Startup Mistakes Quotes

Since most startups operate at a break-neck pace, with a concept to prove or a product to launch within a rapidly shortening runway of financing, company culture often gets shoved aside. This is a big, big mistake: Nobody serious about their business should put culture in the corner.

... the thing we see wrong with YC apps most frequently, is that people have not thought about the market first and what people want first.

Doing startups is all about making mistakes.

Most startups are not nearly focussed enough. They work hard...maybe, but they don't work hard on the right things.

"Patents make our product defensible." The optimal number of times to use the P word in a presentation is one. Just once, say, "We have filed patents for what we are doing." Done. The second time you say it, venture capitalists begin to suspect that you are depending too much on patents for defensibility. The third time you say it, you are holding a sign above your head that says, "I am clueless."

My biggest mistake was when I started up easyEverything, a chain of Internet cafes. The idea that people would go to a shop to use a computer was revolutionary in 1999. It worked for a while, but cheap technology almost killed it. One silver lining of the problems I faced was that it gave me experience of turnarounds.

I think just calling up a VC and saying 'I want to pitch you' is an enormous waste of time.

Too many start up business fail simply because their owners continue to think and act like employees.