The business world is built so that there is an insane abundance of deals, businesses, opinions, ways, suppliers and customers. This abundance is sometimes very confusing, and in times of crisis or financial distress, we are sometimes tempted to do things we would not choose to do on a normal day.Without a doubt, my biggest mistakes boil down to one thing: I did not listen to my intuition.

The biggest business mistake I made and what I learned from it.


The most important thing to understand as a business owner, is that everyone has the customers, the suppliers and the deals that are right for them and they are different from a colleague who deals with exactly the same thing.That’s why by the way why there’s no such thing as real competitors but that's for another post. The abilities of each of us to give service to a customer or work with a supplier, are different, hence the right choice is important even when it is very financially tempting, or there is someone who convinces us that it is a great deal.

Over the years, I have sharpened my intuitive abilities, and they have always proven themselves in my favor. These capabilities serve as a very strong internal compass spring, which if given the right place, one can easily identify whether we are dealing with a good or bad deal.Despite all this, it happened more than once that I turned off this important capability and chose to work with clients who from the beginning turned out to be a huge mistake for me and the explosion that followed was inevitable.

There’s a very big place for your intuition in business! This is your way of understanding the situation despite all the subjective noise of the environment. One can easily understand whether your feeling is fear or intuition so it is important to develop and use this skill as much as possible.

First, that I am human. No one is free from mistakes and whoever does not try is not failing, and therefore does not progress.I also learned how much I know, even when I do not really know all the details. I definitely understand that contacting a customer or supplier, right from the start, can give me a lot of valuable information, that if I choose to see, I can navigate my way as I choose.The most important thing I learned, is that even when you make a mistake, you can learn and correct it. In such a valuable lesson, it is important to understand what we have learned from what has happened.

What did I learn from this mistake?


Everybody makes mistakes, especially when starting something new. But when you’re starting your own business, big mistakes can be very costly — in money, time, and energy.

The business world is built so that there is an insane abundance of deals, businesses, opinions, ways, suppliers and customers. This abundance is sometimes very confusing, and in times of crisis or…

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship

business

Business

startup

Startups

The biggest business mistake I made and what I learned from it.

The photos I take, the movies I buy, the music I rent, the emails I write and receive, the messages I send - all of these are captive. They exist within a database controlled by Google, Netflix, Spotify, Gmail, WhatsApp. If these services disappear, so does my ownership/rentership record. In a future where digital assets are worth not $10 or $20, but hundreds or thousands of dollars, ownership that survives a company becomes an essential substrate of commerce.

A permanent ownership record that exists beyond and outside a company

Internet hegemons have decimated entire spaces: social networks, advertising technology, video streaming and rental, paid email, infrastructure. Their economies of scale and network effects mount significant barriers to competition. What’s a startup to do? Compete on a different axis: reward users with tokens. A social network rewards its most valuable users in the coin of the realm. As the network becomes more valuable, so does the user’s stake in the company. Web3 companies employ tokens to reward their customers for providing value, giving startups the upper hand.

Paying customers in “equity.”

Twenty years ago, startups IPOed after 4 years. Today, it’s 12, driven by several factors but regulatory costs present the principal one. Crypto companies access pools of capital web2 companies cannot because the regulation doesn’t exist. Where nascent rules are present, the regulation isn’t yet a warren of legalese- yet. Within this freedom to maneuver, Defi protocols invent new financial instruments. The <a href="https://research.paradigm.xyz/cartoon-guide-to-perps">perp</a>, a perpetual swap, has become the most traded crypto derivative). Perps don’t exist outside crypto.

Regulatory arbitrage.

Open-source software is arguably the most important motive force powering innovation in technology. Open-source software powers every server and most software. Crypto empowers open-source projects to monetize their innovation in a way web2 never achieved. DAOs bind the loose community of open-source software contributors through tokens. Tokens provide an ongoing financial link that aligns long-term incentives. Foundations with significant token stakes fuel the ongoing protocol development, balancing the capitalism needed to fuel progress with the benevolence of the open-source ethos.

