Startup Advice

As a founder, there will come a point where your backs against the wall, runway is short, and you’ve got to fight for your companies survival.

Every founder has been there. Always look to have another move in your back pocket for when you need it. Ben Horowitz has walked the walk on this — here he is answering why he made the unpopular decision to... See more

We don't have enough experience with early versions of ambitious projects to know how to respond to them. We judge them based on where they are currently, not based on what they could become. The same is true for how we judge people.

Constraints breed creativity.

By running your startup with the stated goal of being cashflow positive, you force your team to take ownership of every dollar just a bit more and consider outside-the-box solutions earlier. It also can influence team members to be willing to go beyond their stated areas of ownership to get things done.

Simply put, an ICP must be a single market segment :a group of people for whom the value of solving a problem is roughly the same, and who can be reached in roughly the same way. “People who use Excel” is not a market segment, because it says nothing about either the value of their problem or how to reach them. “Marketers who use Excel to build... See more

Instead of doing broad but thin market research (e.g., customer surveys), focus on one person (or a small group) and go as deep as you can, learning everything about how your product fits into their broader lives. Or become your customer—spend a day, a month, or even a few years in the role you're trying to sell to before attempting to build a... See more