Another Silly Startup Analogy
diegobasch.com
diegobasch.com
I don't buy it. I don't think that was ever true, and I think it's even less true today.
Today we can run startups with far less overhead and at far lower cost, thanks to open-source, cloud computing, social media and other developments, and we can build profitable, successful startups without necessarily needing to build "the next Facebook".
Thanks to @sgblank and others in the Lean Startup community, we have developed much more detailed processes for going from Idea -> Company -> Company with Customers, leaving less to happenstance than ever before.
The Internet - Angel List, Twitter, LinkedIn, Hoovers, and other resources, make it easier than ever to find customers, partners, investors, resellers and the like.
I keep coming back to this old saw, which - despite being a total cliche - has the ring of truth to it:
The harder I work, the luckier I get
or maybe this one:
Luck is where preparation meets opportunity
Closing thought:
They're sitting out there waiting to give you their money. Are you gonna take it? Are you man enough to take it?
...
The money is out there, you pick it up, it's yours. You don't, I got no sympathy for ya[1]
I think the bigger issue is that there are a lot more people that invest hard work, blood, sweat, etc. and fail than people who do all those things and succeed. It's still silly to say it's all luck, but I think it's fair to say that luck (by which I just mean circumstances that cannot be predicted or controlled by the founders/workers) plays a large part in success.
I should have explained my position a bit more clearly... what I'm getting at is that, in business, you don't ever fail the way you do in this game show scenario. In the show, you get one shot at the "win" and you win or lose, do or die, game over. In Real Life, as long as you're breathing, you get to keep trying. Failure is never final. If Startup A doesn't succeed, you take the lessons you learned from it, and do Startup B. The only way you ever really fail is when you run out of time.
Given that, I posit that if you are dedicated, determined and persistent enough, you can usually find a way to success through "blood, swear, tears and sheer force of will".
Yes, "black swan" events can come along and cripple you, but I'm treating those as outliers that aren't significant for the point of this conversation. You may, of course, disagree with that position.
What do you think?
He's saying that it's hard work, blood, sweat, tears and sheer force of will... and then, luck.
Yes, and I'm saying he's wrong, that this analogy is badly flawed.
- I'm 43 years old, and I've been in Silicon Valley for 15 years.
- I've been intimately involved with a number of startups, in different capacities.
- My latest company was a 7-year ride before we sold to LinkedIn.
Many startups I knew were killed by unfortunate and unforeseeable events. My own startup would have died if one of many unpredictable life events that happened to me before or after the journey had instead occurred during.
Startups are very fragile endeavors, and all the hard work in the world can amount to nothing if you don't have a significant amount of luck (or avoid bad luck, if you prefer).
For every guy like me who got successful, there are a number of other guys like me who did all the right things and didn't. Such is life.
The goal is not always to be together forever and/or marry, just to keep making some timeless/edgy/groovy music together.
Nah - some people leave the band, look back and just shake their head saying "yeah those were some pretty crazy times".
Success in business doesn't work like that. As long as you're alive and aren't dead broke and destitute you can keep trying (keep pulling another key) and there are degrees of success... you might only build a multi-million dollar company and not a billion dollar company. OK, how sad. Or maybe you get acquired for just enough where you, as a founder, walk away with a million even. What a tragedy.
And finally, I believe that skill matters, and that business success is not just a question of chance. Sure, and unlucky "black swan" negative event can short-circuit you, but you don't necessarily need "good luck" to succeed. You can chip away at it slowly, grind, build, grind, build, sweat, bleed, grind, build, and work your way up.