Science and vision are not opposites or even at odds. They need each other. I sometimes hear other startup folks say something along the lines of: ‘If entrepreneurship was a science, then anyone could do it.’ I’d like to point out that even science is a science, and still very few people can do it, let alone do it well.
The answers to all a startup’s challenges are out there. By setting up the right mechanisms for gathering feedback, the road to success can be a less bumpy ride.
You can work hard and be smart, but you need to think about when you’re going to be part of a startup and build it. You only have so much energy, whether you want to admit it or not.
Whether you lead an early-stage startup or a well-established company, it is critical to challenge yourself and your team to prepare for the next disruptive force – be it a shift in the market, a new consumer trend, or a competing innovation.
I think extreme secrecy is a bad sign in all startups. Very few startups die because they tell you exactly how their technology works. On the long list of startup killers, that’s pretty far down. Though on the list of entrepreneur fears, it’s pretty high.
My first job after college was at Magic Quest, an educational software startup company where I was responsible for writing the content. I found that job somewhat accidentally but after working there a few weeks and loving my job, I decided to pursue a career in technology.
If you’re a digital startup, building and highlighting your social proof is the best way for new users to learn about you.
It took less time to build ‘Instagram’ than it did for me to get my work visa. The app was an instant hit, and Facebook agreed to acquire the startup for about $1 billion in April 2012.
The right algorithm is to put off seeking funds for as long as physically possible. And in an ideal world, a startup would never have to seek funds at all.
The gender disparity in STEM is depriving our country of talented minds that could be inventing the next breakthrough technology, founding the next big startup or keeping our nation safe from cyberattacks.
If you asked would I have done a startup in India, the answer is yes.
Despite what some investors say, older age is an advantage in the startup world. You know more about industries and markets, and have ideas for products that the world actually needs and a better ability to motivate and manage than a kid out of school does.
In the startup world, ‘not working’ is normal.
I wish I’d known more about how to build a startup when I was younger.
I’m probably most proud of the fact that we are bootstrapped and that we are able to do not just the typical Silicon Valley startup thing. We are basically throwing away all the typical conventions of other startups.
I like the idea that I can make a big difference to a startup in a short period of time.
I can say without a doubt that being a mom is the ultimate test of my multi-tasking skills. I spend my day meeting startup after startup, helping our portfolio companies, bringing in speakers, and soon gearing up for Demo Day for our accelerator program.
It turns out that one of the biggest drivers of investors are both successful and non-successful startup founders.
It helps tremendously to have operating startup experience when advising startups. It is much easier to tell people how to talk to customers, build product, manage an engineering team, raise money from investors, and talk to press when you’ve done it before yourself.
Big companies are often in the process of laying off workers. Small startup companies are the ones that are hiring. The statistics prove that’s where job growth is going to occur.
There are two companies that the AI Fund has invested in – Woebot and Landing AI – and the AI Fund has a number of internal teams working on new projects. We usually bring in people as employees, work with them to turn ideas into startups, then have the entrepreneurs go into the startup as founders.
Co-innovation between a startup and an enterprise works best when each party fills a gap in the other’s capabilities and when they share equitably in both the work and the rewards.
When you get involved in a startup, you have to be passionate.
It’s very important as a startup to get early press because, although it may not be a large number of people, having a ‘Fast Company’ story – some of those people that read it are going to be your next employees and hires, your next investors.
There is never a time in a company’s history when cost control can be relegated to the back burner, but for a startup company, keeping costs low is a vital necessity.
The typical workday, particularly in startup mode, is from nine to six or nine to seven, then you take a two-hour break to work out and eat dinner. By that time, you’re relaxed, and then you work until midnight or one A.M. If there was no break with physical activity, you’d be more tired and less alert.
Inasmuch as there is a useful purpose to what we do as VCs, I tend to think it’s our duty not only to mentor entrepreneurs and executive teams, but also to learn from them and the others involved. We can then pass on lessons to aid the startup ecosystem and help businesses succeed and grow their impact.
What always drove me was my curiosity. That’s what made me join Booking and not be afraid to leave a very successful job and then go into a startup.
For a startup, you need to stay small so the others don’t attack, or you aim to be one of the big guys. If you don’t do it right, you might lose everything.
The reality is the Lean Startup method is not about cost, it is about speed. Lean startups waste less money, because they use a disciplined approach to testing new products and ideas.
One of the most important tasks as a leader in a startup is to pick the right metric to track. This is often referred to as the ‘compass metric’ because it will be your compass for growth. It’s important to note that ‘compass metrics’ will likely change over the lifetime of a business.
The truth is, there are many types of businesses that require thousands of dollars to be invested during the startup period. However, there are also many different types of business models that you can run from the comfort of your own home without having to reach too deep into your wallet.
If you’re trying to get to profitability by lowering costs as a startup, then you are in a very precarious and difficult position.
I think whether it’s a good idea or not to take the startup plunge comes down to the responsibilities of the individual. If you have a family to care for or a huge mortgage payment, then quitting your steady day job to launch a startup probably isn’t the best decision to make.
No matter what I’ve wanted to accomplish, whether it was raising capital, investing in a startup, or selling a company, legal has always been a cost and a roadblock to the ultimate goal.
It doesn’t matter if you call it a boom or a bubble. The startup business moves in cycles, and what goes up will eventually come down.
Being in a band is very much like a startup. You start in a garage. You hope to get interest from investors, like a major record label.
Startup investing is one of my things, but it is not my everything.
I was one of the early folks at eBay, and by 1999, it was completely overrun by consultants from McKinsey, Bain, and BCG. It went from being a cool, fun startup to an MBA factory.
Too many people go into existing organizations and define success as recreating what is there. To be successful as a startup organization within a large, established culture, you really need to think about how you leverage the assets that are there.
If you’re a small startup considering selling your company, there’s definitely far worse places to work than Facebook.
If you aren’t committed to diversity of thought, you have no business launching a startup.
That’s a problem. I mean, like any sort of growing startup organization, we are sort of overwhelmed by our growth. And that means we’re getting enormous quantity of whistleblower disclosures of a very high caliber, but don’t have enough people to actually process and vet this information.
One of my first investments was $100,000 in a Web-based calendar startup – and I lost every dollar.
As an entrepreneur, the pressures of a startup can be enormous, but it’s rarely life or death.
Startup stories are always smoother in the telling than they are in reality. A startup is not one, but a series of ‘Aha!’ moments, and some which seem like ‘Aha!’ moments but turn out not to be.
A startup for entrepreneurs is like a baby, and I have five babies so far – experienced father.
I got really excited about the idea of data-driven startup just as I was starting Kaggle.
One of the things that’s so interesting when talking to minority founders specifically is that there is really a knowledge gap in understanding what the risk-reward profile is for doing a startup.
If you don’t plan to dive in and dedicate all of your time to your startup, you probably shouldn’t be looking for funding. It’s hard enough asking for money when you believe in an idea; asking for money to fund something you’re iffy about is ten times more strenuous.
Startup India is welcome for the economy, but it cannot be accompanied by ‘Shut Up India’ in society. What gives Startup India its strength is freedom of expression, thought, and dissent. You choke this, and you choke entrepreneurship.