DAO/Foundations:

The fifth cluster of innovation benefits central banks, not startups.CBDCs (Central Bank Digital Coins) are programmable money: central bank digital coins enable a government to focus stimulus as granularly or as broadly as they like. Imagine a reserve bank stimulating the electric bicycle industry in the Kansas City metropolitan area by providing residents new US digital dollars that are only valid within bike shops in Kansas City.

Bonus: great for central banks

As I’ve explored web3 I’ve been forming a mental model of the major innovations powering this enormous wave of innovation. At the moment, I see four clusters:
 A permanent ownership record that exists beyond and outside a company. The photos I take, the movies I buy, the music I rent, the emails I write and receive, the messages I send - all of these are captive. They exist within a database controlled by Google, Netflix, Spotify, Gmail, WhatsApp.

crypto

Cryptocurrency

technologyandthefuture

Technology & The Future

product

Product & Design

Four Fundamental Innovations of Web3 that Will Upend Web2 Incumbents by @ttunguz 

Some neural networks are very expensive to train. This led to the popularization of an approach known as pre-training, whereby a neural network is first trained on a large general-purpose dataset using significant amounts of computational resources, and then fine-tuned for the task at hand using a much smaller amount of data and compute resources.

Expensive to train?

The use of pre-trained networks allows a startup, for example, to build a product with much less data and compute resources than would otherwise be needed if starting from scratch. This approach is also becoming popular in academia, where researchers can quickly fine-tune a pre-trained network for a new task, and then publish the results.

Pre-trained networks give smaller teams a leg up


Pre-training has continued to evolve with the emergence of foundation models such as <a href="https://ai.googleblog.com/2018/11/open-sourcing-bert-state-of-art-pre.html">BERT</a>, GPT, <a href="https://openai.com/blog/dall-e/">DALL-E</a>, <a href="https://openai.com/blog/clip/">CLIP</a>, and others. These models are pre-trained on large general-purpose datasets (often in the order of billions of training examples) and are being released as open source by well-funded AI labs such as the ones at Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI.  They allow startups, researchers, and others to quickly get up to speed on the latest machine learning approaches without having to spend the time and resources needed to train these models from scratch.

Foundational models

One of the risks associated with foundation models is their ever-increasing scale. Neural networks such as <a href="https://github.com/google-research/text-to-text-transfer-transformer">Google’s T5-11b</a> (open sourced in 2019) already require a cluster of expensive GPUs simply to load and make predictions. Fine-tuning these systems requires even more resources. More recent models created in 2021-2022 by Google/Microsoft/OpenAI are often so large that these companies are not releasing them as open source – they now require tens of millions of dollars to create and are increasingly viewed as significant IP investments even for these large companies.

The risks of foundation models: Size & Cost

Dataset alignment can also be a challenge for those using foundation models. Pre-training on a large general-purpose dataset is no guarantee that the network will be able to perform a new task on proprietary data. The network may be so lacking in context or biased based on its pre-training, that even fine-tuning may not readily resolve the issue.  Any startup leveraging foundation models in its machine learning efforts should pay close attention to these types of issues.

The risks of foundation models: Outsourced innovation

The opportunities and risk around using hosted and pre-trained models has led many companies to leverage cloud APIs in the “experimentation phase” to kickstart product development. ﻿Once a company has determined it has a product-market fit, it often transitions to self-hosted or self-trained models in order to gain more control over data, process, and intellectual property. This transition can be difficult, as the company needs to be able to scale its infrastructure to match the demands of the model, as well as manage the costs associated with data collection, annotation, and storage.

The tradeoff 

Foundation models and cloud APIs bring opportunities, risks, and limitations for startups that want to innovate in AI and machine learning.

artificialintelligence

Artificial Intelligence

How to Use Massive AI Models (Like GPT-3) in Your Startup

Are video games good or bad for you?Short answer: yes, if you are using them strategically. <ul><li>Video games improve our memory and visual navigational system</li><li>Video games help improve our problem-solving ability</li><li>Video games can help reduce cognitive decline that happens naturally as we age</li><li>Gamers are better at allocating attention</li><li>Video games might be able to help conditions like anxiety and depression</li></ul>

The Surprising Benefits of Gaming

A 2015 study from the University of California compared gamers versus non-gamers. EXPERIMENT 1People who played 3D games performed better at memory tasks than people who played 2D games like Angry Birds and people who didn't ply any games at all.EXPERIMENT 2They also took a group of non-gamers and placed them into 3 groups.The first group played Super Mario 64, a 3D game.The second group played Angry Birds, a 2D game.The third group didn't play any games at all.Those who practices 3D games for 30 minutes per day had improved performance on certain memory tasks.

