STARTING a Startup

This guide is a part of a larger 3-part guide called The Startup Series. Each of the 3 guides will help you go from idea to full-scale execution.

You can jump to any part of The Startup Series here:

STARTING a Startup

ESTABLISHING a Startup

Becoming the Greatest Chief of Staff Ever

Table of Contents:

• Table of Contents:
• First Off, Who Am I? Why Trust Me and What I Am About to Say?
• STARTING a Startup Guide ⤵️
• THE 10 COMMANDMENTS OF STARTUP SUCCESS
• AS THE FOUNDER….
• STARTING
• IDEA
• RESEARCH
• BUSINESS PLAN
• LEGAL
• FUNDING
• DON’T FORGET MINDSET
• THE MISSION
• THE PEOPLE
• THE PARTNERS
• PASSION, PURPOSE, and PROFIT
• DELAYED GRATIFICATION
• TAKE CALCULATED RISK
• HOW PEOPLE LOSE in BUSINESS
• THE SELL
• THE MARKETING
• INVESTORS
• RESOURCES

First Off, Who Am I? Why Trust Me and What I Am About to Say?

All you should know about me is that I was once lost and I am now saved because of the Death, Burial, Resurrection, Ascension, and Grace on display, of the Lord Jesus Christ dying for my sins, in order for me to be made right with God the Father.

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.“ (John 14:6)

This is not a “contending for the faith”, rather this is a tool to help sharpen one’s faith and understand his/her depravity in order to understand his/her reliance and dependency upon the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Which you can say, innately, becomes the Truth. Whether people accept or deny the Truth, it is still the Truth. No amount of man-used words matters when the Day of Judgement abounds.

Are you in right standing with God?

STARTING a Startup Guide ⤵️

The goal is for you to turn an idea into a tangible business foundation. This is about ideation, validation, planning, and taking the first steps.

Before I get into the 0 to 1 process of building a valuable offering that you can sell to the masses and that acts like a machine (a startup and its product or service), let me give you some startup success tenants.

THE 10 COMMANDMENTS OF STARTUP SUCCESS

1. EXCEPT REJECTION BUT LEARN FROM EVERY “NO”.
2. HIRE LIKE YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON IT. IT DOES. This doesn’t apply to you guys at this point in time. So, don’t focus on it as much — just yet.
• “Patience pays dividends”, say Brian Chesky who interviewed the first 500 employees of AirBnb
• Mark Zuckerberg - “have the best people around you”
3. IN ORDER TO SCALE, YOU HAVE TO DO THINGS THAT DON’T SCALE.
• Perform unscalable actions in the beginning, so you can scale later on — i.e. visiting partners and talking to every customer in the early stages of the company
4. RAISE MORE MONEY THAN YOU THINK YOU NEED. POTENTIALLY — A LOT MORE
• This depends on what type of company you want to become…. It’s also important to note that you don’t need to spend that much money in the beginning. Just focus on testing and iterating.
• 2 Types of Companies (the market determines this as much as you do):
• GET BIG FAST COMPANIES
• To capture the entire market by land grabbing market share
• i.e. Uber, Amazon
• Network effects are the aim for get big fast companies because the more users, the more it increases their platforms value
• Creates lock-in - so employees stay and users stay
• ORGANIC GROWTH COMPANIES
• Frugile, resourceful, and not spending more than they make; much more careful
• i.e. Ben & Jerry's
5. RELEASE YOUR PRODUCTS EARLY ENOUGH THAT THEY CAN STILL EMBARRASS YOU. IMPERFECT IS PERFECT.
• Constant testing, iteration, testing, iteration…. Get more feedback than you can fathom but trust your gut on what you feel is best as well (a.k.a take feedback that is actually useful for iterating your product)
6. DECIDE, DECIDE, DECIDE.
7. BE PREPARED TO BOTH MAKE AND BREAK PLANS.
• Be different and stick to the mission (while considering the markets/customers wants and needs of course)
8. DON’T TELL YOUR EMPLOYEES HOW TO INNOVATE. MANAGE THE CHAOS.
• This doesn’t apply to you guys at this point in time, since there are not many employees.
• USEFUL > INNOVATIVE
• “Cool wears off, useful never does.” (Jason Fried)
• [Be the edges] “You have to keep things off of your product more than you add into it.” (Jason Fried)
9. TO CREATE A WINNING COMPANY CULTURE, MAKE SURE EVERY EMPLOYEE OWNS IT.
• Same as #2 and #8.
• Because things change so fast, all you need to keep is your GRAND VISION. You may even tweak the vision over time, just as we did with ZIKI/THE FOOD COMPANY. Because things change so fast, be willing to be agile. That’s why the strength of being a startup is speed.
• Other strengths in being a startup….
• Decisiveness
• Having a clear vision and that the entire team and shares that vision
• Being a good listener, but also being strong-willed
• Moving fast
• 24/7 work ethic
10. STICK WITH THE HERO’S JOURNEY.
• Have grit and stay on this journey
11. PAY IT FORWARD (Bonus Commandment)
• Think of a startup as a beach-head:
• Marines - deployed onto the beach
• a.k.a initial entry and launch (don’t take this lightly or overlook it - it helps you break through the noise)
• Army - fighting on the ground
• a.k.a invading the market and establishing the company
• Nation building - building nations
• a.k.a solidified at many, many customers and scaling with those networks

AS THE FOUNDER….

