I feel like there’s an ‘all or nothing’ attitude recently around starting a business which doesn’t make sense to me. Either you’re making millions and have 100 employees or nothing.<p>I work in a company that has 5-10 employees, nobody is working their ass off and there’s steady income and gradual growth. Our CEO is not a millionaire, but he enjoys his work and the company he works for. There is no plans for fast growth or VC funding.<p>Can anyone explain to me where does this obsession with VC funding and huge growth come from? I feel like if you grow your company by more then 50% YOY you will end up with a totally different company culture, and you might end up hating your own company.
I read the comments before clicking the link, and found myself agreeing with commenters who complained about this line:<p>> <i>In addition, if people are working less than 8-10 productive hours per day, then they are clearly not being as productive as they could be.</i><p>I almost dismissed the book as a "yet another VC-driven, work-your-people-to-burnout story" but really, there's more to that. I've found it an excellent read so far and it's very concise, it wastes zero space on nonsense. I realized that I don't have to agree with everything an author writes to be able to get value out of a book. Warmly recommend you check it out.
An interesting article; i was reading the replies to this. So here is my take. A UK 40++ entrepreneur.<p>I have been there and done that - made good £££ from the first boom in 2000. Since then tried a couple of startups all of which failed, for one reason or another. Sadly we did burn through quite a lot of investor £££ in the process and gained no personal value other than experience.<p>What I think I have learned is that building a small business with around 5-10 people and making a regular salary of £200k a year is a much more enjoyable existence than trying for the millions and never quite getting there.<p>Working for a large corp, contracting etc is depressing (other than doing it abroad which was fun for a few years and allowed me to travel in my 30's).<p>We now have a funky office, a very tight team of devs. I guess in some ways I modelled on what Joel did.<p>After everything, I have learned "bootstrap" + "lifestyle business" is the best route to have a happy and productive life. Our business is a digital agency - mostly wordpress sites for SME market, a few apps etc. Its regular and good money. it is no way as interesting as some of the "startup" ideas we tried over the years, but no VC still on my shoulder anymore :)
Requiring proposals and updates written down is a good idea. If you allow people to bring up an issue or proposal that they have not already written up in the meeting, someone always comes up with idea on the spot, and tries argue it as something well thought. If they are clever people they can throw the whole meeting off.<p>For the loudest voice in the room problem, speaking order that starts from the most junior and ends with the most senior member is the best (I think it's sometimes used in military). When junior members speak first it's easier for them when the boss has not given his opinion.
> In addition, if people are working less than 8-10 productive hours per day, then they are clearly not being as productive as they could be.<p>So, are people expected to be in the office for 12+ hours a day? Nobody is 100% productive from the moment they step in the door, every day. The fact that the author even wrote the number 10 here makes me a bit angry.<p>I'm only about 1/4 of the way through, does he have a section on employee burnout?
Author namechecks <i>Thirteen Days</i>, the harrowing account of the Cuban Missile Crisis and a world on the brink of annihilation. There is also a terrific movie adaptation. In it, Secdef McNamara talks about how the positioning of submarines and aircraft carriers about the open seas is actually a coded language. And by making moves and counter-moves, what the US and USSR are actually doing is communicating intent.<p>Another classic is Ron Howard's <i>Apollo 13</i>. One of the few movies that depict the engineers as heroes. An inspiring watch for the whole team. And Damien Chazelle's upcoming Neil Armstrong biopic might make for a similar outing.<p>Crisis management, perhaps more so than innate technological superiority, can yield distinct competitive advantage. And this is where actually learning from precisely the type of case study found in the YC network makes sense. Knowing that you can stay calm, slow time, take deep breaths, and react rationally because others have dealt with far more on their plate than you ever will.<p>I'll share an anecdote. A small independent media outlet once got wind of a redesign I was working on and reported the story. The client was incensed as they were planning a full marketing rollout and had "lost the narrative". We were still months from launch. But rather than get into a blame game and lose more time. I suggested a soft, beta launch with media blitz immediately. After a week of jamming to polish our working prototypes for general availability, we were public facing, with laudatory feedback and the client appearing on CNBC ;)<p>Weeks later, as it turns out, it was revealed I was in fact the source of the leak. An unscrupulous reporter had called my office posing as a contract employee of the client and asked about a meeting time and place. In replying that it would be at my office that afternoon, they had confirmation that in fact the redesign was in progress!