A gamer's brain

A 2013 longitudinal study revealed that people who played strategic video games had better problem-solving skills which also correlated with improved grades in school. Gamers are better at allocating attention Dr. Daphne Beverly ran a functional MRI study into the mechanism that controls attentional allocation & this resulted in improved & efficient performance in people who play games.Neuro-simulations showed that people who played video games were better at collecting visual & auditory stimuli to be able to make decisions more effectively & efficiently.

Video games help improve our problem-solving ability

A study from the University of Montréal reveals this.They split up adults between the ages of 55 and 75 into 3 groups.Group 1 was trained on video games like Super Mario 64.Group 2 had piano lessons.Group 3 had nothing.The study found that an increase in brain matter within the hippocampus was significant only in the gaming group.

Video games can help reduce cognitive decline that happens naturally as we age

A study from New Zealand used a specially designed game called Sparks to help teenagers dealing with depression.They found that the remission rate was significantly higher in the Sparks arm, 43,7% than in the 'treatment as usual arm' 26,7.Translation Teenagers who played video games were significantly more likely to have their depression cured.CAVEATSPlaying video games excessively is probably bad for your social life.Like any other excessive habit, dooh!

Video games might be able to help conditions like anxiety and depression

A 2017 UK study showed that a sample of 708 people who played Massively Multiplayer Online Games like World of Warcraft, found various psycho-social benefits like increased self-esteem and social competence.

Gaming can improve social life

Some ideas highlighting the fine line between the brain of a gamer vs. the one of a non-gamer. I have also created a video on this: Speed & Agility - The Key to Getting More Done https://youtu.be/OtpIdRNUMKM

Hey friends, on this episode of Journal Club we're going to be addressing how video games are good for us and the several benefits they bring. 🎮 Follow me on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/aliabdaal Studies referenced in the video: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4682779/ http://rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=3679 https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2013/11/video-games https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235367249_More_Than_Just_Fun_and_Games_The_Longitudinal_Relationships_Between_Strategic_Video_Games_Self-Reported_Problem_Solving_Skills_and_Academic_Grades http://www.rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=3342 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0187779 https://www.bmj.com/content/344/bmj.e2598 https://osf.io/h5m7k/ MY FREE ONLINE COURSES: 🚀 Productivity Masterclass - Principles and Tools to Boost Your Productivity - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/productivity 🎬 Video Editing with Final Cut Pro X - From Beginner to YouTuber - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/video-editing 🎓 How to Study for Exams - An Evidence-Based Masterclass - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/studying 😃 How to be Happier - Stoicism Masterclass - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/stoicism MY FAVOURITE GEAR: 🎥 My YouTube Camera Gear - https://kit.co/AliAbdaal ⌨️ My Keyboard - Wireless Coral mechanical keyboard (Cherry Blue) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/keyboard 📝 My favourite iPad Screen Protector - Paperlike - https://go.aliabdaal.com/paperlike MY FAVOURITE SOFTWARE: 📚 How I remember what I read (Readwise) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/readwise 🎵 Where I get my Music (amazing for YouTubers) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/epidemicsound 🌐 My website platform (Ghost) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/ghost 🎤 My podcast hosting platform (Transistor) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/transistor OTHER RECOMMENDED COURSES 📔 Effortless Output with Roam Research - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/roam 📓 Building a Second Brain - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/basb 🎙My weekly podcast - https://www.youtube.com/c/notoverthinking My brother and I host a weekly podcast where we discuss happiness, creativity and the human condition. You can find it by searching “Not Overthinking” on any podcast app (eg: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts etc). BE MY FRIEND: 💌 Sign up to my weekly email newsletter - https://aliabdaal.com/newsletter/ 🌍 My website / blog - https://www.aliabdaal.com 📸 Instagram - https://instagram.com/aliabdaal 🐦 Twitter - https://twitter.com/aliabdaal 🎮 Twitch - https://twitch.tv/aliabdaal WHO AM I: I'm Ali, a junior doctor working in Cambridge, UK. I make videos about medicine, technology, productivity and lifestyle design. I also have a weekly podcast with my brother (https://www.youtube.com/c/notoverthinking), and I write a weekly email newsletter that contains some quick thoughts + links to interesting things (https://aliabdaal.com/newsletter/). 🌍 My website / blog - https://www.aliabdaal.com GET IN TOUCH: If you’d like to talk, I’d love to hear from you. Tweeting @AliAbdaal directly will be the quickest way to get a response, but if your question is very long, feel free to email me at hi@aliabdaal.com. I try my best to reply to things but there sadly aren't enough hours in the day to respond to everyone 😭 PS: Some of the links in this description are affiliate links that I get a kickback from 😜

