the most fun part of investing in startups is watching newbie founders go from bad to amazing at building a company in just a few years
— Sam Altman (@sama) April 4, 2014
I cringe when I look back on the mistakes I made in the first several years as a newbie startup founder. For instance, I remember our first meeting with NVIDIA. We all showed up in suits and ties!
I also remember pitching our draft business plan competition presentation with Stephen Fleming in the room. He ripped it apart. He was right. It was a naive business plan and a work of fiction.
Despite the embarrassing feelings I have looking back on those early years, I am grateful for them. I agree with Sam Altman’s quote above. It is amazing how fast lessons come along in building a startup.
I’m sure I still make plenty of mistakes in our startup. Well-seasoned corporate operators would certainly laugh at some of the things my team and I do. But we know how to make money and grow. We have come a long way.
I’ve recently been working with two newbie founders that may join with me in important ways to build more startup stuff. It is interesting to see how they think. While they are impressive people, they have not been through the startup gauntlet yet. They will be bad startup leaders at the start. But I look past that to what they will become in a few short years at they mature from bad to amazing, as Sam described.
What are your thoughts on the time it takes to go from bad to amazing at building a startup?
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