We Live to Build

Sean Weisbrot
  • 5.0 (8)
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Updated Weekly

We Live to Build is the interview series for founders who are serious about building something that lasts. Hosted by serial entrepreneur and angel investor Sean Weisbrot, the show features 300+ raw conversations with 7-9 figure founders and investors, the people who've actually done it and are willing to talk about what it really took. Every episode goes deep on networking, AI, fundraising, and the harsh realities of scaling a company. Subscribe to upgrade how you build. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  1. Jul 21

    80% of the Workload Done Before a Human Touches It

    What if 80% of the work in your industry could be done before a human ever gets involved? In this episode, Sean sits down with Ray Meiring, a founder rethinking the proposal process from the ground up, challenging decades-old workflows in an industry that has barely changed in fifty years. Ray shares how his team is using AI to reimagine RFP responses in a fully agentic world, why bouncing ideas off Claude at 3AM is now part of his product development process, and how he balances the speed of AI-driven iteration with the reality of customers who are still mailing binders. You'll come away with a sharper understanding of what it actually looks like to disrupt your own business model before someone else does it for you. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Disrupting Your Own Business Before Others Do 00:57 - What Keeps Founders Up at 3AM 02:01 - Bouncing Ideas Off Claude Before Your Team 04:01 - Why Enterprise Customers Still Mail Binders 05:17 - Release to Sales First, Not Existing Customers 07:19 - Agents Talking to Agents: 18 Months Away 10:36 - Why Smaller Companies Should Sell Into Enterprise Now 17:24 - Building Agents on Microsoft Frameworks Explained 22:37 - Weeks of RFP Work Compressed Into Hours 30:25 - Stay the Course or Innovate Your Way Out Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  2. Jul 14

    Happiness Found Him Through a Crappy Movie at 2AM

    What if the secret to happiness wasn't a grand epiphany, but a bad movie playing at 2AM? In this episode, Sean sits down with Ben Narasin, a veteran venture capitalist who has backed companies like LendingClub, Rippling, and Omada Health, to explore what decades of investing at the highest level teaches you about life, patience, and staying true to your standards. Ben reveals why lowering the bar in venture is the beginning of the end, and how he learned to sit with the discomfort of seeing 2,500 pitches in a year and funding just one, without letting that silence become a compromise. You'll also hear his counterintuitive advice to founders: stop optimizing your valuation pitch and start treating your investor relationships like a marriage, because you'll be living with that choice for ten years or more. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Happiness Is Wanting What You Have 00:35 - Why Ben Only Funded 1 of 2,500 Pitches 01:11 - LendingClub, Rippling, and the Fired Founder Pattern 03:11 - Game Theory Will Ruin Your Investor Relationship 06:44 - The ChatGPT Trick for Vetting Your VC 08:14 - No Skeletons: The Open LP Meeting Experiment 18:03 - Specifics Are Your Friend, Generalities Your Enemy 25:04 - Work Hard When There's a Reason To 31:28 - Sleep, REM, and the Brain-Cleaning Function 33:46 - Life Is Hard for Everybody. Get Over It. Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  3. Jul 7

    88,000 Businesses Later, He Found 11 Biomarkers for This

    What if the real reason most businesses fail isn't strategy or market fit, but the behavior and value system of the owner themselves? In this episode, Sean sits down with Jay Aldebert, a business consultant who has studied patterns across 88,000 businesses and identified 11 biomarkers that predict whether a company will thrive or struggle. Jay explains why he starts every client conversation with a single pointed question about profit, and how the answer reveals far more than most owners expect. He shares why education has to come before measurement, drawing a parallel to how doctors measure without explaining, and why changing an owner's value system is often the hardest and most important part of the work. If you have ever wondered why smart, driven business owners keep hitting the same walls, Jay's framework will give you a completely new lens for looking at your own business. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Business Owners Are Addicts to Their Own Behavior 00:25 - Changing a Client's Value System From Scratch 01:06 - The "Shock and Awe" Hook That Wins Clients 04:03 - The Five Dimensions of Profit Explained 05:37 - The Two-Day Diagnostic Nobody Else Offers 07:45 - Why the Engagement Is a Loss Leader 10:50 - Sand Castle Consulting vs. Project-Based Work 14:01 - The 2-to-1 Return Assurance Unpacked 22:53 - RTO Software and the 11 Business Biomarkers 25:28 - One Profit Decision Affects 40 People Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  4. Jun 30

