Founders' Forum How Gui Costin Built Dakota by Helping Others Win
What if getting fired was the best thing that ever happened to your career? In this episode of Founders Forum, Gui Costin shares how a career setback led him to build Dakota into a company serving thousands of investment firms nationwide.
Gui Costin, Founder and CEO of Dakota, shares his journey from losing his job to creating Dakota Marketplace, a powerful database used by over 1,200 investment firms and 6,000 fundraisers. Along the way, he discovered that success isn’t just about sales—it’s about service, systems, and leadership. Gui explains how documenting his proven sales methodology, the “Dakota Way,” helped scale the business, and why a failed product ultimately became his biggest opportunity.
At the core of Dakota’s growth is Gui’s commitment to helping others succeed—from his employees to customers and the community. His leadership philosophy centers on building a high-performance culture rooted in kindness, accountability, and continuous improvement.
Key Takeaways:
- Getting fired pushed Gui to start Dakota and build something better.
- Systems like the “Dakota Way” helped scale growth and performance.
- A failed idea led to Dakota Marketplace, now used by thousands.
- Kind leadership creates stronger teams and long-term success.
- Growth creates opportunities for employees and the business.
About Gui Costin:
Gui Costin is the Founder and CEO of Dakota, a business development and database company for investment firms. Founded in 2006, Dakota has over 60 employees with offices in Bryn Mawr and Philadelphia, PA.
Dakota’s eight-person investment sales team has raised over $40 billion for 15 different investment firms. Dakota has also raised over $13 billion in the RIA channel alone. Dakota Marketplace, an institutional investor database, is used by thousands of investment salespeople who use it to source leads of institutional investors.
Gui shares the mission of Dakota, which is to make the life of an investment salesperson easier. Each choice and decision Dakota makes daily comes back to that one point, including Dakota’s own sales team. Gui is the author of Millennials Are Not Aliens, a best-selling book on a generation who grew up on the Internet and have fundamentally changed how we buy things.
Gui attended the University of Virginia and is married with three kids.
Connect:
Website dakota.com
LinkedIn linkedin.com/company/dakota-about/mycompany/
YouTube @DakotaRainmakerPodcast; @DakotaLivePodcast
This episode is sponsored by Dakota; helping investment firms connect with the right opportunities through the industry’s leading institutional investor database. Learn more at dakota.com.
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