i remember my birthday month in the year 2017. the most dreaded year of my life which dragged me into the world of entrepreneurship or startups, two terms that made me fearful of not living upto their literal meanings. during the eery late nights of my birthday month of 2017, my phone rang. i didn't take the first call. two minutes later, the phone rang again. it was z on the other side.
i had two friends here in pondy. let's keep them x and y for the narration. y who was the co-founder of x at that time took me aside and had introduced me to z before. i've met z once in chennai before this and we had talked over the phone once before our encounter and after that visit, we didn't stay in touch at all which was partly because z's prev. startup had faled for reasons unknown to me at that time. so, z was the on the other side of the phone and he asked me to immediately come to chennai to meet him on an urgent issue.
by morning, i told my parents and immediately left for chennai. i still remember that day. i took my first individual step into chennai's soil in the koyambedu bus stand and i had called my long-time strategy gamer firend 'ani' who took me to a biriyani shop for lunch. i dont know what happened but 10 minutes after i had the food, i had a sharp headache and i wasn't able to move. ani went and bought a cold water bottle, poured it over my head, gave it to me parching my thirst in the hottest chennai sun and lead me to his small room where he asked me to take some rest.
i woke up in the evening having slept at the gracious hospitality of ani for more than 4 hours. my phone had a lot of missed calls from z who was wondering where am i since i informed him when i boarded the bus from pondy and it shouldn't take more than 4 hrs to reach his place but it's more than 9 hrs now and i've not come at all. i texted him that i am at a friend's place and asked him for his google location which he kindly shared. ani drove him on his activa to z's place which was located inside a nice gated residential area opposite the bungalow of a sitting minister of tamilnadu then. cleared security clearance and arraived at z's place finally and i was welcomed warmly. z told me his own story of what he was doing after closing his previous startup. at the end of telling his story, z convinced me to stay over and he asked me to cancel the bus that i had booked to go back to pondy in the morning within 45 mins of talking to him. he convinced me to take entrepreneurship and start a startup.
there's a reason why i am narrating this experience with such detail. its obvious i left out many personal details, but it's to show i do know the exact moment i decided to start thsi journey. when i started, the biggest question i had was, "can i start a startup?" - a question that many actually have when they decide to start one.
what did these 45 minutes cost me?
1. i decided not to appear for the final round of interviews with a major software firm that made my placement officer and professors close to me sulk in disapproval.
2. i let go of an opportunity of a full-time job in an apac team in a pioneer design software co.
3. dream of my parents - i would somehow go to a good salaried job so that i can help dad help meet the family's ends and also pay for my sister's education which she was pursuing in merit at a big uni then.
i left all of that to 'startup'
the next four years gave me an immense professional and personal experience that most people wouldn't experience even in their seventies, but i wouldn't want this to take away the fact that i am working hard right now for a peaceful life that i could have had with a salaried job. it also took me to another level but that's a one in a million chance and it doesn't happen to anyone. it's the least effective path to success.
if you follow the media coverage of startups, you could be forgiven for thinking they are a quick way of getting incredibly rich and famous. every next-door aunty would scold their son or daughter by showing the example of you as the ultimate star. you're the poster child of what indian parents want their kids to be.
especially in the startup world, when a startup gets investment, there's an explosion of triumphant articles and news which celebrate it. behindwoods would reach out to the security watchman who was having his tea and will bring out an exclusive special into how the startup got funded. the founder would spend much of his time giving interviews and paid pr will carry it far and wide.
but none of them would rarely reveal the journey it took to get there.
the data is clear. the vast majority of startups are destined for failure. others do well and get acquired by larger companies or startups or corporations which gives the founder some $$. some stay strong and go to an ipo to make those $$ which makes them millionaires. i never got an answer when i asked the question myself.
i'll try to demytify this piece by piece.
1. the skills
2. the mindset
the mindset of an entrepreneur
one of the things that many people do when they decide to dive straight into enterepreneurship is try to figure how other startups might have failed inorder to become wise so that you won't repeat those mistakes. it's one of the dumbest ideas ever since there are infinite ways in how a startup can fail but only few reasons as to why they succeed. stick to it. think hard. this is an uncomfortable journey. listen to yourself. not every successful person's path is startup or entrepreneurship and you don't have to do this to be perceived as being successful.
nailing a 9-5 job is hard too. having a successful relationship is super hard. so there are no equivalents. people became great with what they had. so, be very certain if you'd want to proceed. founders of startups are often unique. very different in how they behave that you might think they're flaws. more often they are a feature than a bug and it's only important to see whether they're a net positive to the space they're contributing. their goals are different, ideologies are different but there are few things that were similar. one such thing is their mindset.
