My name is Faraaz Ahmed, I live in NYC with my wife and two young children and am the founder & CEO of DirtLabs. I previously ran a small advisory practice called E and A Strategy Consulting, prior to which I was the CEO of Gust, one of the largest providers of software and services to startups and investors worldwide. I have done a few other things that you can see here
If you need to reach me drop me a line by clicking here: Email
Writing: Professional
Text to Context: A Business Leader’s Guide to Understanding AI’s Evolution from Simple Chatbots to Complex Multimodal Agents
Career Advice: Essay version of a talk I recently gave
Rethinking Corporate Labs & New Venture Programs: How to design your new ventures program to stop it from turning into “innovation theater”
Evolving Credit Card Rewards: Reward programs are stale & new payment rails will further erode their worth. Shifting their focus from transactional utility to true enduring loyalty requires building a new model.
The 1 Simple Trick To Save Your Organization Months & Millions: Large companies are very good at wasting resources on things that seem “innovative”. Here is a simple framework to prevent that from occurring.
How Incumbents Can Win in Financial Services: How leading with a program and monetizing with the product is the best way to build high margin software businesses in the finance space.
Writing: Personal
Now What?: An essay on the mindset needed to overcome the bleakest of hours
Our Humanity Cannot Be Limited (Oped in the NY Daily News): An Oped I wrote in the New York Daily News about why standing against anti-semitism is not a choice but an obligation.
If America were a Song: An essay to my sons explaining why I chose to come to America
When This Is Over: The emotions of the early days of Covid in NYC
Butter Chicken & The Effigy of Richard Gere: The story of an effigy maker and his pursuit of perfection