career

Career

Hey friends, on this episode of Journal Club we're going to be addressing how video games are good for us and the several benefits they bring.

🎮 Follow me on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/aliabdaal

Studies referenced in the video:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4682779/
http://rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=3679
https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2013/11/video-games
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235367249_More_Than_Just_Fun_and_Games_The_Longitudinal_Relationships_Between_Strategic_Video_Games_Self-Reported_Problem_Solving_Skills_and_Academic_Grades
http://www.rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=3342
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0187779
https://www.bmj.com/content/344/bmj.e2598
https://osf.io/h5m7k/

MY FREE ONLINE COURSES:
🚀  Productivity Masterclass - Principles and Tools to Boost Your Productivity - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/productivity
🎬  Video Editing with Final Cut Pro X - From Beginner to YouTuber - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/video-editing
🎓  How to Study for Exams - An Evidence-Based Masterclass - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/studying
😃  How to be Happier - Stoicism Masterclass - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/stoicism

MY FAVOURITE GEAR:
🎥 My YouTube Camera Gear - https://kit.co/AliAbdaal
⌨️ My Keyboard - Wireless Coral mechanical keyboard (Cherry Blue) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/keyboard 
📝 My favourite iPad Screen Protector - Paperlike - https://go.aliabdaal.com/paperlike 

MY FAVOURITE SOFTWARE:
📚 How I remember what I read (Readwise) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/readwise 
🎵 Where I get my Music (amazing for YouTubers) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/epidemicsound
🌐 My website platform (Ghost) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/ghost
🎤 My podcast hosting platform (Transistor) - https://go.aliabdaal.com/transistor

OTHER RECOMMENDED COURSES
📔 Effortless Output with Roam Research - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/roam
📓 Building a Second Brain - https://go.aliabdaal.com/course/basb

🎙My weekly podcast - https://www.youtube.com/c/notoverthinking
My brother and I host a weekly podcast where we discuss happiness, creativity and the human condition. You can find it by searching “Not Overthinking” on any podcast app (eg: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts etc). 

BE MY FRIEND:
💌 Sign up to my weekly email newsletter - https://aliabdaal.com/newsletter/
🌍 My website / blog - https://www.aliabdaal.com 
 
📸 Instagram - https://instagram.com/aliabdaal
🐦 Twitter - https://twitter.com/aliabdaal
🎮 Twitch - https://twitch.tv/aliabdaal

WHO AM I:
I'm Ali, a junior doctor working in Cambridge, UK. I make videos about medicine, technology, productivity and lifestyle design. I also have a weekly podcast with my brother (https://www.youtube.com/c/notoverthinking), and I write a weekly email newsletter that contains some quick thoughts + links to interesting things (https://aliabdaal.com/newsletter/).

🌍 My website / blog - https://www.aliabdaal.com 

GET IN TOUCH:
If you’d like to talk, I’d love to hear from you. Tweeting @AliAbdaal directly will be the quickest way to get a response, but if your question is very long, feel free to email me at hi@aliabdaal.com. I try my best to reply to things but there sadly aren't enough hours in the day to respond to everyone 😭

PS: Some of the links in this description are affiliate links that I get a kickback from 😜

📚 Check out my first book Feel-Good Productivity here: https://www.feelgoodproductivity.com/

Hey, I'm Ali, a doctor turned entrepreneur, and the world’s most followed productivity expert 😜 

On this channel, we explore evidence-based strategies and tools that can help us be more productive, and build a life that we love. 

