commuting from Upstate New York. After seeing the stark difference between these two startup ecosystems, he embarked on a ten-year journey to transform his talent-exporting community in Upstate New York to a talent-magnetic community to support the innovation economy. His journey included a run for congress in 2016, the creation of a new political party, and several experiments to create more innovation economy jobs in his region. He has just released a book entitled “More Good Jobs” about his experience.
In this episode, Martin offers timely advice on why and how VCs should engage politically, and how they can leverage opportunities outside traditional startup ecosystems.
The “Magic Genie Fallacy” phenomenon, in which people start to believe that they need someone else’s magic advice to propel themselves forward, can be counterproductive to both the lamp seeker and the lamp possessor.
Read more ➞I would like to publicly thank my mom for sending a cool and collected text message after her recent accident. That simple message gave me hope that offering kindly candid feedback can, in fact, improve relationships, including the one I have with my mom.
Read more ➞Some of my biggest accomplishments and happiest moments have stemmed from a feeling of discomfort. I am going to publicly commit to staying out of my comfort zone for at least six weeks.
Read more ➞I allowed myself to include all of my “ridiculous” wants and aspirations on my list of 2023 goals, one of which was “finding a coach and co-collaborator who would agree to hold meetings from the chairlift.” Believe it or not, I was actually able to manifest that.
Read more ➞