Lessons Learned:

• Find the best people. Good people are more important than good management structure
• Startups live or die by their momentum. One of the fundamental jobs of a leader is to maintain momentum
• Everyone should be talking with the audience. Everyone should be involved in the creative process. Nobody should be pushing rocks
• Compromise on Scope, not Quality

After 2 years, I'm ending my college startup

Or, wisdom for how (not) to run a business in college

Introduction

In a sense, we were in the business of making business's. We didn't handle the financing, or marketing, or business development; but we did handle the product, which really is the core of any business.

Making a business a hard, sometimes too hard

• It requires full-time effort, otherwise your competition will beat you
• It requires every skill that there is, and you won't have all of them
• You won't make a lot of money for a very long time, and you have to live with that reality
• In college, its smarter to admit defeat and move on than bet it all
  • Per Paul Graham: College is about dipping your toes in many different things, wait until you've graduated to go all in on something
  • Don't make my mistake of investing your whole life into only one thing just because you can, take advantage of all the opportunities you have around you

You Will Live or Die by your Momentum

• Per the Lean Startup: the worst place a business can be in is the slow decline to oblivion
• When a business loses momentum, everyone will know it, but nobody will want to admit it
• As a leader, you have a responsibility to take the initiative to avoid that position
• Signs of slowed momentum:
  • Feeling like you are a feature factory: You change the product, nothing happens, repeat every week
  • Lack of a sense of progress
  • Feeling like it's you against the client when it should be you and the client against the clients problem
• Good ways of maintaining momentum:
  • Clear business metrics, and regular, honest discussions about them with the entire team
  • Regularly talking with your audience and seeing their reactions as you improve the product over time
  • If you are not meeting your goals, having clear boundaries for when you will end or pivot the business
    • This is really hard, and not an exact science. It requires making a tough judgement call, but it needs to happen for the good of the company and the hard working people involved

Beware of "Startup Cosplay"

• Being an entrepreneur is very glamorous, but glamour won't help you one bit
• Having a company makes you realize how shallow startup cosplay really is
• Startup Cosplay includes
  • Spending excessive amounts of time/effort/money of on a logo and graphics
  • Having really fancy business cards
  • Team T-shirts
  • Paying for nice office space
  • Having a significant social media presence (unless your business depends on it)
• Startup cosplay is enticing because it makes you "feel" like you and your business is successful, even though there's no evidence to support that
• I say this less to mean "you shouldn't" do these things, and more to mean "don't sweat it if you don't have it".

Fall in Love with Talking to People

• Most problems we experienced in our business were the direct result of incorrect assumptions about our clients, and our clients audience
• Making a product is so much easier when you have a crystal clear understanding of what your audience needs
• You will quickly learn that your audience doesn't need what you're envisioning. And that's ok, because it means you can begin the process of discovery and experimentation, rather than betting it all on 1 idea
• If you are really invested in your idea, then you will naturally enjoy talking with people who are in that space. And if you don't, it will help you realize if you're really as interested in your idea as you initially thought
• Everyone should be talking with your products intended audience, not just the founders or "the business person". Designers, programmers, marketers, and managers all have unique perspectives that will drive the product in a positive direction. They may not want to do it (especially the programmers), but it's for their own good, speaking from experience

Have clear standards, and never lower them

• Standards are how you communicate your value to others, and help clients decide if your an ideal fit for them or not
• Many clients, especially in the beginning, will pay you less than what you need or deserve. They are not worth it. Instead of compromising on worse clients, put effort into finding better ones. It will suck in the short term, but work out in the long term, as opposed to being better in the short term, and regretting it in the long term
• Always charge a bullshit tax