Shut up. You Don’t Love Your Startup.
Best way to be happy professionally, is to find what you love get paid for it.
Liar.
As soon as I get paid for what I love, it becomes a job. Work. And I hate work.
Man, things are just screaming at my startup. We’re kill-ing it. I just love my startup.
Liar.
You don’t love your startup. You love the success you are having.
It’s that fundamental truth that causes so many startups to fail.
When you decide that you want to become a startup founder (I’m assuming you are already an entrepreneur, because that is something you are, not something you become) you do it most often for two reasons:
- There is a problem you want to solve; and/or
- Working for The Man sucks balls.
Lets start with #2. Working for The Man can, and most often, does suck balls. There is a lack of control around your choices of what to work on. You may think differently than The Man as to what has the potential to be successful, but you only get to voice your opinion, not put your plan into action. Therefore, more often than not, you believe that The Man is an idiot, and see your friends at startups and think to yourself, “Working for The Man sucks balls.” and fantasize about working for your own company.
The reason for your hatred of your job is The Man, and the removal of The Man makes it possible to love your job, but you know that The Man is not leaving, so instead, the only answer is that you leave.
Cool. Got it? Still here? Cool. Lets stop talking about sucking balls, and continue on to #1. There is a problem you want to solve.
Most problems exist because the solutions are either extremely hard, or more likely, impossible.
Therefore, you will fail. Or maybe not. But probably.
And, its going to be really, fucking hard. The hardest thing you have ever done. Think Sisyphus hard. You will fail more often than you succeed.
Want to know a secret?
Love the success. Don’t love the company, the product, the job, the press, the false positives, the co-founder or even the investors. Just love the success.
How do you know something is successful? Not if your friends, investors or even early adopters tell you it is.
Only metrics will tell you. And, you should no more than 2-3 metrics that you actually care about, because they actually tell you if you are actually be successful.
One metric should be whatever you think you can monetize, even if you are not focused on revenue early.
Personally, I don’t care if you focus on revenue early or not, but have a goddamn plan. Think through how you are going to make money. Or test how you are going to make money, and be able to articulate it. There will come a time when you have to turn it on. Don’t be caught out of money and out of time.
Focus on what makes you successful and on nothing else.
Shut up. You don’t love your startup.
You love success.
And if you don’t, then go back to working for The Man.