https://ohadsamet.com/writing/Essays on fintech, risk, leadership, and building companies.https://ohadsamet.com/writing/dont-do-brazilian-jiu-jitsu/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/dont-do-brazilian-jiu-jitsu/Mon, 24 Aug 2026 06:36:12 GMTDon’t do jiujitsu. Especially not the Brazilian type, or BJJ as we call it. This is, basically, the whole post. No, seriously, don’t. They call it a martial art and for the first couple of years you may struggle and get choked out and tapped and think you’re “fighting” or something, but if you…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/my-own-private-midlife-crisis/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/my-own-private-midlife-crisis/Tue, 18 Aug 2026 00:37:16 GMTA few years ago I fired myself from the day to day management of TrueML. The pressures of heavy travel and daily firefighting were wearing me out and also taking away from the focus I needed to have: working with investors and thinking strategically about the group and its future. I hired an…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/you-dont-need-a-new-board-member-most-of-the-time/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/you-dont-need-a-new-board-member-most-of-the-time/Fri, 07 Aug 2026 04:27:04 GMTMy name is Ohad, and I’m a board member. It took some effort to admit this, given how much crap I’ve given the idea of board members, especially external ones. I used to think that “independent”, non-investor board members were just window dressing, a fancy position used by well connected people to…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/slack-and-email-arent-going-anywhere/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/slack-and-email-arent-going-anywhere/Tue, 11 Nov 2025 07:48:16 GMTI’ve been thinking about why I was so intrigued by the C-levels who decided to ban committees. It’s not that I’m a fan of committees; they often exist to avoid responsibility. They’re a way for people without the authority or courage to make a decision to feel like they’re still doing something,…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/an-introduction-to-gustavo-batistas-passing/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/an-introduction-to-gustavo-batistas-passing/Sun, 02 Mar 2025 10:50:48 GMTIf you’ve spent any time watching high-level Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competition, you’ve likely come across Gustavo Batista. His passing system is a masterclass in control, weight distribution, and intelligent movement. For those looking to refine their guard passing, studying Batista’s approach can be…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/11-years/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/11-years/Thu, 11 Jan 2024 09:31:49 GMTI’ve started getting Linkedin messages again, congratulating me on my work anniversary. I have a bunch of fake positions listed (I mean, being my brothers’ older brother is in fact real, just not really a position per se) so it’s sometimes hard to know what people are talking about; but no, this…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/generation-of-food/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/generation-of-food/Wed, 08 Nov 2023 03:45:08 GMTWhen the Nazis came, Bronislava and Herman’s lives would never be the same. They were, as we call it in well-laundered English today, “displaced”. They didn’t know each other back then, or maybe they did, but they had their own separate lives that the Nazis ended. Bronislava, or grandma Bronia as…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/all-i-have-is-time/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/all-i-have-is-time/Wed, 26 Apr 2023 06:38:23 GMTThe most common refrain among older beginners practicing any hobby is “I wish I had started earlier”. I get it, but like any other time when people wish to be younger (read: I want to be who I am now in a younger body), it’s misguided. Sure, I’m out of time, in a sense. I’m [&hellip;]https://ohadsamet.com/writing/founders-normies-conformism/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/founders-normies-conformism/Thu, 14 Jul 2022 07:03:31 GMTScorpion (stylized as </SCORPION> because hAckERs or whatever) was a bad TV series, a knockoff of Lie to Me which was a knockoff of House MD which… You get it. Really. I wanted to like it so much and I couldn’t make it past the first season. I have no explanation how they made it [&hellip;]https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-life-cycles-of-tech-executives/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-life-cycles-of-tech-executives/Thu, 14 Jul 2022 06:18:31 GMTI often describe the evolution of a company as an upwards spiral: you keep progressing and you’re also on a continuous cycle of having to re-evaluate parts of the company for the next level. One of those evaluations is of executives and their ability to