Doglapan

In order to substantially improve your lifestyle you must forego the lure of a "regular income" that your salaried job offers. As a businessman you must have the appetite and patience to not expect a monthly paycheck instead you have to know that you may make a windfall earning that is far beyond the imagination of salaried employees.

From childhood, we're taught to make friends with people from our own strata. While this offers a certain level of mental security to the child it erases the possibility of the child to see what all has been and can be achieved in this world. The next time someone who is financially well-to-do you invites you to their home, definitely go and quietly observe their possessions and ways of life. This will help you to set your aspirations - maybe even get the aforementioned fire burning in your belly!

As a founder, you have to be able to delegate work to people in order to clear up your bandwidth and focus on the bigger picture. You cannot be a one-man army. While self-reliance is a good thing in the beginning, as the snowball gets rolling it becomes difficult to wear all the hats and you must get in the right teams to handle parts of your business for you.

The whole world is connected. To think what can be achieved by interacting with someone at that point in time is shortsighted thinking. Share your story with as many people as you can from a peon to a CEO or even a regulator. Remember that Collaboration is the cornerstone of Human progress. Transactional Relationships don't go very far.

Everybody other than you (value provider) and your customer (value consumer) are secondary characters who come between the two of you. Every one of them - your co-founder, employees, investors, 3rd party vendors, competition - will come at a cost to you before you have even earned a thing. Before you start a business ask yourself:

1. Am I okay carrying them along?
2. Am I ready for them to take a piece? Am I excited enough by what's left after they take their pieces?
3. Am I okay with the uncertainty introduced by adding these people to the mix?

In a regular business, the founder's KPI is their business' profit but in the modern VC money-infused businesses, the KPI seems to have changed to the business valuation.

In the bid to chase a higher valuation 2 critical mistakes are made:

1. Thinking that the investor is above you in the food chain
2. Lose sight of the fact that the Story is between you and the customer

While the Western investors may "suggest" for you to not have family members on the board, you must keep as many close ones on the board as possible. Most of the profitable businesses in India are run by families.

Loyalty is not needed in good times but tested in bad times. Expecting Loyalty from your employees or investors is setting yourself up for heartbreak. After all, people are driven by their self-interest (and paychecks). In bad times, only your family stands by you.

Put yourself first, always. Liquidate your stock at every secondary sale opportunity. Cash in the bank will only make you bolder. Don't wait for higher valuations in future rounds.

As a thumb rule, 80% of all secondary sale proceeds should go to the founders; the balance can be allocated to the ESOP pool or angel investors.

Make sure all secondary sales happen only through you. Don't offer employees liquidity greater than a year's salary or 50% of their vested stock, whichever is lower.

Ask investors for more shares when you deliver a milestone beyond their expectations to cover your dilution.

Beware of professions such as drug peddling, banking, journalism and law. These professionals and professions can give you false comfort and may even numb you momentarily.

However, if you spend a lot of time on them, they may end of up destroying you. They suck all value from you and offer next to nothing in return.