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Knuckle Up with Nakul

Nakul Mandan
Artificial Intelligence
Culture
Rubrik
Decagon
Handshake
Workos
Leadership
High-Growth Companies
Product Market Fit
Ashwin Sreenivas
Notion
Nominal
Profound
Handshake AI
Mercury Bank
Chatgpt
Entrepreneurship
Recruiting
Rubrik Agent Cloud
Product-Led Growth

Knuckle Up is about the HOW of building iconic companies. Recruiting, culture, intensity, the inner game of being a founder CEO. The stuff that actually separates great companies from good ones. Hosted by Nakul Mandan (GP, Audacious Ventures), each episode goes deep with founders who’ve done it at the highest level. Not highlight reels. Operating playbooks, straight from the best of the best. knuc... more

PublishesTwice monthlyEpisodes11Founded4 months ago
Number of ListenersCategories
TechnologyBusinessEntrepreneurship

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Artwork for Knuckle Up with Nakul

Latest Episodes

Will Bryk was working as one of the first engineers at Cresta, writing a book about the history of civilization on the side, when the research started to feel absurd. “Google is great for surface-level investigations,” he says. “But it is not built t... more

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At a Christmas party in December 2024, Garrett Lord met a researcher who told him about the challenges with model training. This researcher was working at a frontier AI lab. Two weeks later, Garrett’s company Handshake was recruiting STEM PhDs for th... more

James Cadwallader and his co-founder Dylan Babbs were working six days a week in an office before they had a company, or even an idea. James would drag Dylan into their coworking space on Saturdays, ban laptops, and fill a whiteboard with post-it not... more

Most founders get more stressed as the company gets bigger. Immad Akhund has spent years engineering the opposite. “I’ve tried to make it so that the pressure kind of goes down as success goes up, which I think is relatively rare,” he says. “If you’r... more

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Recent Guests

Garrett Lord
CEO of Handshake, leader behind the Handshake AI transformation
Handshake (Handshake AI)
Episode: 0 → $1b in a year: The remarkable story of Handshake's refounding
James Cadwallader
Founder of Profound, former Kyra executive
Profound
Episode: The new marketing playbook: “Marketing Engineers” and agents as the audience
Immad Akhund
Founder and CEO of Mercury
Mercury Bank
Episode: Building a $5b company without 996
Cameron McCord
Co-founder of Nominal, former Navy submarine officer
Nominal
Episode: Startup lessons Silicon Valley won’t teach you | Cameron McCord (Co-founder of Nominal)
Akshay Kothari
Co-founder of Notion
Notion
Episode: Business used to be go karting. Now it's Formula 1.
Ashwin Sreenivas
Co-founder of Decagon, immigrant from India, former Palantir and Scale AI alumnus
Decagon
Episode: Behind the curtain of a $4.5b AI-native powerhouse
Michael Grinich
CEO of WorkOS
WorkOS
Episode: $50M ARR With 3 sales reps, no CRO, and one PM | Michael Grinich (CEO, WorkOS)
Bipul Sinha
Founder of Rubrik, former VC at Lightspeed
Rubrik
Episode: Nobody knows anything, product market fit is dead, and there's only one moat | Bipul Sinha
Qasar Younis
CEO of Applied Intuition, former YC CEO, former Google/YouTube engineer
Applied Intuition
Episode: Battle-tested playbooks for recuriting, reading the market, and adapting to AI

Host

Nakul Mandan
Host of the show, founder/GP at Audacious Ventures

Reviews

4.8 out of 5 stars from 5 ratings
  • Excellent podcast!

    Frank is the OG force of nature CEO being interviewed by a force of nature investor! Great insight and timely with how AI is changing the world!

    Apple Podcasts
    5
    CRS UT
    United States4 months ago

Listeners Say

Key themes from listener reviews, highlighting what works and what could be improved about the show.

Content leans into AI-enabled growth and high-growth cultural dynamics.
Host delivers blunt, practical leadership insights that you can actually apply.
Guests offer concrete playbooks from top founders and operators.

Chart Rankings

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Apple Podcasts
#54
Belgium/Technology

Talking Points

Recent interactions between the hosts and their guests.

Building a $5b company without 996
Q: What changes did you implement to keep the recruiting bar high as Mercury grew?
We built a formal training process for interview conduct, created rubrics to standardize scoring, and eventually promoted an internal recruiter to VP of recruiting who could scale culture fit assessments across a larger team.
Building a $5b company without 996
Q: How did you approach hiring your first 10-20 people at Mercury?
We prioritized candidates from universities, looked for generalists who could slot into multiple roles, and emphasized ownership mindset, product-mindedness, and cultural fit. We also used the curiosity interview to assess deeper interests and potential beyond standard resume signals.
Startup lessons Silicon Valley won’t teach you | Cameron McCord (Co-founder of Nominal)
Q: What does Nominal do differently in recruiting and culture to sustain mission-driven talent at scale?
He emphasizes that Nominal interviews deeply (three layers deep) to understand what motivates people, prioritizes low ego and collaboration, and uses friction in interviews to gauge composure. The company also distributes offices globally while maintaining a strict emphasis on clear communication and accountability.
Startup lessons Silicon Valley won’t teach you | Cameron McCord (Co-founder of Nominal)
Q: How did your path through Navy, Capitol Hill, Anduril, Saildrone, and Lux Capital shape Nominal's culture and growth strategy?
The Navy imparted discipline and a direct, mission-focused mindset; Capitol Hill exposed him to large-scale governance; Anduril injected customer obsession and rapid execution; Saildrone and Lux Capital provided operational and investment perspectives. These experiences converge at Nominal to prioritize speed with discipline, a strong mission, and a culture that values low ego and high performance.
Behind the curtain of a $4.5b AI-native powerhouse
Q: What was the recruiting philosophy as you scaled to ~450 employees in three years?
There is a strong emphasis on cultural alignment and barraisers who ensure new hires embody Decagon's values. The founders remain involved in interviewing and emphasize hiring people who can operate across teams, move quickly, and deeply understand customer problems.

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Frequently Asked Questions About Knuckle Up with Nakul

What is Knuckle Up with Nakul about and what kind of topics does it cover?

Knuckle Up with Nakul focuses on the realities of building iconic companies, drilling into recruiting, culture, and the inner game of leading a high-growth startup. Episodes feature founders and CEOs sharing concrete operating playbooks, leadership mindsets, and culture design—not hype reels. Listeners get blunt, practical guidance on scaling teams, maintaining intensity under pressure, and navigating fast-moving markets, often with personal anecdotes that illuminate tough decisions, tradeoffs, and the human side of entrepreneurship. A standout throughline is a founder-first perspective from an investor-host who surfaces actionable tactics for building durable organizations at scale.

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How many episodes of Knuckle Up with Nakul are there?

Knuckle Up with Nakul launched 4 months ago and published 11 episodes to date. You can find more information about this podcast including rankings, audience demographics and engagement in our podcast database.

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What guests have appeared on Knuckle Up with Nakul?

Recent guests on Knuckle Up with Nakul include:

1. Garrett Lord
2. James Cadwallader
3. Immad Akhund
4. Cameron McCord
5. Akshay Kothari
6. Ashwin Sreenivas
7. Michael Grinich
8. Bipul Sinha

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