Paul Graham, speaking on start-ups:
As in science, the hard part is not answering questions but asking them: the hard part is seeing something new that users lack.
Paul Graham’s a smart cookie, and has been involved in countless more start-ups than I have; but I would proffer that it doesn’t even need to be something ‘new’. Observing deficiency itself seems like a worthy enough project. If it happens to be something novel, then all the better.
The piece is worth reading. One of the thrusts of the essay is that Graham speaks of start-ups as an enterprise of self growth:
Understanding your users is part of half the principles in this list. That’s the reason to launch early, to understand your users. Evolving your idea is the embodiment of understanding your users. Understanding your users well will tend to push you toward making something that makes a few people deeply happy. The most important reason for having surprisingly good customer service is that it helps you understand your users. And understanding your users will even ensure your morale, because when everything else is collapsing around you, having just ten users who love you will keep you going.
Understanding people and responding to their needs is basically an ego-denying role. An exercise in maturity, if you will. Having a grand vision is basically egotistical. Here one thinks of the CEO as enfant terrible, throwing a hissy fit whenever their beautiful vision isn’t executed exactly. Of course, these are stereotypes, or perhaps more appropriately, archetypes.
It’s interesting to me that we look to start-ups as institutions of growth and self-subjugation, and established companies as testaments to their CEOs. It amazes me how often Steve Jobs and Apple are viewed as one in the same. This is no doubt a result of careful public relations, but the 35,000 employees there must be doing something other than walking around in an infinite loop.
And Microsoft of course is closely tied to Bill Gates, even if he’s left day to day operations. Here’s Bill Gates speaking about his accomplishment:
We’ve really achieved the ideal of what I wanted Microsoft to become.
Are the models for success between start-ups and established companies really so different? Or are we creating stories that seem to fit the bill, magnifying certain qualities in order to make our stories square with the reality we want to see?
