We live in a world where opinions are often seen as a cure for misery, and social media has amplified this trend even further. Any nameless account will post anything about anyone and anything. Building a successful startup requires a winner’s mindset. It starts with radical optimism and self-belief: a level of becoming obsessed and …
Category Archives: startups
Lowballing
The price of being nice in business is that people will take you for granted. This should not shake your core fundamentals. This is an arm-twisting technique that has existed for a long time and has been practiced by many in trade. The sooner you realise that your niceness is seen as weakness, the sooner …
change
We are living in a different time. After the internet, AI seems to be the next big thing. It will impact each one of us, in good or bad ways. As a startup founder, I see it as a blessing when it comes to shipping code. The dependency on humans to write code is going …
responsibility
As a founder, responsibility is absolute. You don’t get the luxury of blaming employees, investors, competitors, or the market. If the company fails, it fails on you. Period. Ownership is not a title: it is a weight you carry end to end, whether things are going well or falling apart. At the same time, a …
Straight talk
One of my core responsibilities as a founder is to speak honestly and directly with the team. Not to sugarcoat things or create artificial comfort, but to keep everyone grounded in reality. In a startup environment, this approach may not always be popular at face value, but it is necessary. My responsibility is to run …
belief system
We live in a world where innovation happens every single day. Competitors emerge quietly, problems surface unexpectedly, and uncertainty is constant. In that environment, if you don’t carry an unshakeable belief that things will work out, that you’ll find a way forward, you simply won’t survive. Even after building this company for 8+ years, every …
Insider
As the company grows, middle management is established. It is a tough change for the overall organization. Everything starts becoming a process. Well-established rules are set. What used to be normal begins to feel like baggage. Early employees who have been on this journey with the company start feeling locked in. Some leave because of …
picture
Expecting your team members to understand the bigger picture of the organisation is a tough ask. As a company grows and its size increases, we divide the organisation into major compartments. As a result, the hired team members become so engrossed in the tasks they are assigned. As a glue, it becomes more important for …
River
Building a startup is like a flowing river stream.When it starts from the glacier, it has a strong current with no defined course. Over time, when it reaches the plains, it becomes more predictable, steady, and controlled. With the passing of time, the same applies: it meets the sea and becomes a world. The journey …
Urgency
As a founder, if you are settled and not seeking urgency: whether in closing sales or shipping: your team will mirror you.They will gradually become complacent, and deliverables will start taking months instead of weeks. We humans are creatures of habit.It takes very little time to adopt others’ behaviour when you are part of a …