Advice for Founders with Timi Ajiboye

Meet Timi

Timi Ajiboye is the Co-founder, CEO & CTO at BuyCoins; a crypto-currency exchange for Africa. He enjoys writing, table tennis, reading, drawing, and video games.

Having constant power supply and internet access has made a big impact on my life. When you are at a certain socio-economic class you take these things for granted but it has made me more creative and productive.

This is also the only way I and my co-founders were able to build Buycoins.

You need to care about the product or service that your company is trying to provide. There are many ways care can come from but you have to care to bits because running a company is a very long road.

You have to be dedicated to making what people want. If profit and mass adoption is your goal, it is very important that you provide what they need.

It is very important to realize that nothing great is ever built by one human being. It is either done by a community or a village of people and as someone who thinks very highly of himself, it makes you deemphasize yourself and know your limitations.

When you realize that nothing worthy of immense value was done by just a single person you will learn how to delegate, be a better boss and find the right people to work with.

I think ignorance is good sometimes. When I decided to start my company I had no idea how difficult certain things were going to be and that is the only reason I started Buycoins. If I had known how difficult it was going to be I might have been more scared or discouraged to start.

I rarely ever think of things in terms of “I wish I knew this 10 years ago” because I am very receptive to learning lessons the first time.

I read mostly fictional books and I don’t have any particular book I’ll say founders should read. There are other ways to get information on specific things about running a company in an industry and there are podcasts, articles, and chapters in books that founders can read and learn.

I wasn’t really organized before. I am a very impulsive person so if I think of something I need to do now everything else suffers. As my responsibilities increased and the things I had to worry about grew exponentially, I had to become more of a planner, more punctual and use my calendar more to plan my day. I don’t know if I can categorize that as a mistake but that was where I was at a point in my life.

I used to be somewhat dismissive of ideas and thoughts that were foreign to me. I’ll immediately dismiss any idea that I couldn’t relate to but I have learned to just keep a very open mind and try as much as possible to switch my point of view.

I don’t think there can be a universal time that matters in one’s life as it varies in individuals. I think the most important thing is just being comfortable with just how much effort you put into going the direction you want to go to.

Life is really weird and things might not happen the way you want it to but what you need to do is being comfortable with the effort you put into it.

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