Co-Founder @ Stan | building a $BN company 🚀

Hi, I’m Vitalii 👋🏻

Over the past 3 years, I’ve built a $30M ARR business with 30 people.

A $1M/employee company.

Now, we’re building a category-defining brand—with $100M ARR in sight.

To do that, I focus on Culture, People, and Product.

Everything that got me here is self-taught.

Born and raised in Russia, I started working at 13—packing parachutes and skydiving. 🪂
By 18, I had 800+ jumps and enough saved to pay for my first year of college.

Jumping out of planes redefined my relationship with fear.
Once you commit, you act. Without hesitation.

I learned English in one year to study abroad—still the hardest thing I’ve done.
That brought me to Canada, where I earned a degree in Chemical Engineering.

I never used it.

My side projects opened doors for me—first to Deloitte, then to eBay.
But the real work happened outside the job.

I made time to build:
9–5 for the paycheck,
5–9 (both morning and night) for what I actually cared about.

That’s where I proved to myself—nothing is impossible.

In 2021, I met my cofounder. We went all-in and started building Stan.

On my LinkedIn, I write about:

→ Founder war stories (unfiltered)
→ Building a $1M/employee startup
→ Creating top 1% culture

🎧 Follow me here if you're building—or want to build—something great.

People I work with would describe me as:

→ I make things happen
→ Zero tolerance for mediocrity
→ I build and run top 1% talent-density teams

🫂 DM me on LinkedIn if you'd like to work at Stan.

But know—it’s likely to be the hardest thing you’ve ever done.
And worth it. For the right person.

—

On LinkedIn, I share stories for founders building what’s next—
The ones who care about People, Culture, and Redefining what's possible.

If that’s you,
Follow me. Drop a comment. Or just say hi 👋🏻

Vitalii Dodonov

I spent $204,000 to take the whole team to Costa Rica.

→ Travel (Flights & Bus): $103,000 
→ Hotel & Food: $89,000 
→ Offsite Planner: $12,000

Total Investment: $204,000 
($4,163 per person)

That’s a lot of money to spend on "vibes" and gallop tours 🇨🇷

But here’s why we do it:
I treat offsite trips as a productivity accelerator.

By spending $204K to build deep trust and clear 6 months of roadmap debt in 4 days,
I'm catalyzing our execution speed.

If this offsite increased our efficiency by even 10% over the next year for every individual team member, our team-ROI is easily 10x+.

Offsites is one of the many vehicles we use to invest in our most valuable asset:
People.

I give Credit Cards to my team on Day 1.

"Isn't that risky?”

It’s risky. And frankly very expensive…
But here’s what’s more expensive:

→ An engineer losing flow state because they are hungry
→ A designer missing details because their screen is low-res
→ A PM waiting 48 hours for a $50 software license approval
→ A team member waiting for a bus in the snow after a late night grind

I remember working out of a shared WeWork.

Uncomfortable chairs. Fighting for meeting rooms. Fast food.

Scrappy and frugal is in our DNA.

Now:
✅ Standing desks (Health)
✅ Free lunch & dinner (Focus)
✅ Unlimited Bubbly & protein bars (Fuel)
✅ Discretionary spending (Autonomy)

We don't do this to be "cool."

We do this because top 1% performance requires top 1% support.

You can't expect Ferrari speed if you provide Corolla maintenance.

Invest in your team.

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Alina Antoniuk

I just gotta share this... I mean... Jonathan, what are you doing!?? And why is building security calling us… and you asked for 30 extra seconds? 🤦‍♂️

$20,000. 60 hackers. We hired 4 of them on the spot, and filmed the whole thing! LIVE 🟢 on YouTube:

https://lnkd.in/dtMd7sys

We went from $5M in the bank to under $1M in two years.

On purpose.

Every entrepreneur needs to get extremely comfortable with losing money.

For us, the lesson came after raising venture capital.

We made an uncompromising commitment to hire the top 1% and build a category-defining brand.

