Michael Houck

Megaphone

We create high-converting LinkedIn, X, and newsletter content for over 50 founders and send it viral with the help of over 400 creators with tens of millions of followers.

Founder

Founding Journey

Helping founders build, grow, and raise capital for their startups.

launch house

An early stage venture fund for companies building the New Silicon Valley. It began as a membership club built around IRL coliving residencies in LA, NYC, Tulum, Aspen, Miami, and Lisbon.

Co-Founder

Airbnb

Product Manager

Uber

Product Analytics, Uber Eats

TherapyNotes, LLC

Software Engineer

85,000+ founders read my free weekly newsletter. Follow me to learn about startups and venture capital.

I didn't know what a startup was until after college. I wasn't lucky with connections or mentors.

But within a few years my startup raised $23 million from a16z + other investors.

Along the way I:
· Cold emailed my way into an early role at Uber Eats
· Got laid off by Airbnb during COVID
· Built an audience of ~100K across LinkedIn and X
· Started a coliving residency for startup founders in Tulum
· Co-founded a venture fund and made over 50+ early stage investments (incl. Figure and Beehiiv)

More recently I've bootstrapped my personal holdco from $0 to $100K MRR in under 2 years. We help founders through content, connections, capital, and services:

· megaphonestudio.com → let my content agency build your newsletter or social media audience
· megaphone.network → partner with big creators in your niche

· join.foundingjourney.com → get my weekly playbooks and advice alongside 75k founders (for free)
· upgrade.foundingjourney.com → get ~100 fundraising case studies from founders I interviewed
· go.foundingjourney.com/fundraising → get connected with investors (including me)

I'm also building a new YouTube channel. Here's a recent video on the history of Silicon Valley: youtu.be/alUQxEldEMM

A weekly newsletter designed to help you build, grow, and raise capital for your startup.

The Strategy Guild

Weekly-ish newsletter & blog about problem-solving, strategy and curiosity for business and life.

Read along with Founders, Chief of Staff and other business generalists

Writer

Bayer

• Launched an automated dashboard to track EUR *X0M cost-cutting projects leveraging Power BI.
• Led a brainstorming workshop for ~20 senior executives to ideate EUR *X0M cost-cutting initiatives.
• Conducted onboarding sessions for new joiners and Power BI introductions for consultants.

Consultant

Certos

• Increased client interaction by 30% for €1M-accounts through lead email strategy. 
• Structured hiring strategy and process to remove €1M hiring costs.
• Implemented software tools worth €3K to remove candidate screening bottleneck.

Founder Associate 

HEC Consulting Practice

• Implemented hypothesis-first methodology to improve storyline building process for the team.
• Identified client’s unique selling point as community solutions, through competitor analysis of trip features.
• Tailored client's product strategy to sell 1000 individual trips for Year 1, by customer journey maps.

Strategy Consultant 

Atos

• Enabled top management decision making by automating dashboards on audit performance.
• Identified best practices of vendor authentication processes in Italy, outlined through audit report.
• Facilitated change management process after flagging training process conflicts in Italy and Poland.

Group Internal Audit Intern - Business Support Functions

GreenParking

• Reduced operation costs by 15% through capacity planning dashboards.
• Improved data quality by 70% after standardizing parking data cleaning methods.

Data Analyst

Larsen & Toubro

• Accelerated $161M project by two weeks – organized interns to complete quality checks on 100 metro rail controllers.
• Pushed the project to the implementation phase – coordinated with engineers and completed the testing phase in one month.

Project Trainee

Fractal Systems

• Led a 4-member team with weekly brainstorm sessions and project progress assessments.
• Launched a drone prototype 2 months earlier than planned through an iterative design process.

Project Lead

Sanbook Quality Consultancy

• Prepared and delivered presentations to clients and for workshops on OHSAS and ISO quality standards. 
• Designed brochures and other marketing materials on Canva for the company's workshops.
• Prepared audit reports and interviewed clients directly to understand their requirements.

Quality Auditor

BMW Group

Mechanical Engineer

HEC Paris | Bayer Strategy & Business Consulting

I have a dual background in both engineering and business, with a Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering at BITS Pilani (Dubai Campus) and a Masters in Management at HEC Paris

My key skill sets are tailored to the consulting industry, from analytics to strong business writing and presentation skills. 

My experience covers a diverse set of areas such as strategy consulting, audit, data analysis and project management. 

In addition, I have international work experience, with professional experience in Dubai, Paris, and Cologne. I have worked for both large conglomerates and fast-growing startups.

To reach out regarding any opportunity/advice, you can contact me by email: vedshankar120@gmail.com

taplio

The Battle

Michael Houck

Ved Shankar

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