\n<\/p>\n
Robert Wolfe<\/a> describes his company Zeck<\/a> in one brutally efficient line: \u201cWe\u2019re reimagining the entire miserable, archaic board meeting process.\u201d After building and selling two companies with his brother Jeffrey Wolfe<\/a> \u2014 outdoor retailer Moosejaw to Walmart and charitable giving platform Crowdrise to GoFundMe, where the brothers partnered with investor\/actor Edward Norton \u2014 Wolfe realized his personal experiences with boardroom pain weren\u2019t unique. \u201cWe thought we were the only ones who were having this challenge,\u201d he told Entrepreneur<\/em>, \u201cand it wasn\u2019t until after our companies were acquired that we realized this angst we were having was universal.\u201d<\/p>\n The problem: Traditional board decks are 300-page PDFs that no one can easily read on their phone, are filled with backward-looking reporting and inspire very little strategic conversation. \u201cFor all participants, it was a valueless process,\u201d Wolfe says of his earlier companies\u2019 board meetings. Zeck, he says, was built to flip that model by letting leadership teams plug in their existing data (Google Sheets, Excel, and more), then using AI to pull out exactly what a specific board or investor will care about most. The final product is presented in a format that \u201clooks a lot more like an article you\u2019d read on your website than a slide deck.\u201d<\/p>\n Wolfe\u2019s third startup is built around two simple company culture rules: move fast and have fun. \u201cWe realized we\u2019ll probably never be the smartest, but it\u2019s a lot easier to be the fastest,\u201d he says, noting that customers and investors can expect replies within 24 hours, \u201cand more likely within an hour,\u201d even if he\u2019s \u201cflying to Greece.\u201d Speed, he says, is an edge any entrepreneur can adopt: you may not always be able to outthink the competition, but you can out-respond them.<\/p>\n The second pillar\u2014fun\u2014isn\u2019t just fluff. It\u2019s a productivity strategy. \u201cThe truth is, if you\u2019re having fun, you\u2019re going to do a better job,\u201d he explains. At Zeck, weekly sales and customer success meetings end with trivia or math questions, where the winner doesn\u2019t get a generic gift card, but might win a DustBuster as a prize. To underscore their philosophy, a quote from the movie The Wedding Crashers<\/em> appears on the homepage: \u201cWhen it stops being fun, break something.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a move from his Crowdwise playbook that served the company well. \u201cOur slogan was, \u2018If you don\u2019t give back, no one will like you,\u2019\u201d he laughs. The lesson: injecting humor into serious spaces makes your message stick.<\/p>\n When you think of Edward Norton, you are probably picturing him in his day job as an Oscar-nominated actor, but at Zeck, he\u2019s a co-founder, operator, and, as Wolfe describes it, \u201ca product obsessive.\u201d They originally teamed up on Crowdrise alongside Norton\u2019s now-wife, producer Shauna Robertson, whose credits include Anchorman<\/em> and Forgetting Sarah Marshall<\/em>. The idea for Zeck actually came during a trip they took together, when Wolfe ducked away for a three-hour board meeting on Zoom. He came back and told the group, \u201cThat was the most miserable three hours,\u201d and told Norton the experience was like the scene in Fight Club<\/em> where \u201cyou were punching yourself in the face.\u201d<\/p>\n The conversation set the Zeck journey in motion, and Wolfe says Norton\u2019s ongoing role could not be further from a celebrity endorsement. \u201cFirst, he\u2019s so fucking smart, it\u2019s crazy,\u201d Wolfe says. \u201cHe\u2019s very strategic and hands-on,\u201d adding that Norton also understands that building a business involves a fair degree of grinding it out. \u201cI\u2019m a big believer in luck,\u201d says Wolfe. \u201cAnd having Edward as a partner is very, very lucky.\u201d<\/p>\n For Wolfe, Zeck is the culmination of some hard-won lessons about what to do\u2014and what not to do\u2014when building a company. One of his biggest takeaways: never build with \u201cget acquired\u201d as the primary goal. \u201cThere is a very big difference between building a great company and building a company to be acquired,\u201d he says. \u201cWe are definitely doing the former, having made the mistake of doing the latter.\u201d At Moosejaw, outside investors pushed them to replace their in-house e-commerce platform with one built by IBM because \u201cwe will never sell this company with a bunch of kids building the website.\u201d The result? \u201cWe paid three million dollars and the end result wasn\u2019t as good,\u201d says Wolfe. \u201cThat was a mistake.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019s also become \u201cmaniacal\u201d about systems and focus. A board forced his earlier companies to shift from concentrating on \u201ccrisis to crisis\u201d to setting three to five clear goals per quarter. And his team is empowered to challenge his ideas \u2014 even if they are great ones \u2014 if they don\u2019t support those goals. Today, Zeck operates on rolling 12\u2011month plans that are constantly updated, aligning resources tightly against what matters most. <\/p>\n Asked if entrepreneurship is what he was born to do, Wolfe doesn\u2019t romanticize it: \u201cI wish I wasn\u2019t born to do it \u2014 there must be something wrong with me to have done this a third time,\u201d he laughs. But the pull is undeniable: \u201cThere has never been a single day, literally not one, where I didn\u2019t wake up in the morning excited to go at it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Robert Wolfe<\/a> describes his company Zeck<\/a> in one brutally efficient line: \u201cWe\u2019re reimagining the entire miserable, archaic board meeting process.\u201d After building and selling two companies with his brother Jeffrey Wolfe<\/a> \u2014 outdoor retailer Moosejaw to Walmart and charitable giving platform Crowdrise to GoFundMe, where the brothers partnered with investor\/actor Edward Norton \u2014 Wolfe realized his personal experiences with boardroom pain weren\u2019t unique. \u201cWe thought we were the only ones who were having this challenge,\u201d he told Entrepreneur<\/em>, \u201cand it wasn\u2019t until after our companies were acquired that we realized this angst we were having was universal.\u201d<\/p>\n The problem: Traditional board decks are 300-page PDFs that no one can easily read on their phone, are filled with backward-looking reporting and inspire very little strategic conversation. \u201cFor all participants, it was a valueless process,\u201d Wolfe says of his earlier companies\u2019 board meetings. Zeck, he says, was built to flip that model by letting leadership teams plug in their existing data (Google Sheets, Excel, and more), then using AI to pull out exactly what a specific board or investor will care about most. The final product is presented in a format that \u201clooks a lot more like an article you\u2019d read on your website than a slide deck.\u201d<\/p>\n Wolfe\u2019s third startup is built around two simple company culture rules: move fast and have fun. \u201cWe realized we\u2019ll probably never be the smartest, but it\u2019s a lot easier to be the fastest,\u201d he says, noting that customers and investors can expect replies within 24 hours, \u201cand more likely within an hour,\u201d even if he\u2019s \u201cflying to Greece.\u201d Speed, he says, is an edge any entrepreneur can adopt: you may not always be able to outthink the competition, but you can out-respond them.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nFast and fun<\/strong> culture<\/h2>\n
Edward Norton, co-founder and power user<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Lessons from a three-time founder<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Fast and fun<\/strong> culture<\/h2>\n