From my response on the Yabbly Startup Survivor Challenge: What are the most common mistakes that startup CEOs make in their first six months of business?
Painful! Here are a half dozen missteps I’ve either made, been a part of making, or seen made. Hopefully this will save some trauma for others:
Don’t - think for a microsecond that your view of the world will last. Everything you know about your product, your business model, and your customer base is subject to change. What this means, practically, is that you need to be prepared to shift, pivot, and evolve as you learn. Know that you will be wrong, and that it’s OK. Don’t go too deep until there’s validation, and remember that until you have traction the world is only yours to READ FROM, and not yet to WRITE TO.
Don’t - speak until you really have something to say. This goes for branding, promotion, working the press, etc. Nothing is more painful than having to go back to the world and tell a completely different story.
Don’t - fight to carve up a pie that doesn’t yet have fruit filling. Founders agreements and division of equity are a Difficult Business, but if you can’t equitably figure things out and move on with joy, perhaps it’s best not to go any further with that partner. One additional bit of advice here: don’t establish a founding partnership with either a) no mechanism for control (even a 49/51 split can work), or b) too diffuse a mechanism for control (even splits among 5 partners, for example).
Do - act quickly to define and live your core values. A company’s DNA comes from its founder(s), but they need to make their stamp as early as possible. When it’s early, it’s ok not to be able to clearly define what you’re doing, but unless you can articulate how you’re going about it, there’s no seed of a culture.
Don’t - ask customers to agree with your world view. By and large, customer research is a great thing, but it can set you up for failure if you’re not very very careful. What someone says in response to a question is almost invariably meant to please the asker. The real truth value in customer research is only found in behavior in the wild; the rubber meets the road when (and how, and whether) a customer actually commits to using/buying the product.
Do - as a founder, know what game you’re playing. Are you in it to build something cool? To generate buzz? To establish yourself as a CEO? To become part of the startup community? To build and be acquired? To grow a business organically? To sell clicks to the next guy for a penny more? To innovate? To prove something to yourself? Until you’re honest about what your motivations are, I’d argue that your ability to build a real business is diminished.
The final bit I’d add is that while we all want to avoid making mistakes, it’s essential to realize that the business of a startup is in fact making mistakes. If you look at truly successful companies, it’s almost always the inevitable sequence of failures and pivots that has led them towards the light.