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Startup founders are makers. If your maker bit is malnourished, feed it. Give it time to blossom. If you get caught up in too many things you cant do it. Multi-tasking is not your friend.Once you figure out what to make, first money in should be your own then customer money.
Investor money only if/when needed. If you cant have skin in the game u likely wont win. Unless your name is preceded by Dr. make some thing first. Every day I meet folks who want to raise a round to launch, yet have made nothing & put no money in. People have the wrong idea.
It's about passion, making time and aligning your energy. You dont need to leave your job to make some thing, that comes from within. Simple things wake up earlier, get stuff in before work. Use weekends and free time wisely. When you discover what makes you tik it'll all be well
Carving out a few hours to find this magic is a small price to pay. Most times internal validation or being your own customer is key, that is a use case of 1. Figuring this out is pure bliss.External validation is not always required initially.Being content in knowing this is key
You have it within you to make. Every time you cook some thing complex for your self and follow complex instructions, you are shipping for one, learn to ship more and more frequently. But you cant ship what you don't make, if you've forgotten the feeling, go host a dawat(party).
Put your self through a 3x3 week test to build an MVP. You cant ship what you dont make, just like you cant serve food at a dawat that you dont host.Week 1, Customer Research, Tech Research, If non-techie then know your limitations. Week2,Address limitations,Features,Stack
Bare bones product design, Figure out details but dont over engineer/plan. Week3, Litmus test with (customer 1), It could be a work flow test, a better mouse trap, a brain storming session, doesn't have to be a product yet. See if its worth completing, will it result in a sale?
Week 4, Feature set/scope closure, Basic functionality done well vs all functionality or service over engineered. Week 5, test run the concept in what ever state it is, for a service the bench mark should be does it add efficiency or lower the pain point.
For a product, does the total cost of ownership go down whilst enriching the experience and decreasing the effort. Would you pay for it at this stage?If not use week 5 to recalibrate.If you would pay to build/complete/execute, then proceed & do a dry run & add missing items
that when done incrementally enhance the overall value.Week 6, you launch, be it an MVP, be it a better mouse trap.But know these are soft launches,not loaded with product hunt & PR.Not many things in life can get done in 6 weeks. But some validation can come. The idea is to Make
Use the 3x3 frame work to launch weekly/make weekly.Keep going back and repeating parts of the 3x3 process as needed. No one has to have a market ready product in 6 Weeks this is a frame work for you to invest your time and energy with focus to keep getting closer to the goal
Every time your launch it will get a little bit easier & better. The secret sauce is to get users in, get feedback, listen,fine-tune, calibrate & launch again. Not all launches are market shattering events. Internalize the process before you externalize the product. Dont wish, do
You will make better products/services if you consider your self an investor & founder at the same time. You don't have to give up being an operator to become an investor.Invest in your self & operate better @rebootdude @TalhaIzhar @SaadGH @raza_matin @Ash_Kalim @YusufJan
