Three Steps to Startup Success (in 15 syllables)
August 17, 2018 § Leave a comment
What is a Technical Co-Founder?
April 8, 2017 § Leave a comment
Most successful startups require both a technical “hacker” and a relational “hustler” to bring them to life. One common pattern is that a “hustler” has access to ideas and potential funding and looks for a “technical co-founder” to join him or her, through a process often compared to finding a spouse.
TBC 4: The Process for Products
February 20, 2015 § 3 Comments
In this series I have been building a case that Transforming the Bay with Christ (TBC) should consider reframing itself as a startup building a platform for governance. In this, our final installment, I will discuss the process necessary to build such a product.
One of the key insights about entrepreneurship in the last decade is that a startup is not just a small version of a established business. Rather, a startup is an organization formed to search for a business model, rather than execute one.
In particular, this implies that startups should be designed to maximize learning by exploiting surprises. This is the exact opposite of a traditional business, which attempts to increase predictability by avoiding surprises.
To get the optimal structure, we need to be clear on:
- Which things we need to learn (the problem)
- How we are going to learn them (the process)
- Who will own the learning (the people)
- What will prove we have learned the right lessons (the product)