1. ambiguity is the devil's volleyball
when you're running a startup, you'd never have enough information to make an important decision. you think you're good at data science? good. you won't even have enough points to plot a graph and the best part is, you wouldn't even kow which variables are involved to forecast anything. be prepared to guess most of the time. take decisions and stand behind them when things get tough and nimble enought to change them fast when you are certain about what causes it to fail. it's literally a dance with the devil and you better come with the best moves so that even if it lasts for a short while, you know that you're the best person the devil has ever danced with.
2. can you sell me this pen?
more often in a startup, you are going to be spending much of your time selling something every moment of your day. did you take up entrepreneurship seeing the quote, “why work under someone else when you can be your boss?” guess what? now you’d have to answer to every damn guy instead of just your manager at your salaried job.
- you'd be selling to your customers
- you'd be selling yourself and your startup to investors when seek reasons to invest in you (and then consistently in every one of your interactions until your startup starts printing either valuations or cash)
- you'd be selling your startup to the people you are hiring to become your employees on why they should quit their stable salaried job and join a whack-ass broken pirate ship that’s making everyone get sea-sick every 5 mins
- you'd be selling yourself to your partners/vendors on why they should partner with you or onboard you
- you'd be selling yourself to your parents/spouse/partner on why they should let you destroy and damage their lives and future on a madman like you on a dream which is statistically proven to fail more than 90% of the time.
3. can you stop being emotionally dumb?
most founders who come up with a brilliant idea in tech or a startup are often technically brilliant and they tend to have well-above-average intelligence. but it should be known that often such founders would fail to make great startups because of their volatile nature of not being sociable with other people.
- can you inspire and motivate your team?
- will you put your egos aside and listen to your team, advisors, and investors?
- would you place enough trust in your team without effectively micromanaging them because you distrust them?
if your emotional intelligence and the ability to empathize don't rival or aren't greater than your intelligence quotient, your intelligence is as good as a hired money and you can be replaced at any point in time by anyone.
4. are you a tough son-of-a-gun or the baddest sob?
during my time in active mixed martial arts as an amateur fighter, my coach told me only one thing. if you can't taste your blood and delight in it, you will never draw your opponent's blood. it's so true in the world of startups because someone is going to punch you every day. any form of trouble is going to come to you at any point in time. they are going to punch you for sure and they are going to draw blood for sure. can you taste your blood at that point and enjoy it? are you the type of person who will keep getting up when life pushes you down? or are you the type who will stay down koed to the ground? will you show resilience?
5. are you the caesar who inspired his troops to cross the rubicon?
if you don't understand the analogy tldr: julius caesar, the conqueror rallied his troops who were dejected to cross the rubicon and enter rome effectively making him the de-facto emperor.
ask yourself,
- can you set a vision and mission and get people both in your team and the public excited to follow you?
more often, there's no singular playbook on how this can be done. all that matters is getting it done by whatever means possible.
6. no one can make you feel inferior without your consent
the above quote is often over-used to state how self-confidence is one of the rarest, yet highly desirable qualities. you might say that often people are self-confident among startup founders. no. they are founders who are over-confident and they thrive on a drug dosed with endless hope, which is beautifully named 'hopium'
this is not the self-confidence i am talking about. i am talking about the bare minimum confidence that can help you set sail in a stable manner which will also allow you to be skeptical of things, receive opinions and advice and carefully review them.
- if you are too confident, you wouldn't notice the holes in your ship.
- if you are too confident, you wouldn't listen to the people telling you that there are holes in your ship
- if you don't have enough confidence, you will spend a lot of time checking if there are holes in your ship instead of sailing which will make the ship rust and devalue to zero
- if you have shaky confidence, you will look for the first chance to take the lifeboat, jump, and escape from the ship.
what you need is, thanos - perfectly balanced, as all things should be.
now, do you know how to strike a balance?
as i said earlier, there's no hard and fast rule on how you can achieve that. it is different for each person, unique, and only time and trial would tell you what's best for you. are you ready for the experimentation?
could you see the pattern of ambiguity? does it feel like playing volleyball with the devil or dancing with the devil?
