Proposing a Standardized Vocabulary for Startups

So I recently noticed a conversational trend between startup folks which happens like every single time. It happens in the hallways, in the cafe while grabbing your morning coffee before your eyes are even fully open, in the washroom while pissing, at a cocktail party drinking to wash the pain away just to name a few. It’s like no matter what, or where you are it’s gonna come up one way or another.

“oh btw, how’s your startup doing?”

Stop. Stop right there. Don’t say a word. It’s a trap.

The things is, as simple as this question may sound, the answer to this question needs some thinking. Really hard thinking. And I mean it.

It’s not like, you can just say “we are fine” Or “things are well” and it’d go away. Turns out people actually care about what adjective you use to describe how things are going with your business. Unlike when someone asks “how you doing” and you say “I’m okay.” and nobody gives a damn. When it comes to startups, people seem to actually care.

The adjective you use has way deeper meaning that you’d think and you need to be smart about it. Of course, you don’t want a little misunderstanding jeopardizes you relationships or even worse lose creditability, or god forbid, people think of you as a dis-genuine person.

We don’t want this to happen. After all there are so many things in startups to take care of that you wouldn’t really want to add misunderstandings to it too.

Therefore, I’d like to propose a set of standard Vocabulary that’d put this very common misunderstanding forever in rest. From now on anytime anybody asks you: “how’re things going with your startup?” Or “ how’s your startup doing?” you can pick the right adjective that describes your situation/progress best from list below.

We are doing ________ :

A) Shit (0–25%)
When the average combination of product, sales, team morale, money and core metrics is below 25% and you are in deep shit. i.e. Founder disputes, out of money, no sales, missing product milestones and other typical startup stuff.

B) Okay (25%-50%)
When the average combination of product, sales, team morale, money and core metrics is between 25%-50% and you need to figure shit out asap. i.e 2–3 months of runway, tensions between teammates, product is not just there yet.

C) Well or Fine (50%-75%)
When the average combination of product, sales, team morale, money and core metrics is between 50%-75% and you are figuring things out to turn your business to a rocket ship. i.e. Things are starting to finally work for you, team morale is high, 8–10 months of runway in the bank and the product is in good health.

D) Amazing (75%-100%)
When the average combination of product, sales, team morale, money and core metrics is above 75% and everything is working in your favour. i.e. Taxi drivers go on protest against your company and your company makes more money as a result.

That’s my two cents. Hope it helps.

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Originally written for relevant.ai