This meant watching our bank account shrink over a year and a half.

I still remember the day I pinged John: 

V: "Guess what - we're at $827K and didn't lose any cash this month!" 
J: "Years in the making. Upwards from here."

It takes a lot of belief and conviction to invest this way, as opposed to optimizing for safety.

The reality is, for you to have a disproportionate upside, you need to create disproportional value.

And that's expensive: technology, R&D, talent. 
80% of our costs were purely talent.

Losing money before you make money is the price of being in the game.

Having done it once, I have a lot more appreciation for the process. 
And significantly fewer worries.

What's the biggest bet you've made on your company?

Hanging out with Liz Nucci today who got us our beautiful office 🏡. If you’re looking for office space in Toronto, call Liz! 

Just saying 👀

No alternative text description for this image

I’m having a wonderful time at BrainStation tonight!

I waited 3 years for a top 1% mobile engineer.

Not because we couldn’t hire.

Because I refused to hire a “maybe” and call it progress.

For 3 years, we could’ve “just shipped something” on mobile. 

We passed on several candidates who were good on paper… but weren’t a clear yes.

I kept coming back to one filter:
If this person can’t take what we built and make it 10x better, they’re not going to change the company.

So we waited.

Then we met Johan.

He built the entire mobile app solo.

When we launched, we got 500 five-star reviews in 2 weeks.

That’s the part people see.

What they don’t see is what we avoided: months of “management work” disguised as building—

Rewriting specs, re-scoping tickets, adding layers of process so a hire can keep up.

That’s how teams get slow. 

Not from lack of effort—standards quietly dropping.

Lesson I keep relearning: talent density isn’t a vibe. It’s a strategy.

Where in your org are you accepting a “maybe” (role, project, decision) just to feel progress?

Yesterday, NVIDIA’s Jensen Huang made it free for any company to build AI agents. Here’s what that actually means:

He announced NemoClaw — the enterprise version of OpenClaw, the open-source operating system for AI agents.

He also named what’s coming: ASAAS. Agentic Software As A Service. OpenClaw won’t kill SaaS — it’ll create a new category.

The “A” in ASAAS is the hard part.

At Stan, we’ve been working on AI agents for over a year. The technology was never the bottleneck. Teaching the AI what “good” looks like in your business — that was the bottleneck.

NVIDIA just commoditized the easy part. The hard part is still hard.

The companies winning at ASAAS in 2027 won’t be the ones with the best plumbing.

They’ll be the ones who spent 2025-2026 doing the boring work of encoding domain expertise into their agents.

What was the first thing your company successfully taught AI? (or planning to?)

⚠️ ⚠️ If you're an engineer, now is the worst time to quit your job.

I know. Everyone's saying the opposite.

AI makes it so easy to build. Ship an app in a weekend. Be your own founder.

But here's what the "go build your own thing" crowd isn't thinking about:

Yes, you'll see success stories. 

But for every one that works, there are hundreds who shipped the same weekend. 

The barrier to entry dropped for everyone at the same time. 

More builders, more competition, lower odds for all of them.

And the question is still the same question it's always been: who has distribution?

Distribution, customer trust, brand — these are built over years of compounding. 

They live in the human relationship world that AI hasn't touched. 

Companies hold that. Your side project doesn't.

Sure, your app might launch well. 

Maybe you make a few thousand dollars. 

Then it gets duplicated by your friend over the weekend, and you're left without the job and without the revenue.

If you've been thinking about going out on your own — do it. 

Just not right now.

Don't be impulsive in the middle of a revolution.

"I'm sorry, I f*cked up" 

This was my opening line at our leadership offsite last March.

Standing in front of all 8 leaders at Stan, 

everyone paid attention.

If I was to rate my relationship with everyone in the room, 

these would be my scores:

🟢🟡🟠🔴🔴🟠🔴🟡
(relationship health check: you get the picture)

6 months earlier...