I'm about a quarter way through this book and I'm enjoying it so far. This line, however, didn't resonate with me:<p>> To encourage 8-10 productive hours, serve dinner 8-10 hours after morning stand-up.<p>As a person who enjoys life outside of work, the idea of having a job where they were serving me dinner every day is baffling. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
> Agenda
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> Spouse
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> Connect- listen to each other’s day for 5 minutes each<p>I had to laugh at this. Setting aside only 5-10 minutes a day for your closest confidant and life-partner? Good luck with that marriage.<p>One of the ironies for me of people who slave away with the hope of scoring the jackpot, is that they often justify it by telling themselves and others what they'll do once they're financially independent, when in reality you can probably do most of those things now already.<p>Want to travel the world? You can travel worldwide for a year for about $10k to $20k.<p>If you have a wife and family, they're alive now. There's no guarantee they'll be alive even tomorrow, or that you'll be.<p>Delayed gratification and sacrificing some of the present for the future are both definitely good and necessary, but should be done within due measure.
> the data shows that solo founders rarely succeed<p>Where is the data on this?<p>The only public exit / ipo yc has had to date was a solo founder.
This is a fantastic resource.<p>>> ...the data shows that solo founders rarely succeed. The emotional burden is just too high.<p>I am a solo founder and yeah, I completely agree with this. I severely underestimated the emotional burden of going it alone. I am in a much better state now, but it was definitely a struggle. If I had to do it over again this is the main thing I would change - be more open towards and work harder towards finding a co-founder.
If you study coaching, or organizational development techniques, you'll find that most practices are consultative -- defining goals, as well as how the coach/consultant will work with an individual or organization. You then evaluate where the person/org is at, where they want to go, and develop various plans and interventions to get there.<p>I point this out because this document skips all that. It says so in the first page - this is written by someone who targets young founders in SV. Quite a narrow niche. This document is one specific playbook, for that specific niche.<p>Sure, young founders in SV may want this. And if you do, too, the info is good for you. But there is more than one way to run a company, more than one desired outcome, and more than one set of answers in what you should be doing.
Try this link to copy it to your drive so you can read or format it any way you like:<p><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZJZbv4J6FZ8Dnb0JuMhJxTnwl-dwqx5xl0s65DE3wO8/copy" rel="nofollow">https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZJZbv4J6FZ8Dnb0JuMhJxTnw...</a>
> YCombinator has a near-blanket policy of only accepting co-founder teams (ie- no solo founders), because the data shows that solo founders rarely succeed. The emotional burden is just too high.<p>But YC application FAQ states that this is not true. Although practically speaking from speaking to other startups, I have noticed that only startups with co-founders made it to the final round. This is just based off my experience and talking to other startups
Side tangent, if you’re looking to share a draft book like this with a bunch of people, <a href="https://betabooks.co" rel="nofollow">https://betabooks.co</a> is a good option. Specifically designed to handle heavy load of readers and look great on mobile, etc.
I just want to say that I really love that they're using the pronoun "she" in the beginning. It is refreshing to hear when most business books are directed using male pronouns.
Amazing write up. I have been through it (now in a second startup) and can relate to most of it. This is like the book I can read as summary of my journey through startup world.
> “If we were to make you the following offer (state the offer in full detail, including cash, equity, benefits, etc), would you accept?”
If they say yes, then make them offer.<p>This is most effectively done on a paper note, passed between classmates, so that there is plausible deniability if they say no /s
The book mentions "Percentage of tickets closed" as a metric by which engineering should be evaluated, which IMO is incredibly short-sighted.<p>The Google Doc has all editing disabled at the moment, but does anyone know if the author would welcome improvements to the text?
Is this book available as a printed book? Would love to buy a copy. I have read disparate parts over the years, but this one is concise and covers a gamut of topics. It might even help in running a research group!
> In addition, if people are working less than 8-10 productive hours per day, then they are clearly not being as productive as they could be.<p>Am I the only one that immediately thought about employees as the Clueless on the Gervais Principle[1]?<p>It looks to me like they need to sell this dream of exiting big for people to sacrifice everything for the company. However everyone forgets how absurdly low the chances of winning the lottery is.<p>It's essentially the carrot on the stick.<p>Maybe I'm wrong and it's easy to win on this "game"? I'd love to see some data on how many actually become millionaires after killing themselves on the startup grinder.<p>[1]: <a href="https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/" rel="nofollow">https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/</a>
<i>While there are many books out there with excellent and relevant knowledge for the founding CEO...</i><p>I'd love to know some of your's book suggestions for aspiring Tech Founder-CEO.
> 3. Someday/Maybe: This is the list of things that you one day want to do, but don’t need to get done now (e.g. read a book).<p>Someday/Maybe<p>Schedule a guitar lesson<p>Order the book Getting Things Done by David Allen<p>---<p>Man, this guy really gets me.
> Hire an x-CEO to come in as a “1 day a week CEO” to implement this system. <i>She</i> should be able to do so in 6-8 weeks. Have <i>her</i> then watch you run the system for 2 weeks to ensure that you are doing it correctly.<p>I was under the impression that the accepted gender-neutral pronoun to use in this case would be "they". Any idea why "she"/"her" is used? Is this a new phenomenon?