If you are the founder of this thing, don’t just take it from my experience in witnessing the best CEO’s in the world operate. Take it from Sam Altman.

Here are 13 of his thoughts.

"I’ve observed thousands of founders and thought a lot about what it takes to make a huge amount of money or to create something important. Usually, people start off wanting the former and end up wanting the latter. Everything here is easier to do once you’ve already reached a baseline degree of success (through privilege or effort) and want to put in the work to turn that into outlier success. But much of it applies to anyone."

1. Compound Yourself
• It's useful to focus on adding another zero to whatever you define as your success metric - money, status, impact on the world, or whatever
• "But I always want it to be a project that, if successful, will make the rest of my career look like a footnote."
• Be willing to let small opportunities go to focus on potential step changes
• One of the notable aspects of compound growth is that the furthest out years are the most important
• Trust the exponential, be patient, and be pleasantly surprised
2. Have almost too much self-belief
• Cultivate this early
• Self-belief must be balanced with self-awareness
• Truth-seeking is hard and often painful, but it is what separates self-belief from self-delusion
3. Learn to think independently
• Entrepreneurship is difficult to teach because original thinking is difficult to teach
• School isn't set up to teach this
• You have to cultivate it yourself
• "I will fail many times, and I will be really right once."
• Practice finding solutions even when there seem like there is none
4. Get good at "sales"
• Self-belief needs convincing others to believe
• Every job becomes a sales job at some point
• Requires inspiring vision
• Strong communication skills
• Degree of charisma
• Evidence of execution ability
• Get better at written communication
• Show up in person whenever it's important
5. Make it easy to take risks
• Most people overestimate risk and underestimate reward
• It’s often easier to take risks earlier in your career…….
• "It easy - and human nature - to prioritize short-term gain and convenience over long-term fulfillment
• Keeping your life cheap and flexible for as long as you can is a powerful way to do this, but obviously comes with trade-offs
6. Focus
• Focus is a force multiplier on work
• It's much more important to work on the right thing than it is to work many hours
• I have yet to meet a slow-moving person who is very successful
7. Work hard
• You can get to the 90th% by working either smart or hard, BUT the 99% requires both
• Extreme people get extreme results (comes with trade-offs)
• Momentum compounds
• Success begets success
• You have to figure out how to work hard without burning out
• In fact, work stamina seems to be one of the biggest predictors of long-term success
• "One more thought about working hard: do it at the beginning of your career. Hard work compounds like interest, and the earlier you do it, the more time you have for the benefits to pay off."
8. Be bold
• I believe it's easier to do a hard startup than an easy startup
• Follow your curiosity. Things that seems exciting to you will often seem exciting to other people too
9. Be willful
• A big secret: you can usually bend the world to your will a surprising percentage of the time
• Reasons people fail: combo of self-doubt, giving up too early, and not pushing hard enough
• Ask for what you want
• Successful people = “I am going to keep going until this works, and no matter what the challenges are I’m going to figure them out”
• Be optimistic. I have never met a very successful pessimistic person
10. Be hard to compete with
• Companies are more valuable if they are harder to compete with
• Same with people
• If you are doing the same thing everyone else is doing….. you are not going to be hard to compete with
• Strategy examples for building leverage: personal relationships, building a strong personal brand, or getting good at the intersection of multiple different fields
11. Build a network
• Great work requires teams
• The size of the network of really talented people you know often becomes the limiter for what you can accomplish
• Take care of the people who work for you
• Be overly generous with sharing the upside; it will come back to you 10x
• Also, learn how to evaluate what people are great at, and put them in those roles.
• "You want to have a reputation for pushing people hard enough that they accomplish more than they thought they could, but not so hard they burn out"
• Define yourself by your strengths, NOT YOUR WEAKNESSES
• "Acknowledge your weaknesses and figure out how to work around them, but don’t let them stop you from doing what you want to do"
• "Remember that you are mostly looking for rate of improvement, and don’t overvalue experience or current accomplishment"
• Finally, remember to spend your time with positive people who support your ambitions.

• Additional note I liked: "A special case of developing a network is finding someone eminent to take a bet on you, ideally early in your career. The best way to do this, no surprise, is to go out of your way to be helpful. (And remember that you have to pay this forward at some point later!)"

