This page collects links to blog posts, articles and books about the attitudes and values that improve entrepreneurial success odds, along with some lessons learned by founders.
Companion pages listed at the right and also in the nav bar above compile readings on entrepreneurial failure and startup lifestyle, in particular, dealing with pressure. Other pages collect resources and insights related to lean startup logic/methods; product design; product management; business development; marketing; sales; funding; and startup business models.
Reflections on Startup Risks and Key Success Factors
- Chris Dixon expands on Balaji Srinivasan's concept of the "idea maze" -- a metaphor for the choices a founder must make in the face of uncertainty and incomplete information
- Blake Masters' summary of Peter Thiel's Stanford CS183 lecture on the role of luck in startup success
- Paul Graham of Y Combinator on "black swan farming," i.e., coping with the facts that: 1) the vast majority of returns are concentrated in a few startups, and 2) the most successful startups often don't look very good at the outset
- Paul Graham of Y Combinator on why startup = growth, and a response from Mark Suster
- Graham on generating/coping with frighteningly ambitious startup ideas
- Graham explains three things you need in a successful startup; summarizes startups in 13 sentences and in this longer post; describes 18 mistakes that kill startups
- Marc Andreessen on team vs product vs market as key factors for startup success
- Steve Blank on the challenge of distinguishing between vision and hallucination in charting a startup's course
- Blank on why startups should avoid deliberations over "corner cases," i.e., potential problems with a very low probability
- Leo Polovets on how to parse the various risks confronting startups
- Jitha on how to avoid bad startup ideas that seem good
- Jason Cohen on startup problems that cannot be solved with money
The Founder's Role: Motivations, Attributes, and Attitudes Required for Success
- Investor David Tisch on the importance of "not losing sight of why," that is, of an entrepreneur keeping her motivations for launching a business in perspective
- Steve Blank on why entrepreneurs are like artists and how aspiring entrepreneurs can fail from lack of nerve
- Graham discusses the hardest lessons for entrepreneurs to learn
- Blake Masters' summary of Peter Thiel's Stanford CS183 lecture on "founder as victim, founder as god." Fascinating stuff!
- Graham on the importance of determination for entrepreneurs
- Graham on the different rhythms and mindsets of makers (product builders) vs. managers (business types)
- Eric Ries on money as a motivator for entrepreneurs
- Ries on what startup CEOs can learn from Steve Jobs
- Mark Suster on the importance of realism in startups
- Suster on the importance of tenacity and street smarts in entrepreneurship
- Jason Calacanis describes the personal attitudes and attributes required to succeed as an entrepreneur
- Marc Andreessen on why not to do a startup
- Union Square Ventures' Fred Wilson on benefits and costs of entrepreneurial bias for action
- Jordan Cooper: 35 attributes that entrepreneurs require
- 20 questions about motivations for would-be entrepreneurs from Seth Kravitz in response to Dan Isenberg's 20-question list
- Klinger of LOOKK on why founders prefer to keep doing things in their comfort zones
- Furqan Nazeeri on startup ethics
- Fred Wilson on the strengths and weakness of 1st-time vs. serial entrepreneurs; VC Rob Go on why second-time founders may face a sophomore slump
- Horowitz on why he prefers to invest in founder-CEOs
General Advice for Founders
- YC's Sam Altman's Startup Playbook covers a broad range of actions/attitudes required for success from concept through scaling
- Lectures from Altman's Stanford course, "How to Start a Startup," cover every aspect of startup management
- Entrepreneur Gilad Avidan on "Ten Things I Wish I Knew About Being a Founder Two Years Ago"
- 50 startup lessons learned by James Maskell, founder of Vinetrade
- Startup lessons learned by Vin Vacanti
- Caryn Marooney of Facebook offers 30 insights for startup success
- James Altucher offers 100 rules for being an entrepreneur
- Dharmesh Shah on 23 questions that keep entrepreneurs up at night
- SpinBrush inventor John Osher cites 17 mistakes that hurt startups
- Jason Cohen offers six questions that startup CEOs should ask themselves regularly
- "I wish I'd known…" advice from entrepreneurs from Under30CEO.com
- Lessons for first-time entrepreneurs from Matt Mireles
- Programmer/investor Alex Payne offers advice to a young programmer considering a startup
- Graham on things to consider before launching a startup
- Graham on how to get startup ideas and the benefits in early-stage startups of "doing things that don't scale" -- especially when acquiring a new venture's first customers
- Paul Graham on the concept of "ramen profitability," i.e., earning just enough to live on noodles
- Meebo founder Seth Sternberg offers tips on how to get started
- Serial entrepreneur and investor Chris Dixon on the tradeoffs with keeping your new business idea confidential
- Andrew Chen on dealing with the "trough of sorrow" following a big bump in traffic after a TechCrunch story
- Chris Dixon: once you take outside money, the clock starts ticking
- Investor James Altucher on how to survive your 1st year as founder/CEO
- A long story from Wired Magazine's Gideon Lewis-Kraus on a Silicon Valley seed-stage startup's struggle to gain traction and secure funding
- Entrepreneurial marketing guru Sean Ellis on milestones for startup success
- Mark Suster on the danger of a hot startup's team "drinking its own Kool-Aid"
- Brad Feld on what to do after a successful exit
- Video of Aaron Patzer recounting lessons learned while building Mint from concept to exit