    1 Out of 100 Sellers Does This. He Built 8x Pipeline Doing It.

    What if the single move almost no seller bothers to make is the one that multiplies your pipeline by eight? In this episode, Neal Goyal, a go-to-market leader who built 8x pipeline at Postpilot in just eight months, breaks down exactly how he did it using LinkedIn in a way that only one out of every hundred sellers actually does. Neal reveals why content is the last step in his three-part flywheel, not the first, and why showing up in your target ICP's comments before ever sending a message is the real foundation of trust. You'll also hear why the spray-and-pray outbound tactics that dominate most sales teams are actively eroding the trust you need to close deals, especially when thousands of software companies are all fighting for the attention of the same two thousand brands. If you want to understand how to compete for attention instead of just competing on features, Neal's approach will change how you think about pipeline building entirely. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - No Shortcuts to Building Real Relationships 01:04 - How Neil 8x'd Postpilot's Pipeline 02:45 - The Three-Part LinkedIn Flywheel Explained 05:22 - Deposits Before Withdrawals on LinkedIn 09:14 - Meet Your ICP Where They Actually Are 18:16 - Why Neil Won't Let AI Build Relationships 23:11 - Coaching Reps Out of LinkedIn Fear 27:13 - Personal Brand Follows You Everywhere 28:03 - Bet on Yourself Before You're Ready Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  5. Jun 23

    60 Days Down to 60 Minutes Changed How Shelton Thinks About His Own Team

    What if the key to unlocking your team's potential wasn't hiring better people, but simply removing the friction slowing them down? Shelton Mercer III joins Sean to share how a shift from a 60-day process to a 60-minute one completely reframed how he thinks about the people around him and what they're truly capable of. You'll hear Shelton break down why power is less about authority and more about influence, how bringing together leaders from government, capital markets, and philanthropy in the same room creates a parity that cuts through political gridlock, and why framing collaboration around shared geography rather than competing agendas is what actually moves things forward. If you've ever wondered whether the systems your team works within are the real bottleneck, this conversation will make you think twice about where you're looking for solutions. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Philanthropy Is Limited, Government Is Broken 01:25 - The Power Shift Redefining Who Leads 02:01 - Using the World Cup to Unlock City Change 07:56 - One City, One Day, 100 Leaders 08:34 - How Activate's AI Cuts 60 Days to 60 Minutes 15:50 - AI Took My Designer's Job — Now What? 19:21 - Upskilling Your Team Instead of Cutting Them 28:05 - Pencils of Promise and Community Buy-In 36:07 - The Three Traits Every Leader Needs 38:00 - Mentor Told Me to Finish Some Ish Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  6. Jun 16

    He Built LLMs in 2016 and Still Trusts Gut Over AI

    What if the key to smarter business decisions isn't more data, but knowing when to trust yourself over the algorithm? In this episode, Sean sits down with Robert Indries, a builder and investor who was working with large language models back in 2016, long before AI became a boardroom buzzword. Robert shares why, despite his deep technical background, he still believes human intuition catches what AI cannot, especially when it comes to detecting deception during company acquisitions. You'll hear how his team uses a rigorous due diligence process of up to 170 questions to surface hidden problems before they become costly headaches, and why the best questions on that list came directly from painful past experience. Robert also breaks down how he thinks about failure tolerance in acquisitions, including why growing a company's value before a black swan event can mean the difference between a loss and getting your money back. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Getting Sellers to Tell You the Truth 01:17 - The 21-Question Due Diligence Massage Method 02:38 - Building a "Should Have Asked" Backlog 04:41 - Why AI Can't Catch a Liar in M&A 07:07 - Human Intuition Still Beats Generated Scripts 09:06 - Sean's Podcast Pitch That Turned a Rejection Around 17:25 - No Industry Is Safe From AI Disruption 19:52 - Protoss, Zerg, or Terran: Which Future Wins? 26:53 - Learning to Love as a Daily Skill Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  7. Jun 9

