Resources

Put this into practice

Everything worth your time on the question: Do I want the business, or the escape?

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TRY · 12 MIN

Failure Before Failure

TAIU

It is a year from now and this failed. Write the reason before you start.

A pre mortem written before the consequential decision is made.

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TRY · 12 MIN

Should This Exist?

TAIU

The idea, the person it is for, and whether it needs to exist.

The idea, the person it is for, and whether it needs to exist at all.

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READ · ARTICLE

Strategy for Start-ups

Joshua Gans, Erin Scott and Scott Stern

Argues that a young venture is choosing between a small number of genuinely different routes to market rather than executing one obvious plan, and that the choice is reversible for less time than founders think.

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READ · BOOK

The Founder's Dilemmas

Noam Wasserman

A decade of data on the early decisions that decide whether a venture survives: who joins, on what terms, and who holds control. The uncomfortable finding is that most damage is done in the first months, socially rather than commercially.

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READ · RESEARCH

Effectuation: Elements of Entrepreneurial Expertise

Saras Sarasvathy

Expert founders were found to start from what they already have, who they know and what they can afford to lose, rather than from a goal and a plan. It reframes starting something as a question about available means rather than about vision.

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