Startup Advice
sari and
Startup Advice
It takes less effort to interview three times as many people as it does to turn a mediocre performer into a star.
nametwitter.comBuild a cross-company network of change agents.
You need to start by building out a layer of high-performers within your own team. Before you go broad, adapt and iterate on the culture you want to build among that group. Then, just as they are ready to move up in their career ladders, facilitate cross-functional moves into key roles for them. This... See more
You need to start by building out a layer of high-performers within your own team. Before you go broad, adapt and iterate on the culture you want to build among that group. Then, just as they are ready to move up in their career ladders, facilitate cross-functional moves into key roles for them. This... See more
Superhuman
The myth is that there isn’t enough time. There is plenty of time. There isn’t enough focus with the time you have. You win by directing your attention toward better things.
James Clear • 3-2-1: On seizing the day, perseverance, and focusing on one task at a time
On building “Flavored” startups
Enterprise software is (mostly) not flavor-based. Sure, there are enterprise fads like the metaverse, but generally speaking, large companies only sign contracts when it feels like there is an obvious commercial advantage to doing so.
Networks are (mostly) not flavor-based. If you’re using an app because of the content created by its other users, it’s not necessarily a guarantee for success, but at least if it fails it probably won’t be because it hit a flavor-based asymptote. For instance, BeReal leveraged a unique flavor of photo sharing to build a network, but people are still using it because they like the way it helps them stay in touch with their friends. If it were just a single-player utility, it would not have scaled in the same way. Another historical example is Instagram versus Hipstamatic. Both had a cool new flavor called “photo filters,” but one had a network and the other did not. Here’s a more recent example: the network is what sets Substack stands apart from its flavor-based competition.
Tech-enabled services are not flavor-based. If you act like a tech company but really do grocery delivery, banking, education, housing, healthcare, or any other real-world service, your competition is mostly not flavor-based because starting this type of business involves a lot of cost and complexity. (Also, some, like ride hailing and delivery, are networks.) The downside is that your cost structure is probably not as great as pure tech companies, but the upside is that you have less competition.
All of these types of products can involve some flavoring to help them get off the ground. The point is not that flavoring is bad. It’s good! But it has a very specific role. Flavor provides an initial product wedge. It’s helpful for standing out initially but doesn’t provide long-term differentiation or durable advantage.
Disruption, as theorized by Clayton Christensen in the early 1990s, is a process by which a startup offers a lower-cost product that performs worse along standard dimensions of performance for a small subset of customers outside of the mainstream. The product gets adoption, though, because it performs better on a new dimension of performance that... See more
Can a Startup Kill ChatGPT?
The “bedroom startup” approach, an audience-centric model
If you notice something at your company below standards and don't fix it or make sure someone else does, you have set a new standard.
Complaining about it does not count as fixing it.
If someone gets upset/tells you to stay in your lane, they've set an even worse new standard.
nametwitter.comWhy Are We Surprised That
Startups Are So Freaking Hard?
We think they can be hacked, but the only enduring moat is effort
Startups Are So Freaking Hard?
We think they can be hacked, but the only enduring moat is effort
