Sam Pollaro, CEO of Venga, talks about pivoting his second startup, the yin and yang between co-founders, and learning the value of "hire slow, fire fast" the hard way.

Sam Pollaro founded and sold a subscription service startup before companies like Birchbox and Dollar Shave Club had even been born. While the acquisition was finalized, he already had his eye on his next venture: Venga, a CRM business intelligence platform that improves the relationship between restaurants and their guests.

In this episode, we talk to Sam about the growth of DC's startup scene, giving 100 percent, and joining a startup incubator as an 18-month-old company.

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I never really had given more than 80% of what I could give until I was working for myself...then I realized what it felt like to give 100% every day.

Winston [my co-founder] and I to this day are an incredible yin and yang...and I think that's really important for start-ups to have that complement of skills.

Sam can be reached by email at sam@getvenga.com. Venga @GetVenga and www.getvenga.com. The Protagonist @hughandcrye, #theprotagonist.