Startup — After your “Why”, dig deeper on “What”
Category: Startup
Reading Time: 15 minutes
Disclaimer:
This content is very relevant to people who are techies but, are scared to launch or setup their own startup. Relevant for people who are NOT from “IIM’s”, “IIT’s” (or) >80% grade systems.
Background:
YES. I am talking about “Startup”. Being my own boss. Entrepreneur. CEO. “Kya bhaat hai”. When I talked about the relevancy and if you have liked it I understand there is a sense of “negativity” but, it’s not the case. It’s about how lazy are we in the execution.
Before we deep dive, let me share few of my bookmarks in the journey of a startup. This looks like a typical writing style for me 😆.
Prologue
Here are the “List of Websites” that are providing (or) attracting Angel Investor / VC’s.
https://www.startups.com/
https://fundersclub.com/
https://angel.co/
https://startupxplore.com/en
https://500.co/
http://10000startups.com/
https://bangalore.startups-list.com/
Here are the “List of Books” : (My personal preferences)
Zero to One — By Peter Thiel
The Lean Startup — By Eric Ries
Before you startup — By Pankaj Goyal
Built to Sell — By John Warillow
Start with why — By Simon Sinek
Small Data: The Tiny Clues that Uncover Huge Trends — By Martin Lindstrom — (Yet to read this book but, it is a recommendation and hence have to forcefully add it here 😆)
Few other good reads:
https://www.cloudways.com/blog/best-startup-books-for-new-entrepreneurs/
Along with this a Google search on keywords (startup books), and it lists all the books 😆.
When there are websites like:
https://www.entrepreneur.com/
https://www.startupcommons.org/
https://thehubforstartups.com/
https://www.openstartups.net/in-en/
and there are startup reviewers like
https://techcrunch.com/startups/
https://www.failory.com/blog/top-indian-startups
Event hosters like:
http://www.thetalk.in/
https://meetup.com
… and Governments encouraging startups. In India, official website is:
https://www.startupindia.gov.in/
After starting, there are very good enablers like:
https://growthenabler.com/
Having said all of this, what am I going to tell in this article ? Has any other article covered this topic ? If so, was my search query in Google wrong. Didn’t I find answers in Quora.com (or) through any other blogs ?
Never mind, I am here to discuss about one important thing if you are in the journey of a start up. That is related to “What” you have to do.
I haven’t seen any article or book (with my limited knowledge) covering this topic and hence thought it would be appropriate for me to write something on this.
Plot
Let me walk you through a “User Story”.
As an aspiring Entrepreneur,
1. I would like to know if my “Why” for starting a business is important ? (Hint: Read the books I have mentioned).
2. I would like to know if my “Idea” is aligned to solving the problem identified ?
Wait… wait…
I heard you telling aren’t you copying the contents from all the books. Well, I understand you are awake.
Let’s say you have a problem (or) you want to improve an existing solution. Let’s call it “X”. (Typical naming derived from R.S.Agarwal method of quantitve aptitude).
After thoroughly analysing ( Need to add a smiley 😆 ) you have a solution called “Y”.
As an average IT guy I would definitely jump in to discussing the pros and cons of a solution with “Whatsapp chats”, “Meetup Groups”, “Facebook friends”, “LinkedIn members” and will try to find out if I can figure out who would be my Co-Founder / CTO / CFO etc., (Hint: Read the books I have mentioned).
Ignoring all the partnerships that you have to make, discussions you have to go through, tell me “What” is stopping you to “Execute” your idea? Is it the “Fear of Failure” (or) “Lack of knowledge” ?
If it’s “Lack of knowledge” on few ground rules, then this article might be of good help to you even though you are still in “Preparation phase” for your “Solution”.
Considering what you can do alone now for your vision what you have planned to achieve after 2 years, 5 years ’N’ years (For now forget about startup team, funding, legal etc.,), I would like to elaborate more on “What” you need to do if you have :
* Identified a problem.
* You have a solution for it.
If “Problem” and “Solution” are available can you start working on these ?
- Have you drafted a plan (or) prepared a task list on what are the things you have to consider for your solution to work ? If so, is documenting that stopping you? Have you tried online tools that will help you acheive this? One such thing is: Atlassian confluence. (atlassian.net)
- Have you tried creating mock diagrams/screens and evaluated yourself as a potential customer? If not, are procuring tools stopping you? If so, you can try these: draw.io, lucidchart, gliffy, visual-paradigm and much more.
- Have you tried naming your solution ? People tell it has to be fancy, catchy, relevant etc., but, have you ever tried naming it? If not, have you come across websites with these naming and if it’s already taken why not add “…ify”, “…ing”, “…cy” … Few would be very funny and might alter the meaning. So please be little careful while you are naming it.
- Once you have named, have you registered your name in the web (Of course, I am considering that your solution is on-line solution and not dedicated only for brick-and-mortar). Have you tried those name(s) are available (or) is it taken ? If it’s taken, point #2 will help you out with fancy naming. Few registration providers are: GoDaddy, AWS Route 53, hostinger etc.,
- Have you considered a hosting plan for this name you have selected ? Did you observe that everything is costly (It’s all in $) ? But wait a minute. If you consider the hosting plan is costly how will you talk in numbers (ROI, ROCE, Cash Flow, Salary, % Growth) etc., Are you not ready to pay this initial cost ? Think. It will be worth now, once your idea gets refined with your experience.
- Have you tried programming ? Are you scared to work in UI ? If so, think about all the presentations you have to make to your investors, recognition tables, patent registrations etc., UI is far easier than doing this and with the maturity of the frameworks, it’s now easier to create a flashy website in hours. (Thanks to getbootstrap.com, w3schools.com, css/scss/less, npm, node.js, angular.io, reactjs, vue.js and few more).
Epilogue:
All the points listed above has a relevant “How” to do in their corresponding websites. So, just to remind, this article is only about “What” to do.
Let’s stop here and continue with other “What” in the next article.
PS:
I have posted this article in medium.com