Startups are a rollercoaster ride – every time you make it over one hump (hiring the first employee, fundraising, launching an alpha, etc.) you will suddenly see the next, new challenge looming on the horizon. You need to stay focused on the challenge.
As a founder or CEO, you should be constantly asking yourself what is the single more important thing you should be doing for the company at any given period of time. And then you should focus most of your time on that. A good exercise to try:
- Once a week, take a step back and ask yourself what you are trying to accomplish, and what are the 1-2 most important things that will get you there.
- Every morning, make a list of the 1-3 things you absolutely need to get done that day.
- Get those things done.
- Don’t get distracted by the easy low hanging fruit that doesn’t matter – it just wastes your time even if you get satisfaction by doing it.
In parallel to the spot roles you are playing (e.g. CMO, VP sales, whatever), the two most consistently important jobs for the CEO of a startup on an ongoing basis are:
1. Make sure you do not run out of money. People seem to forget that running out of money is the #1 reasons startups fail.
2. Hiring and firing. As CEO, you constantly need to be hiring the best possible people, and letting underperformers go.
