Running a Startup teaches you a lot as it provides a hands on approach. But did you know that there is a common pattern of mistakes that some of us have been doing over the years that could be easily avoided?
It can be easily avoided or taken care of. But, if you overlook these small factors, they may eventually build up into something that could go beyond control. In fact, I’ve seen a good friend’s startup shut shop due to these factors.
Here’s a quick look at what you might have missed and could potentially save your startup.
- Not Being accountable to each other:
It’s one of the most basic things you could do. Being accountable to each other saves a lot of explanation and confusion. If you are being open about your strategy, your vision and steps that you will be taking, right from the beginning other founders can relate, agree or disagree to it. Plus, if you’re going wrong somewhere, validation from others can help you save time and resources.
2. Messed up Hierarchy:
In the initial startup phase, you might have managed pretty much every task that you could handle. Once the hiring starts, we might just keep adding people and assign them responsibilities. The problem is, when the company grows to mid size, without a proper structural hierarchy, teams would struggle without a proper process from a leader. A well laid out layers of leadership is required to run things properly.
3. Not ready to get your hands dirty:
As a founder, you might have been the sole person developing the product or have been the only person running the marketing campaigns during the initial phase. Once, you’ve hired people to do that for you, you tend to depend on people to take care of it. Sometimes they do, and sometimes they may not. That’s when you’ll need to take up the task yourself and get things done. Also, you’d know what works best and what doesn’t for your company.
4. Spending time on less critical stuff:
When Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, had a lot of things to take care of once they had been funded, Peter Thiel had advised him to focus on one thing only, instead of doing things that were less important. Similarly, it’s easy to get carried away with so many things that seem important. But identify and focus on one thing that matters the most and choose the one that is most critical, let it be cash flow, user acquisition, product revision. Identify the issue that is the need of the hour and work accordingly.
5. Losing track of expense:
Early stage startups usually make the mistake of not keeping track of expenses. In the process of spending, you tend to oversee certain factors that might cause financial bottlenecks in the near future. Keep a tab of your expenditure, calculate any over-heads, determine your financial runway before you make choices.
6. Not hiring right:
Hiring when done right can extremely benefit you. Get people who will help you translate your vision into action. Hiring people who do not align with your vision and value might end up doing more damage than good.
7. Finish task / Ship on time:
Steve Jobs once said, “It’s never done until it ships”, to emphasize the importance of getting things done. Think about it, around the same time you’re trying to build a product, another person is already adding finishing touches to a product that is similar to yours. Need any more reasons to worry about? All that matters is who will launch first.
8. One CEO:
Even if there are 2 or 3 founders in a startup, it would increase the efficiency if only one person makes the Executive decisions and the rest of them stick with it. Come to a common consensus about who will take up the role of the CEO. This makes things simpler and streamlined.
If you feel that I may have missed out on a point or two, please share it in the comments below or if you liked the article, share it with your friends, it may be of great help to them.