Startup Systems

Pick a customer instead of an idea: “One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was that when you're starting a company, you often think you're picking an idea, but you're really picking a customer. It's actually pretty easy to change your idea, but it’s way harder to change the customer you're serving,” says Agrawal.

Necessary chaos embraces the uncertainty inherent to startups. Here are a few examples:

As growth accelerates and larger teams are needed, people stretch into new roles, teams scale and split, and new processes are formed.

After a promising call with a potential new customer, the product roadmap is re-prioritized to incorporate features that will... See more

They looked for first principles thinkers, so not necessarily your experience, but how do you approach problems, how do you know the right questions to ask? And then create your own framework around that.

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Dropbox also hired for people that were just really humble, collaborative and team oriented. And the combination of those two things,... See more

“Most product and marketing teams are built to create or expand the core value provided to customers. Growth is connecting more people to the existing value.” —Casey Winters (ex Eventbrite, Pinterest)

I tell founders to think about the problem they’re solving, specifically my LUV framework:

1. Large: Is the problem you’re aiming to solve large enough—customers, users, spend, etc.?


2. Urgent: Is the problem urgent to your users/customers—will they be interested in a new offering, change their way of solving this problem today?


3. Valuable: Are people

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You can do what's called the board mission pledge where the people on your board are required as a condition of being on your board to pledge that they'll use their business judgment under Delaware law to support the mission, not just the narrow interest of shareholders. You can build, we call it an LTSPV, which is basically a financing instrument... See more

From James Clear's 3-2-1 Email: The work required to be happy, and important lessons that aren't taught in school

Many people won't attempt something unless they can find an example of someone else who is already doing it. Rely on this type of thinking too much and you'll never do anything interesting.

Your path through life is unique. It is

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Angles that spread usually check the following boxes:

1. Surprising — presents unexpected new information or theories


2. True — we actually believe it


3. Important — has an impact on our behavior


4. Relevant — related to domains we care about


5. Cool — we think we’ll look impressive for sharing it