• "Eventually, you will define your success by performing excellent work in areas that are important to you. The sooner you can start off in that direction, the further you will be able to go. It is hard to be wildly successful at anything you aren’t obsessed with."

Now, that you’ve digested those 13 thoughts, think about these things as the Founder:

Jaime Schmidt on Making the Leap to Entrepreneurship:

• Make your commitment: first to yourself, and then to the business
• Pursue your abilities: develop skills and authority
• Fund your business: balance the bottom line
• Integrate your life: structure for sustainability

There are going to be early stages in the company, where people aren’t getting paid. Who cares if you're not paying people in the beginning as a startup. Get over that mentality of being sorry for employees in them doing their work for you since they are unpaid.

Because if people aren't performing well now when they're unpaid, they're most certainly not going to perform well later when they are paid

As a Founder, you need to be decisive, high conviction (because who will believe in your mission, if you don’t believe in it deeply), and courage to persist through everything. Refuse to give up.

Have unwavering faith.

If it comes down to it, and you have nothing to sell at the start, sell yourself.

Be solution oriented, not problem focused. Problems arise daily like mini fires. Get good at putting them out, fast.

Important to stick to the basics. Don’t get lost in the idea sauce. Execute on what’s in front of you.

When selling clients, partners, or potential employees, make sure you sell the vision and your story. Selling an employee on why they should buy into you is no different than selling a client on why they should buy into you too.

You know where you are going as a founder. Let people tag along with you. Show them the vision and lead the way. If they buy in, great. If they don't, great. Move on with who you need and adjust as needed.

The right team dynamic is key. It takes a lot of different team rotations, cycles, and turnover until you find the company-team fit, just as it does for you finding product-market fit. It allows for such a faster speed of movement, again this comes with time experience, and momentum. The momentum attracts the best talent.

Even though your people will be inspired, they will never love your baby as much as you. It’s YOUR baby (your business) for a reason. As Gary Vee says, "You can't ask someone to love your baby as much as you do." Same thing applies with your business!

And at all times, know your leverage. Always always always. Know your leverage and use that leverage — at all times.

STARTING

Everything starts with an idea, but most importantly, an idea that is centered around something you enjoy and want to see in the world.

Greg Shepard:

• The North star: Knowing where you're going before you start is crucial
• Not Ready, Fire, Aim but........Ready, Aim, Fire

IDEA

• How to Generate Ideas:
• Use the “Problem-Solution Fit” method: Identify a pain point in your life or others’ and brainstorm solutions. Example: Airbnb started because founders couldn’t afford rent.

Figure out what you don’t enjoy doing, and outsource it via delegation or automation.

Partnering is the fastest way to get to market — that refers to a business partner and a vendor partner or a partnership of businesses.

Also, this is important: where are you going? Where do you want to go? What is success for you? Reverse engineer that.

Also, what problem are you looking to solve for? The business can and needs to center around this too.

RESEARCH

Market Research

• Validation Techniques:
• Run a landing page test with Carrd (carrd.co) to gauge interest before building.
• Competition is for losers. Just focus on creating. Market research is a business 101, university learning scam

Steve Jobs talked about this with NEXT: It takes longer than you think to exploit something in the marketplace……

Forcing Function:

Disregard your ideas, leverage your assets.

You are the product

Client problems = Your problems

BUSINESS PLAN

• Lean vs. Traditional:
• Lean Canvas (leanstack.com): One-page plan focusing on problem, solution, metrics, and cost.
• Traditional: Use SBA’s guide (sba.gov/business-guide/plan-your-business/write-your-business-plan).

LEGAL

• Choosing a Structure:
• Sole Proprietorship: Simple, but full liability.
• LLC: Limits liability, flexible taxation (see LegalZoom.com or Incfile.com).
• Corporation: For bigger ambitions, complex but scalable.
• Steps:
• Register via your state’s website (e.g., sos.ca.gov for California).
• Get an EIN for free at IRS.gov.
• Resource: The Startup Owner’s Manual by Steve Blank—covers legal basics.

FUNDING

• Options:
• Bootstrapping: Use personal savings or revenue (e.g., Mailchimp bootstrapped to $700M).
• Crowdfunding: Kickstarter (kickstarter.com) or Indiegogo (indiegogo.com). Ascending
• Small Business Loans: Check SBA.gov for loan programs.
• Resources:
• X: Follow @naval or @paulg for funding advice from startup gurus.
• Website: AngelList (angel.co)—connect with angel investors.

DON’T FORGET MINDSET

• Mindset: Start small, test fast. Eric Ries’ The Lean Startup methodology is gold here—build an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) and iterate.