If that sounds interesting, consider subscribing! See you in the next video x

Ali Abdaal

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law#:~:text=Sturgeon's%20law%20(or%20Sturgeon's%20revelation,science%20fiction%20author%20and%20critic.">Sturgeon’s law</a> is a philosophical aphorism that states that 90% of everything is crap. And, of course, you should take this with a grain of salt. “All things — cars, books, cheeses, hairstyles, people and pins are, to the expert and discerning eye, crud, except for the acceptable tithe which we each happen to like.”— From Theodore Sturgeon’s “On Hand: A Book”

Sturgeon’s law 

1. What is the oldest error-free book for X topic?2. What is the newest error-free book for X topic?3. Can I find the book online, for free?

Questions to ask yourself before going out to buy a new book

Assert someone’s credibility & respectability in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academia_(disambiguation)">The Academia</a> is to check their <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-index#:~:text=among%20different%20fields.-,Calculation,with%203%20or%20more%20citations.">H-index score</a>. This represents how many other scientists are citing their paper. a “successful scientist” will have an h-index of 20 after 20 years; an “outstanding scientist” will have an index of 40 after 20 years; and a “truly unique individual” will have an index of 60 after 20 years or 90 after 30 years.

One should read the full article for a detailed view.

Sturgeon’s law is a philosophical aphorism that states that 90% of everything is crap. And, of course, you should take this with a grain of salt. Sturgeon’s law can still be an interesting framework…

productivity

Productivity

books

Books

How to read higher quality books

When startups and their investors partner to raise capital and fund scale, there is an opportunity to take a look at their existing human capital structure and plan a more purposeful road map to support their growth.While the average check size has grown among <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/venture-capital">venture capital</a> (VC) firms, the success rate of their portfolio companies hasn’t. <a href="https://www.hbs.edu/news/Pages/item.aspx?num=487">Harvard Business School</a> notes that in spite of the increased cash infusion, 75% of VC-backed <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/startups">startups</a> still fail.

Growing Outwards

Failure can be attributed to a variety of unforeseen or unavoidable factors, often coming from external circumstances out of our control. However, as leaders and investors, we must ask ourselves, What are those things in my <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/company">company</a> that we can control, especially at critical moments of growth? And with that question comes a look inward into the construct of the organization itself. One of the most often overlooked but integral components of this is <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/333102">human capital</a>.

Startup Failure

The bottom line is that when startups and their investor's partner to raise capital and fund scale, there is an opportunity to take a look at their existing human capital structure and plan a more purposeful road map to support their growth. Here are five keys to managing human capital through hyper-growth.

A Purposeful Road Map

Before thinking about the “what next” understand the “what now” For example, have you identified the existing team members who are integral to your company’s future success? Have you put together growth-supportive <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/300515">compensation packages</a> to ensure their continued commitment?

Tie Your Internal Shoelaces

Investors expect their capital to be put to work expediently and efficiently. With that, comes the need for rapid but effective hiring. However, the support to manage such hiring is often an afterthought, a mad scramble for resources once an event is complete. Prior to a fundraising, transaction or growth launch, it is important to put the recruitment team in place and set the foundation for its human capital alignment.

Hire an Internal Recruiting Team

As your company grows, its core may continue, but its characteristics will inevitably change. It’s like a baby turning into a toddler. It’s so important that as your company continues through key phases of its growth life cycle, leadership defines what it wants post-growth to look like, how it wants to behave and what it wants to be known for. In short, the company needs to create a new post-growth archetype.

Create a New Company Archetype

As the company turns on the growth fire hose and starts running a flowing stream of <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/383196">investment cash</a>, it will inevitably take on a new and more mature persona. Companies know that with growth comes growing pains, and it is within their power to plan accordingly. Change management is necessary, but many times, it comes into play only at the point when dysfunction arises. Often, that can be too late.

Pre-Allocate a Percentage of Your Fundraise for Change Management Integration and Training

Successful growth isn’t just about revenue, eyeballs or market share. So, create a comprehensive growth rubric — the key components that leadership will continuously measure the company against to define successful progress. This growth rubric can be used before, during and after transition phases, benchmarking against individual success metrics while course-correcting where needed.

