That ‘hard bit’ between starting and IPO

The startup race is long and grueling.

It will take longer than you thought.

It will be harder.

It will test and tax your relationships.

You will question yourself.

Your resolve will be tested over and over again.

At times you will lose your way.

But like any great race the rewards abound, both in the participation and the end result.

Ive been starting up for 5+ years, I’ve made a lot of mistakes but here’s some things I’ve learned that help — a lot!

On getting advice

Several advisors, small and often.

If you’re moving fast, iterating your product, marketing and team there’s a lot of change. Chances are on any given week you’ll find yourself in uncharted territory. So you need a ‘go to' person in each area to run things by. Even if it’s a 5 min phone call, it can help to keep you on the straight and narrow.

I have a good 7–10 people I can call on virtually any time to help with almost any aspect of the business. These include:

• Investors
• Directors
• Lawyer
• Branding guy
• Other founders
• Retired founders

If it’s a really tricky problem I’ll talk to a few of them. Otherwise I’ll lean on the subject matter expert.

BUT…

Advice is sometimes only 10% of the solution.

As founder you need to THINK then DECIDE. Regardless of the advice it’s still your call.

On making decisions

Decision making is like a muscle. The more decisions you make the easier it gets.

Every meeting I have with an advisor I take notes. So I can reflect on the key points and because I can’t trust my memory. I also find writing during the meeting helps me stay focused and ask better questions in the session.

Sometimes the time between advice and decision can be weeks.

The time in between is helpful processing time. It’s where the advice, your intuition and everything you’ve read meld together, allowing you to reach the conclusion that’s right for you.

On reflection I used to place a far too high weighting on advice and not enough on my own thinking. Maybe this has changed as my confidence has increased and my decision making muscles have become stronger.

Advice applied instantly without thought can be very risky.

Most advisors are not in the trenches with you which means they’re giving you direction with incomplete information.

On ‘your time'

Time is what stands between you and success (or failure).

The more focused and ruthless you are with your time the greater your chances of success.

If you’re ruthless it’s amazing how much more time you can spend executing (or thinking).

Simply start by saying no to ‘good things’. Workshops, webinars, coffee meetings, phone calls. Spend a month executing instead and see what happens. Stop talking about doing it and do it. (This is the advice I give myself every week because it’s so damn easy to get distracted).

Think about world class athletes. All they do is train. I think most startup athletes are far less rigorous in their approach and a lot fail as a result.

Which begs the question, “how intensely should I be working on my startup?”.

I can’t answer that question for you. But I will say if you have a part-time or hobby mentality then you’re likely to fail. I operated like this for years because my startup was part time, and for years I got part time results.

I get that not everyone has 40 or 80 hours a week to bring to bear on their startup. But I think you can make up for it with intensity and hunger to get it to full time.

These are the reflections of a founder somewhere between starting and IPO. It’s the part where the dream becomes a reality or dies on the vine. It’s how we work today that matters.