Now that we are in the era of down rounds and limited funding, many fundamentals of building startups are back. Everyone is talking about revenue and burn. Until the last few years, it was all about growth and winning at all costs. How long will it last; nobody knows.
Category Archives: startups
plan
As a founder, you are the best to judge what and how you want and build. Are you in a short game or the long game?The dynamics of the organization and journey both depend on this.Also, neither is right or wrong. It will also set up the culture for years to come. Have a game …
Open
I feel most successful organization ensures their principles are not just presentation slides. An employee is not working for a founder or team lead but an organization and its stakeholders. I see principles taking a backseat sometimes because of the founder’s ego and maligned culture. It can hurt an organization and its stakeholders badly. An …
Choice
Startups with VC money take years before the product hits the market. It takes multiple years before the product starts making any revenue and, some companies never make any revenue. There are multiple schools of thought, one championing growth, a bigger market, and first movers. Another school suggests going slow, growing on customers money. In …
lead
Founders are the soul of any startup, said repeatedly. There is no denying this. But what happens when a founder has limited vision? We have seen this with McDonald’s or Starbucks; the original owners moved away. It ended up becoming a super successful enterprise with a visionary. In the end, it is about a leader, …
winning
Enterprise sales are about winning people and their trust. At the same time, one cannot make everyone happy. We have many sales closed because stakeholders believed in us and, we delivered our promise with time. In numerous instances, our believers switched organizations and got us there as well. We closed multiple sales just by delighting …
Era
Are we living our life or outsourcing ourselves to the commons? How things have worked in the past or a defined spectrum for commons. In sales, potential customers talk about our competitors. They won’t get fired buying it like IBM. Are we living our life or outsourcing ourselves to the commons? How things have worked …
Powerful
The book ‘Powerful” by Patty McCord talks about hiring and the overall culture at Netflix. Patty was an early recruiter there and these days consults startups by teaching how and what to hire. If you have read No Rule Rules by Reed Hastings, I don’t think you need to read this book. Building an initial …
David
As early-stage startup founders, we are always like David’s in the battle with many Goliaths. A laughing stock, underdog, and with few believers. A very few crazy heads, after all, side with the ship sailing against the tide. Founders have a huge responsibility to go after existing players, win trust from engineers, customers, and everyone around …
journey
As a founder, life is no different than running a ship in uncharted territory. The help of team members makes the journey meaningful. Outsiders with no skin in the game have too many opinions. It can be social media experts or journalists, media houses. They see the effort or outcome from a biased and blurry …