7. startups don't need brilliance or genius, but energy.
most people see startups or any successful journey of people as travel from point a to point b. more often, that would never be the case as it often would be wading through a maze that is denser than the amazon forest and crazier than the events in jumanji film.
the catch here is, that you can never stop. there's no stopping or resting point here. you are not running a 100m dash or sprint here. you are running a long marathon.
do you know what they teach in a marathon? conserve energy. use energy where it's required. be consistent. you need to keep moving at all times. the same applies to startups too.
8. the one who conquers himself conquers the world
i am talking about discipline. you are going to be a boss. decisions lie with you. if you are disorganized or not disciplined, your team won't like working with you. nor will your investors or any future partners.
- do you have a strong financial personal discipline or can you develop it? (i will write more on this topic separately)
- can you make your weekly agenda and to-do list and cross-of things and hold yourself accountable when you miss them?
- can you keep track of what's happening over weeks and months across?
- can you keep yourself naturally in check?
if you can say yes to the above, you are one step closer to achieving great self-discipline. the rest is up to you to figure out as you embark on this entrepreneurial journey.
skills that make you an entrepreneur
one of the most common mistakes that most techies often make is that they consider themselves an entrepreneur just because they have coded and developed an application. remember, you are just a code freak. great code-freaks are available for hire on any freelance site to code for $/hour. or, just because you have a great idea, you won't be considered an entrepreneur. gone are those days when ideas were valued by millions of $. implementation speaks now.
how would you implement it when you don't know how to? take a look at what i am writing here and ask yourself these two questions.
1. can you do them?
2. will you enjoy doing them?
trust me, startups aren't about the bling, shorts, and cool offices. it would be worse than corporate desk jobs. the only difference now is that you would have to juggle the job of 10 people single-handedly. now, do you think 9-5 jobs are a lot better? they are certainly more stable and peaceful.
here are the skills you would have to master mandatorily.
finance
- build financial models
- learn financial forecasting
- manage budget
- cash flow statement
- balance sheet
- income statement
- calculate monthly burn and path to profitability?
conflict resolution
- are you good at being unbiased during conflicts so that you can resolve them?
- are you good at keeping your anger and ego levels in check during confrontations?
- can you resolve problems between two conflicting groups and pacify both of them and bring order?
capital
- can you put your funds and bootstrap?
- do you have connections to investors and pitch your startup?
- do you have enough charm to attract investments? (see more on story-telling section)
- can you at least convince a bank to give your startup an easy loan?
- or do you have enough knowledge to know about various government schemes to avail finance for your startups or different pitch competitions/invitations from major vc houses or accelerators?
lobby
- if you anticipate any trouble in the industry your startup is in, would you be able to wade through regulations?
- can you identify with whom to make relationships so that you will know first-hand all the policies that you would have to go through?
- would you be able to sort out competitor challenges that are thrown on your path?
- can you figure out the right decision-maker of a client/a partner/a government agency to solve things quickly because the longer it takes, the more it's going to hurt you monetarily!
telling the story of the brand
- would you be able to craft a beautiful story about your startup so that the investors would love to put capital?
- will it be inspiring enough for the media to cover you?
- will it be promising enough for potential customers to try out your prototype by paying for the mvp (minimum viable product)?
- will it be attractive enough for people to leave their safe jobs in salaried companies to join your risky startup for far lesser pay and guarantee their growth?
after reading all of this, do you think you could do all these things? it's not necessary that you need to know everything because most of these things can be developed with careful practice and training.
but the more important question is,
would you enjoy doing all of this? would you enjoy the chaos?
search for an answer within, and a hero will be born. remember, no matter how your startup journey ends up, you'll always be a hero. even if you're not remembered. even if you're not celebrated, you'll always remain a hero to me.
note: 14th sep 2024
this was first published in my substack titled 'the sheep code'. over the past 2.5 years, i've learnt a lot more things and i've grown so much beyond. i've unlearnt and learnt new things and i've removed certain sections which was originally there since i know they no longer hold value. i'll keep writing to share my experience while i'm waging this war. thank you.
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