Define Your Growth Rubric

The growth company of today has a unique opportunity to develop a more self-aware plan. As part of the securing of capital, it is up to the company and its investors to develop a comprehensive strategy for a healthy scale. Every VC has investors to appease, and their reports are chock-full of metrics such as revenue, compound annual growth rate (CAGR) and customer acquisition.

A Self-Aware Plan

As leaders, we have an opportunity to also hold ourselves accountable for internal metrics such as hiring efficiency, retention rate, <a href="https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/368614">employee satisfaction</a> and rate of internal promotion. Human capital is the engine under the flashy hood, and it is ultimately what will make the fast car last throughout the growth journey.

The Bottom Line

When startups and their investors partner to raise capital and fund scale, there is an opportunity to take a look at their existing human capital structure and plan a more purposeful road map to support its growth.

Discover the world of business and economics.

economics

Economics

Looking Inward to Grow Outward: 5 Keys to Managing Human Capital Through Hyper-Growth

In 2019, 50.7 million businesses were identified as small, employing up to 499 people. Eighty-one percent of those business owners had no additional employees. Solopreneurs are entrepreneurs who, by choice, run their businesses entirely on their own. They come in all shapes.

Solopreneurs are on the rise

People are leaving their jobs to start their own businesses. Yet, <a href="https://eig.org/news/the-startup-surge-business-formation-in-2021-on-pace-to-break-record?mod=djemRTE_h">less than three percent</a> of the 51 million independent workers filed as businesses intending to hire employees. A 2021 MBO Partners report found that 82 percent of independent small business owners want to keep their company small, and 56 percent said they wanted to remain solopreneurs. Many became entrepreneurs to improve their well-being, not to add complexity by managing other people or building a mass operation.

Redefining a work-life balance

A decade ago, solopreneurship might not have been possible but new technologies give the tools to turn anyone into an entrepreneur. <ul><li>Billionaire Kylie Jenner outsources manufacturing and packaging to private label producers while letting different services handle her sales.</li><li>Drop-shippers evolved from third-party order fulfillment for Amazon and eBay.</li><li>Solopreneurs, from dog trainers to therapists, can bring home six-figure incomes.</li></ul>

Diverse solopreneurs

As major enterprises continue to automate and consolidate, they’ll need less manpower and leave fewer places for everyone to fit. This will leave more room for people to start their own businesses. Reports predict that the number of solopreneurs will skyrocket by 2026. They’ll create more networks of solopreneurs hiring solopreneurs and increasingly develop more resilience working together. As they become more diverse, society as a whole will demonstrate greater economic endurance and stability.

A diverse economy is stronger

A new kind of entrepreneur is taking the business world by storm -- and solopreneurs are doing it all by themselves. 

Solopreneurs are Changing the Face of the Economy

“Don’t be afraid to say no to projects. Prove that you’re serious about specialization by turning down work that falls outside your area of expertise. The more people you say no to, the more referrals you’ll get to people who need your product or service.”

If you focus on doing one thing well and hire specialists in that area, the quality of your work will improve and you will stand out among your competitors.

Don’t generalize. Specialize

Relying too heavily on one client is risky and will turn off potential buyers. Make sure that no one client makes up more than 15 percent of your revenue.

Don't rely too much on just one client

<ul><li>Owning a process makes it easier to pitch and puts you in control. Be clear about what you’re selling, and potential customers will be more likely to buy your product.</li><li>Don’t become synonymous with your company. If buyers aren’t confident that your business can run without you in charge, they won’t make their best offer.</li></ul>

Owning a process puts you in control

“To sell your business, you need to demonstrate to a buyer that you have a sales engine that will produce predictable, recurring revenue."

<ul><li>Take some time to figure out how many pipeline prospects will likely lead to sales. This number will become essential when you go to sell because it allows the buyer to estimate the size of the market opportunity.</li><li>Two sales reps are always better than one. Often competitive types, sales reps will try to outdo each other. And having two on staff will prove to a buyer that you have a scalable sales model, not just one good sales rep.</li><li>Hire people who are good at selling products, not services. These people will be better able to figure out how your product can meet a client’s needs.</li></ul>

Sales and sales reps

Find an adviser for whom you will be neither their largest nor their smallest client. Make sure they know your industry.Avoid an adviser who offers to broker a discussion with a single client. You want to ensure there is competition for your business and avoid being used as a pawn for your adviser to curry favor with his or her best client.