I took on 2x more responsibilities at the company. 

As a result of this crushing workload, I had to prioritize and remove everything that wasn't mission critical.

One of the things I sacrificed was weekly 1:1s with my direct reports,

delegating them to my Chiefs of Staff.

I reasoned that most people I'd been working with for years and we'd manage.

What a mistake it was.

What I failed to see at the time was that the company ran on shared context established in those 1:1s.

Leadership runs on two things:
• Trust
• Shared context

Remove either one, and it's a matter of time before everything breaks.

That's what happened to me.

It took me the following 1-3 months to rebuild what I'd lost — to rebuild the relationships and rescope my work.

Some scars are still itching.

If you're a leader at your busiest time, I'm sharing this story to remind you:

Your company is a group of people working toward a shared objective.

Prioritize people so they can prioritize the shared objective. 

It doesn’t work the other way around.

We took an AI product from $0 to $10,000 MRR in 14 days 📈

I documented our process in full, from the initial build to the specific growth tactics we used to hit that $10k milestone in two weeks.

Sharing the 19-page Playbook today.

Follow + comment “PLAYBOOK” below and I’ll DM you the complete breakdown.

You're probably working on the wrong things right now.

Does this sound like you?

100 emails sent.
5 meetings run.
1 new initiative started.

Every day feels full, but every week you go:
"What did I do?"

What's the difference between moving forward and running in circles?
Well — direction.

Motion without direction is just expensive wandering.

To help with that, I've adopted this habit:

Every morning, before opening Slack, I ask myself:

"What would I do if I could only work 2 hours today?"

"What moves us closer to $100M ARR?"

"Is this urgent, or just loud?"

I'm serious - I tend to ignore 8/10 of the inbound I get, (even from my teams).

Sorry y'all I know you're reading 😅

5 minutes of thinking saves 5 hours of wandering.

Now when I journal, it's not about what I did.

It's about whether what I did actually mattered.

Most founders act too much and think too little.

We confuse being busy with being productive.

The best talent I've hired all share this trait:
They pause before they sprint.

What would you stop doing if you could only work 2 hours?

Price isn't just revenue. 
It's a filter.

For customers. 
And for your team.

Early at Stan, we picked $29/month. 

No deep methodology. We just wanted to feel premium.

Then we had to live up to it.

That meant obsessing over the first 100 customers. 

Fixing bugs on the call. 
Shipping overnight.

Pricing sets expectations. 
Expectations force standards. 

And standards attract a certain type of person.

Builders lean into hard problems. 

Bargain hunters lean into discounts and exceptions.

Same principle applies to talent.

Last month, I ran a hackathon with a $20,000 grand prize. 

It got the top 1% of builders out of the house.

4 hires. 2 days. No resumes.

We don't price based on cost. 
We price based on value.

What's one thing you'd price differently today?

Headcount doesn't fix slow execution. 

Clarity does.

When execution slows, the reflex is: 
"We need to hire."

Most of the time, you don't have a people problem. 

You have a clarity problem.

Here's what I did:

I used to take meetings all day. Felt productive. Wasn't.

Now I auto-decline everything before lunch. 

7 hours of deep work. Zero interruptions.

One calendar rule deleted dozens of daily decisions.

Speed is subtraction.

List your recurring weekly decisions. 
For each one, choose:

→ Delete it. 
→ Delegate it. 
→ Automate it. 
→ Assign a DRI (directly responsible individual).

We used to debate tool purchases in Slack. 

Now everyone gets a $5K card. Decision deleted 🤷‍♂️

Less flexibility upfront. 
More speed downstream.

What decision could you delete this week?

In 1846, astronomers had a problem.

Uranus was wobbling in space.
And nobody could explain why.

Every calculation said it should move one way.
But it moved another.

Most scientists thought Newton's laws were breaking down at that distance.

But Urbain Le Verrier, a French mathematician, had a different idea:
"What if there's another planet pulling on it?"