    He Presented from the Hip on Stage and Invented a World First in 90 Days

    What does it actually take to back yourself when the whole world seems to doubt you? In this episode, Sean sits down with Travis McGregor, a technology pioneer working to reinvent how the world handles security from the cloud to the edge, including building a world-first innovation in just 90 days. Travis opens up about the defining moment at 22 years old when he froze on stage in front of a thousand people after his team changed his entire keynote without warning, and how that humbling experience shaped him into the prepared, accountable leader he is today. You'll hear how Travis learned to stop second-guessing himself, why true belief in your own ideas is a deeply personal journey, and how choosing to fall on his sword rather than point fingers became the foundation of his leadership philosophy. ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Believing in Yourself When Nobody Else Does 01:44 - Choking on Stage at 22 Years Old 05:22 - The Off-the-Cuff Pitch That Changed Everything 09:21 - Patents Aren't What Most Founders Think 12:27 - Why Your Data Is Never Really Yours 14:56 - Flipping the Cloud-to-Edge Security Model 23:13 - SLC's Play to Reach 600 Mobile Networks 27:51 - 6G and the End of Anonymous Fraud Calls 29:32 - Could SIMs Replace Broken Government Systems Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  8. Jun 2

    She Woke Up One Morning and Knew She Had to Buy A $50M Company

    What does it actually take to back yourself when no one else believes in you? In this episode of We Live to Build, Sean sits down with Stacie Shifflett, a self-taught entrepreneur and subject matter expert in federal government procurement and acquisition, who shares the raw story of orchestrating a 50 million dollar software company acquisition with zero prior experience at that scale. You'll hear how Stacie walked into a boardroom, discovered her name had been left off the org chart despite a signed employment contract, and chose to stand her ground rather than go along to get along. She also opens up about one of the hardest decisions entrepreneurs face, knowing when to say no, take your money, and walk away even when others frame it as a missed opportunity. If you've ever been underestimated or felt pressure to shrink yourself in a room where you clearly earned your seat, Stacie's story will resonate deeply. ────────────────────────────────--───────────────────── 📚 NETWORK BEFORE YOU NEED IT (6 LESSONS THAT MADE SEAN $15M) ────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Get my brand new eBook free - https://welivetobuild.com/network ────────────────────── 📋 WORK WITH ME ────────────────────── ▶ Buy 300 Lessons From 300 Founders: https://welivetobuild.com/300-lessons-ebook ▶ Sponsor the Channel: https://www.welivetobuild.com/sponsorship ────────────────────── 🔗 CONNECT WITH SEAN ────────────────────── ▶ LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/seanweisbrot ▶ Inquiries: welivetobuild@gmail.com ────────── 🕐 CHAPTERS ────────── 00:00 - Stacy Led a $50M Acquisition From Scratch 01:00 - The CEO Who Didn't Know What to Do With Her 03:28 - Leaving Money on the Table Was the Right Call 05:22 - The One Time Stacy Actually Threw a Punch 09:59 - Stacy Woke Up and Decided to Buy a Company 15:40 - Self-Taught, No Degree, Still Outperformed Everyone 26:02 - Peace of Mind Is Our Greatest Personal Asset 29:22 - Know Yourself Before You Can Go Anywhere Leave a Review (it truly helps us grow): https://welivetobuild.com/review Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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5
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About

We Live to Build is the interview series for founders who are serious about building something that lasts. Hosted by serial entrepreneur and angel investor Sean Weisbrot, the show features 300+ raw conversations with 7-9 figure founders and investors, the people who've actually done it and are willing to talk about what it really took. Every episode goes deep on networking, AI, fundraising, and the harsh realities of scaling a company. Subscribe to upgrade how you build. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Information

  • Creator
    Sean Weisbrot
  • Years Active
    2020 - 2026
  • Episodes
    317
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026
  • Show Website
    We Live to Build