Are you ready to launch your startup?

As an operator, you may have built something in the past at a high-growth organization, maybe a technology start-up. You were responsible for a critical piece of the giant puzzle.

You've built teams, products, and systems, leading complex operations with specific industry nuances across operations, product, growth, technology, engineering, etc.  

The idea of starting your venture might have crossed your mind, but perhaps you haven't yet nailed the idea you think is worth the leap, or maybe you have stumbled on this great idea, but you are still seeking a co-founder on the journey or not quite sure what to do next to move this from idea to startup.

This post will share six tips to consider as you take the leap.

1. Build Conviction:

Sometimes, that unwavering belief that you can build a solution to a significant problem and  put your mark on the world comes immediately. Other times, the nagging desire to create a solution to solve a specific problem, builds up slowly, then all at once.

Either way, your "why" is critical as it is the anchor that will stabilize you through the inevitable uncertainties of building something from scratch. This venture will make significant demands of your time, dedication, effort, and resources, and you need to be 100% convinced that it is either this or nothing.

Many founders have varying reasons for taking the plunge.  For some, it's an opportunity to solve a huge and impactful problem that presents itself as a time-bound opportunity requiring a swift decision to take the plunge. For others, they realize that as they progress, the opportunity cost of an entrepreneurial decision such as this gets more expensive the more responsibilities you have.  

Whichever way you arrive at this conviction, getting there before you leap is essential. You must answer yes to the question, "Could you see yourself doing this for the next ten years, and would you do this even if it failed?"

Read more on 10 Ways to Build Conviction HERE

2. Find Someone To Build With:

This will be a long journey, and you really can't build anything noteworthy alone. As you ruminate on your idea, it helps to find someone with complementary skills that could be a partner on the journey.

Sometimes, it is someone you already know and work well together, which helps. You can hit the ground running because you know each other's quirks on how you work best.

However, if you don't have someone you could work with top of mind, that's also fine. Now you need to find them. How do you find them? Use your network! They are likely within your network, so look again with fresh eyes. Who are the people with the skills you don't have but need in your current or past job, school, or friendship groups? It's time to dig through your contact list.

Kick off a discussion to know their ambitions and if entrepreneurship is part of their plan. Gauge your energy and chemistry: Do you enjoy spending time with this person, even over long periods? Hang out a couple more times in different contexts to get a true sense of this.

If you've exhausted your network and still come up short, then it might be time to speak to folks around you about your idea and if there is anyone in their network you should talk with. We speak to a LOT of founders, many of them meet their co-founders through introductions via mutual networks. It's a prevalent way people find co-founders or early founding team members.

With new potential co-founders, it helps to try out the relationship with a smaller scope to see how well you work together and take it from there. The next step below could be a great way to start.

3. Decide which problem:

This piece is an interesting one because, most of the time, your initial problem statement to the market is only a suggestion. The market is a moving organism; you are likely right and wrong about some assumptions.

For your ideas, sometimes you already have an idea you think could be a good one, or you could brainstorm and find ideas to work on with your original concept on the list.

Finding the right idea is an approximate science, but it helps to go through a few ideas with a framework in mind. 1) Is it painful/significant/scalable/impactful enough for your ambitions? 2) Is there a real gap in the market? 3) Does it fit your background and experiences? 3) Do you have the skills it will take? 4) Can you unlock your first 1-5 potential customers over a phone call?

At this stage, it is critical to stay flexible and open-minded because one of the reasons why start-ups might take longer to get market validation is that the founders are too attached to the original expression of their idea that they aren't listening to what the market and users are saying, they're just trying to convince the market that they are right. The blindspot from this bias could be dangerous, so stay super flexible and follow what users do as evidence of what they want.

If you discover that your original idea has fundamental flaws, don't be afraid to pivot to find one that works. Many incredible start-ups in the past ended up doing things so far from their original idea. Did you know youtube started as a dating app, and amazon as a bookstore?

4. Validate The Problem & That You're the Team for It:

Now that you've built conviction, perhaps have someone along with you on the journey to building this together, and you've decided on the problem to start with, the next step is validating that problem.

Surveys and market research could be tricky because sometimes people act differently than they might think or say they will. Also, market research is historical static data and needs to have nuance.

So, the best way to validate the problem is to answer the following questions using behavioural data. Essentially, watch what they do, not just what they say. Here's what you're trying to find out:

4.1. Are you solving a problem customers want and will pay for?

Evidence: Is your target customer profile willing to work with you for a pilot where you co-build a solution and they will pay for it? A strong signal is that there is willingness to pay even before a solution is built.

Transitioning from non-paid to paid pilot can be hard, best to avoid a free pilot and co-create enough value for it to be paid. Have they tried to solve this problem before to no avail limiting the education you have to give to the problem? Are the alternatives terrible for user experience and too expensive and is your solution different enough?

4.2. Can you easily find and access these customers?

Evidence: Can you find 1-3 target customer profiles to agree to sign a pilot? If these customers are too far out of your previous network, getting your idea off the ground might be difficult.

Whatever works in the pilot phase will unveil learnings to scaling what works. If the first part is challenging, it will probably be 10x more difficult as you rise.  

4.3. Can the team quickly and cheaply build and launch an MVP?

Evidence: Can you build the initial versions of the solution? Especially if this is a technology product, you want to be able to make a low-stakes version of the solution. It helps to have a co-founder who can build and ship products or at least someone who can use low-code tools to solve process problems.

For highly technical products, there might be other options than the latter. Although you often don't even need to write a line of code, stringing a process together with existing tools to solve the problem via a process. A process that technology might automate later. If you struggle here, key team competencies around the building are likely missing.

There's this famous quote – "Great founders think of product first, and distribution second."

5. Are you the right team for the problem?

Do you have the "right to the problem"? Is there a "problem, team fit"?

Why exactly are you the right team to solve this problem? You need to be able to answer that – there needs to be some skills, network and experience from the team's background that gives you an advantage in solving this problem.

If you struggle with this, it might be worth exploring other large issues that are a strong fit.

Continue to iterate on the problem and solution till you refine it enough.

6. Kickstart Fundraising from Angels:

Now that you're in a great position to have validated all or at least most of the above. You and your co-founder(s) are working well and beginning to navigate difficulties successfully. You also have successfully secured 1-3 pilot customers for whom you will co-design an MVP, and perhaps that has already started unlocking fantastic user insights.

At this point, you might start running into the issue of covering costs, depleting your funds and now needing more to build out the MVP and complete the pilots, or moving from part-time to full-time into the company with a minimal salary.

This is where you might consider fundraising from angels, friends and family to get you going to build solid metrics for a proper fundraising round from institutional investors.

The good news is that you’re in a good position to do so given the progress so far, making it easier for people who know and trust you to back you.

Did you know at OpenseedVC we invest in pre-incorporation startups at the angel stage? We'll be your family and friends round if you don't have rich family or friends who can put in thousands of dollars into your startup.

So, if you're in the early stages of validating an idea with some signals our doors are open to support you through that process. We give starter funding and a strong head start to talented operators turned founders, alongside the support of an experienced operator network. Tell us more HERE

I hope the tips above are helpful and wish you all the best as you imprint yourself on the world with a solution to a problem you are best positioned to solve.

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P.s you'll never be 100% ready to launch your startup. So don't wait for absolute certainty before you take the leap.

Maria Rotilu