He spent months calculating where this invisible planet would need to be.

Then wrote to Berlin Observatory:
"Point your telescope here. You'll find a new planet."

They thought he lost it...
But they looked 🔭

Neptune was sitting there.
Exactly where the math said it would be.

Le Verrier discovered a planet using only pencil and paper.
2.7 billion miles away.

I think about this whenever we're stuck at Stan.

When something doesn't make sense, we work backwards.
There's always a hidden force.

We just have to calculate where to look.

What's wobbling in your business that you can't explain?

The First Send

Are you a founder or coach with incredible insights and expertise,

but zero time (or desire!) to actually write about it on LinkedIn?

You know the power of consistently sharing valuable content, but the thought of staring at a blank page after a long day is just… exhausting.

This isn't just about 'posting more.'

It's about Missing out on valuable connections.

Losing potential leads to competitors who are active.

Feeling like your voice isn't being heard in the noise.

You're leaving impact and revenue on the table because writing feels like another chore instead of a growth engine."

That's where I come in.

As your ghostwriter, I take your brilliant ideas and transform them into engaging LinkedIn content that resonates with your target audience.

I research. I write. I refine.

So you can focus on building your business and doing what you do best.

Imagine consistently showing up as a thought leader, attracting ideal clients, and building your brand authority (all without writing a single word yourself.)

Let's chat about how I can help you lead your business while I handle the writing.

Founder 

RevGenius

RevGenius is a community of revenue generating sales, marketing, customer success, and revops professionals brought together to learn, share, support, and grow with each other. You can consider us your alt work family!

Member

Here's why I excel in business development:

1. Analyzing trends
↳ Spotting market shifts
↳ Aligning with organizational goals

2. Uncovering untapped markets
↳ Finding hidden opportunities
↳ Boosting growth potential

3. Building connections
↳ Crafting successful partnerships
↳ Ensuring sustainable growth

4. Skilled in research
↳ Deep diving into market insights
↳ Making data-driven decisions

5. Proficient with CRM tools
↳ Managing leads effectively
↳ Turning prospects into lasting collaborations

6. Dynamic environments
↳ Thriving in fast-paced settings
↳ Adapting to innovation

7. Committed to learning
↳ Eager to grow continuously
↳ Making meaningful contributions

8. Creating exciting opportunities
↳ Ready to collaborate
↳ Let's drive success together

In my experience, business development is about making a real difference.

Business Development Specialist

piamotech

Business Development Consultant

Etalk School of English

- Gathered information to better improve the workplace.
- Prepared and organized students record.
- Analyzed and recorded employees reports to find prime areas for improvement.
- Organized weekly programs to improve employees performance.  
- Looked at ways to increase the sales of the center. 
- Prepared monthly cash reconciliations.

Sales Operations Manager

Yemen English School

- Taught multi-level English classes.
- Collaborated with other ESL instructors to increase the productivity of students.

ESL Instructor

Are you a CEO, founder or an executive?

You know you have to write on LinkedIn but you don't have time.

You know that by becoming the EXPERT in your industry:

- You'll get noticed by the right people
- You'll attract better clients
- You'll hire top talent

But the cost of not posting? 
You're losing attention that should be yours. 

And all your best ideas stay locked in your head instead of reaching the people who need to hear them.

I'm Mohammed Alobaidi, and I help busy executives like you become the recognized expert in your industry.

I create content that positions you as the go-to person 
- so you get noticed without spending hours writing posts.

Best part?

You maintain your authentic voice. Every post sounds exactly like you (because it is you.)

I'm just the person who puts it on paper.

Think of me as your LinkedIn ghostwriter, brand builder, and time-saver all rolled into one.

Ready to finally show up as the industry leader you already are? 

DM me and let's connect.

taplio

The Battle

Vitalii Dodonov

Mohammed Alobaidi

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The Battle

Vitalii Dodonov

Mohammed Alobaidi

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Vitalii Dodonov's LinkedIn Performance

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