continue to lead the functions they are in…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/side-quests/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/side-quests/Thu, 14 Jul 2022 05:28:58 GMTTrue story: in my 20s I thought teaching martial arts was going to be my career. I was always someone who needed to work hard to cover for lack of natural athletic talent, but by then I had been training for a few years and running most classes for my teacher. I had a small [&hellip;]https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-visionary-and-the-desperate-3-observations-on-how-early-products-get-traction/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-visionary-and-the-desperate-3-observations-on-how-early-products-get-traction/Sun, 19 Dec 2021 07:50:25 GMTI’ve recently started helping a small team working on an early stage product. Before I got involved I heard troubling news: they had no product-market fit, a large deal had fallen through that was undermining core dynamics, and maybe it’s best to just build [insert latest fintech fad] instead. Once…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/bad-monkey/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/bad-monkey/Wed, 27 Oct 2021 21:39:14 GMTEver wondered why CEOs aren’t more visible outside of their formal commitments? It’s because doing anything outside of the paths of corporate machinery like connecting authentically on social media, or developing a hobby that requires creativity, or any similar activity requires a level of energy…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/slaying-dragons-for-fun-and-profit/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/slaying-dragons-for-fun-and-profit/Mon, 27 Sep 2021 06:56:00 GMTHere’s a video of my talk from Fintech Devcon: why experienced founders should try to solve Really Hard problems, and my playbook for doing so.https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-worst-type-of-career-advice-although-its-given-in-good-faith/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-worst-type-of-career-advice-although-its-given-in-good-faith/Mon, 24 May 2021 14:52:40 GMTThere’s a Tai Chi master in Israel, called Nir Malkhi. He heads Israel’s biggest school for “internal arts”, a family of Chinese Martial Arts that broadly fit in the Kung Fu category. He has been teaching for decades. His students come to learn discipline, focus, a practice. They also learn how to…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-cages-we-build-for-ourselves/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/the-cages-we-build-for-ourselves/Wed, 21 Apr 2021 05:11:43 GMTThis is the moment that broke my heart in The Godfather part 2. You see, people talk about Michael’s rise to power but they don’t often talk about how ill equipped he was to be the Don. Godfather 2 does more than just tell the story of two characters; it compares and contrasts Vito – [&hellip;]https://ohadsamet.com/writing/nothing-matters-and-were-all-going-to-die/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/nothing-matters-and-were-all-going-to-die/Sat, 17 Apr 2021 15:06:00 GMTNothing matters. You may believe your soul is eternal or that karma determines your future lives. You may not believe any of that. Regardless, our trivial pursuits mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. Our petty squabbles, our victories and defeats, our joys and sorrows have no innate…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/white-belt-black-belt/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/white-belt-black-belt/Tue, 13 Apr 2021 02:17:43 GMTOne surprising thing that I learned about martial arts is that at the highest levels, it is about conservation of energy and well timed exertion more than giving it all you have and winning with a single motion. As a white belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu you know maybe one choke, and your best hope…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/how-to-be-less-boring-in-panels-and-podcasts/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/how-to-be-less-boring-in-panels-and-podcasts/Sun, 03 Jan 2021 07:58:33 GMTContent rules. Conference panels are a fixture in the life of a CEO, whether in virtual or in-person. Podcasts are more popular than ever. How do you keep getting invited to those and keep people in the room and not out in the proverbial (or literal) corridor? These are my tips. Prepare. Maybe 1%…https://ohadsamet.com/writing/staying-sane-as-an-executive-in-hypergrowth/https://ohadsamet.com/writing/staying-sane-as-an-executive-in-hypergrowth/Tue, 22 Dec 2020 10:51:41 GMTGrowth is cool, but also exhausting. The absolute number of fires grows with time as does complexity. I’ve made it a habit to ask my execs not only about business performance but also how they’re taking care of their mental wellbeing. You can only push >100% for a time but burnout is real and is…