Tech Vibes has a good post today on startups entitled "5 Things I learnt from Year One in My Startup". Three of the points are themes which I have discussed here at Sophisticated Finance.
The other two points made in the post I would have stated differently.
Hire those with the best attitude and a willingness to learn over those with experience.
I would have said "hire those with experience and the ability to learn". Typically in a startup learning comes from mistakes and mistakes use up capital--the scarce resource. Experience may reduce the number of mistakes. Hire experienced people who have been in successful previous startups. The startup environment is a learning environment and a person willing to return to a startup situation has both experience and usually a willingness to learn. Another indicator of a willingness to learn is someone who has worked on a lot of successful projects. Also, remember that it is the CEO's responsibility to lead the team. If your experienced team members are reluctant to follow in a new direction, it could be a reflection on your maturity as a CEO.
A "Strategy Guy" should not be hired in a Startup
I agree that a strategy guy should not be in a startup. First, that should be a role played by the CEO. Second, a strategy guy is too expensive and too low value-added for a startup budget. Just like a marketing guy. However, I find that most startups can not articulate the basic parts of a strategy, which is why they have trouble raising capital. The CEO has to have the ability to articulate a strategy and take the responsibility to communicate, implement and update it.
Read the post for a good re-statement of the three points I agree with completely.