About finding an advisor

If you want to be a sellable, product-oriented business, you need to use the language of one. Change words like “clients” to “customers” and “firm” to “business.” Rid your website and customer-facing communications of any references that reveal you used to be a generic service business.

Using the right language

<ul><li>They are “teachable” to employees (like the Stapleton Agency’s Five-Step Logo Design Process) or can be delivered through technology;</li><li>They are “valuable” to your customers, which allows you to avoid commoditization;</li><li>They are “repeatable,” meaning customers need to return again and again to buy (e.g., think razor blades, not razors).</li></ul>

Scalable things meet three criteria

Run your company. Don’t let it run you. Most business owners started their company because they wanted more freedom—to work on their own schedules, make the kind of money they deserve, and eventually retire on the fruits of their labor. Unfortunately, according to John Warrillow, most owners find that stepping out of the picture is extremely difficult because their business relies too heavily on their personal involvement. Without them, their company—no matter how big or profitable—is essentially worthless. But the good news is that entrepreneurs can take specific steps—no matter what stage a business is in—to create a valuable, sellable company. Warrillow shows exactly what it takes to create a solid business that can thrive long into the future.

marketingandsales

Marketing & Sales

moneyandinvestments

Money & Investments

Run your company. Don’t let it run you. Most business owners started their company because they wanted more freedom—to work on their own schedules, make the kind of money they deserve, and eventually retire on the fruits of their labor. Unfortunately, according to John Warrillow, most owners find that stepping out of the picture is extremely difficult because their business relies too heavily on their personal involvement. Without them, their company—no matter how big or profitable—is essentially worthless. But the good news is that entrepreneurs can take specific steps—no matter what stage a business is in—to create a valuable, sellable company. Warrillow shows exactly what it takes to create a solid business that can thrive long into the future.

John Warrillow

Built to Sell

When you have confused and jumbled views of your dreams and ambitions, you have only two options-<ul><li>Either get a professional qualification; or</li><li>Do something so unique that they will start teaching about your work at Universities like 'Harvard'</li></ul>Modern education encourages us to pass with flying colours and avoid failures. Entrepreneurship encourages us to try new things and embrace failures.Every life in this world is in search of a purpose. And when we find it, we pursue it with determination, forgetting everything else. Once it has been fulfilled, we go back to looking for our next purpose.

Harvard

<ul><li>We collect a lot of information through our education system but it's the inspiration that ignites us.</li><li>Inspiration ignites us for action and brings momentum to our ideas.</li><li>There's a big difference between understanding & knowing.</li></ul>

Inspiration

Who says you don't find help when you need it?

Find the purpose and the means shall follow

<ul><li>Business are built on a mix of analysis and imagination. But for a startup imagination is more important than analysis. While driving a car we mostly look through the windshield ahead, and occasionally check the rear view mirror</li><li>Exploration first; operations follow- that's the journey from entrepreneur to enterprise. Alexander the Great and Vasco de Gama were explorers; the Romans and the British followed, building empires.</li></ul>

Start-up

<ul><li>Assets of true utility are mostly developed in small parts and in different places. Rubber originated from South America; major oil reserves are held in the Middle East and the combustion engine was invented in Europe. When brought together, they make a car.</li><li>Evolution always happens on the verge of extinction. Larva becomes caterpillar; caterpillar becomes butterfly.</li><li>Technology always wins. A handful of Spanish sailors captured South America with one superior tool- the Toledo steel sword </li></ul>

Hindu mythology promulgates the concept of divine trilogy. The divine three represent Creation- Preservation- Destruction in the forms of Bramha- Vishnu- Mahesh. As an entrepreneur, Mr. Iyer found this concept extremely useful:In life nothing lasts forever. What we create today, we will continue to build for a while. Our creation will continue live and grow but once it has outlived it's usefulness, it will be destroyed. This is the law of nature.The startup journey is all about turning from a caterpillar into a butterfly. At every stage transformation happens.