THE MISSION

Know your Why

THE PEOPLE

Danny Meyer who founded Shake Shack in 2004 and it went public in 2015 said this about his list of people to prioritize in business:

1. Employees
2. Guests
3. Customers
4. Suppliers
5. Investors

On What Steve Jobs Learned at Apple

• "I now take a longer term view on people. In other words, when I see something not being done right, my first reaction isn't to go fix it. It's to say

'We're building a team here and we're going to do stuff for the next decade, not just the next year. So, what do I need to do to help the person that is screwing up, learns. Versus how do I fix the problem."

1. It's what Josh Gershon talked about with,

"If you help others it will help you. If I win, you win."

2. It's what Nick Nanakos and I talked about with,

"Making sure to show people your vision and be the hardest worker on the team."

• "that's painful sometimes."
• Me speaking: It's painful only because it is self-inflicted and we, as humans, have a personal desire for something
• "Get everyone on the core team in the room and talk about it to get in sync."

The Standard with People:

• Be hard on systems, not people
• Hire, empower the hire, and give them knowledge
• When empowering: 1) connect 2) inspire with vision 3) instill w/ confidence 4) share everything 5) involve in decisions

The 4 Times That People Change:

• Hurt enough — they have to
• See enough — inspired to
• Learn enough — they want to
• Receive enough — able to

From Gary Vee:

• You work for your employees. Your employees don't work for you.
• As a leader you should serve first and lead second
• Set an example, have empathy for others, put in more work than anyone else in the organization

B.O.S.S. Strategy by Greg Shepard:

• Strategy:
• Five functional areas:
• CEO
• Sales/Marketing
• Service/Delivery
• Shared Services (IT, HR, Accounting, Legal)
• Product and Engineering
• Missions from that load of work to do: from X to Y by date
• Establish objectives
• Assign tasks/activities
• "Do the important things first, so the urgent things don't happen." (Greg)
• "Do the things that have the highest impact with the lowest effort." (Greg)
• Standardizations, accountability, and measures
• Optimization and refinement- "Kaizen"

THE PARTNERS

Collaboration is key.

Partnering with the right companies will allow your product/service to get to market faster.

PASSION, PURPOSE, and PROFIT

When I started Dream BIG & Co., I started it as a podcast. I then realized I needed to monetize the businesses, to keep my personal financials in check and to be able to focus on the business full-time. So, it went from passion to passion and profitability.

Being scrappy and resourceful is great, and always a needed mindset in business, yet there comes a point when you have to ask, “If I want to stay in this specific game for as long as possible, how can I make money from it to allow me to do it forever?”

The Forcing Function:

"Service-based businesses are the lowest risk way of becoming an entrepreneur."

"A service-based business is a rare opportunity to monetize your passion. Getting paid to develop and teach a skill you enjoy turns your consumption into production."

Then, eventually you can productize it.

Start with a rev based service model

OR

Learn how to make a product and sell it.

DELAYED GRATIFICATION

Willing to suffer for the desire you have. This requires persistence and patience.

Law of Reciprocity. Being able to give, give, give value upfront, even not making money at first, in order to gain a customers trust.

It is important to NOT SCALE IN THE BEGINNING…. Steve Jobs talked about going to customers and learning about their needs, what they enjoy about the products, and getting real, truthful feedback…. (and he talked about talking to those people he only once dreamed he would talk to)

TAKE CALCULATED RISK

Be willing to take risk.

“If you are afraid of failure, then you are afraid of success, because failure is required in order to reach success.” — Tanishq Joshi

HOW PEOPLE LOSE in BUSINESS

• Things owning people
• Ego — if not channeled properly

#1 Causes of Startup Failure:

• Creating a Product that not Enough People Want or Need
• Team Falling Apart
• Competition
• Financials

Top 20 Reasons Startups Fail:

TEAM

Who are the generals and troops in your business and entrepreneurial army?

Grow

Build

THE SELL

Understand your market

Understand your customer

Understand your product

Master your pitch

Follow up, follow up, follow up, follow up, follow up

Forcing Function:

Remember: clients don’t pay to work with you. Clients pay for the results unlocked by working with you.

Stay out of sales purgatory

** You need to ask for the sale. Don’t leave the call without a clear yes or no.

THE MARKETING

Marketing is a detailed system, not a single static thing.

PR

Branding

Standing Out

Forcing Function:

Whenever you get stuck, shift your focus outward to who you can help.

"Aspirants pitch. Peers collaborate."

Framing is everything

Remove referral friction

INVESTORS

Look for investors, just like you do with a business partner. Long-term. Values aligned. Committed. Trusting. Good track record.

YOUR CIRCLE TO TAP INTO

• Community: Join r/Entrepreneur on Reddit or Startup Grind (startupgrind.com) for peer support.

RESOURCES

Small Business Legal Center

Overview of legal issues that may arise for small business owners, such as those involving formation, operations, contracts, employment disputes, and conflicts between entities.

www.justia.com

© Anthony Dap III | 2025-2030