Hindu Trilogy 

This story is for anyone who may have a dream and wishes to make their dream their destiny.

motivationandinspiration

Motivation & Inspiration

leadershipandmanagement

Leadership & Management

Venkatesh Iyer

My Journey with Vadapav

My Journey with Vada Pav

Tim Westergren was a rock musician before he became a startup founder. His music genome project was the core technology used for Pandora. Tim Westergren founded Pandora in January 2000. The goal was to "capture the essence of music at the most fundamental level" using a matching algorithm and compare them to other songs for a better recommendation experience. However, at the peak of the dot-com bubble in March 2001, the doors slam shut behind them.

The music genome project

At the start of 2001, they began to stretch their money out and asked employees to defer their salaries. Tim maxed out his 11 credit cards, and they stopped paying their employees at the end of 2001. About 50 people worked for two years without getting paid to get them across the bridge. Tim pitched Pandora 348 times before getting their second round of financing. They raised 9 million dollars for the 2nd round. Two million went out the next day to pay the salaries. Today, the company has over 6 million monthly subscribers.

Not giving up

Two things worked in their favour: <ul><li>The product was magical. Everyone was excited about the product they've built. Investors were offered password-protected access to the product.</li><li>The company was resilient. When the company went through tough times, the founders were the first to defer. This inspired the staff to continue without salaries. </li></ul>

The project that wouldn't die

In the early days of Pandora, it was all about bringing together people that were inspired by an idea that mattered. The key moments in the first 5 years of Pandora were when Tim influenced important people to make decisions that helped them. You have to be creative to influence people. You have to create crumbed trails that will get you to key decision-makers. For example, Tim is a good basketball player. Once he had to influence someone from a legal profession who also played basketball. Tim figured out how to get invited and play on his team.

Influencing people

These are the moments when your startup is dead, and all seems lost. As a radio company, Pandora operated under a statutory license that let them play all the music without directly licensing the content. But in 2007, the Copyright Royalty Board made a ruling that made the royalty rates so high that it almost put them out of business. Pandora then emailed their listeners and asked them to contact their members of Congress. Two million people called, wrote, or visited their members of Congress to protest. Congress finally intervened and got the rates to a more normal place.

“We’re f*cked, it’s over” (WFIO) moments

The most common question among startup founders is how to know when is it time to quit. They really want some validation for their decision. A better mindset is to say, "This is my life. I'm not doing it because I'm guaranteed a reward at the end. I'm doing it because that's what I do." It's better to do and fail than regret not trying at all.

How to get out of an entrepreneurial rut

Tim Westergren discusses his company’s humble beginnings and what it takes to sell your vision.

Tim Westergren maxed out 11 credit cards, racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, and was rejected 348 times for a second round of funding for his revolutionary idea for a music streaming platform. But like any true artist, Westergren remained committed to his vision of creating an aesthetically more beautiful future with Pandora, and now the company boasts more than 6 million monthly subscribers. Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Westergren to discuss the company’s humble beginnings, why it took an act of Congress to keep the company alive, and why both men believe the best founders are artists who can sell their vision.

podcasts

Podcasts

Host Mike Maples Jr from venture capital firm FLOODGATE offers lessons from the startup super performers—BEFORE they were successful—featuring interviews with some of Silicon Valley’s most legendary entrepreneurs and thought leaders, including Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen, LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, Nextdoor co-founder Sarah Leary, Instagram founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Kreiger, and more.

Starting Greatness

Tim Westergren: How The Band Kept Playing At Pandora

Find 100+ Facts about Entrepreneurship - Curated from inspiring sources like Books, Podcasts & Articles - Genuine Insights from like-minded Users like You!

The biggest business mistake I made and what I learned from it.

Four Fundamental Innovations of Web3 that Will Upend Web2 Incumbents by @ttunguz

How to Use Massive AI Models (Like GPT-3) in Your Startup

The Surprising Benefits of Gaming

How to read higher quality books

Looking Inward to Grow Outward: 5 Keys to Managing Human Capital Through Hyper-Growth

Solopreneurs are Changing the Face of the Economy

Built to Sell

My Journey with Vada Pav

Tim Westergren: How The Band Kept Playing At Pandora

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