Founder Involvement Is What Keeps Everything On The Rails
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Most advice for startups is useless because it’s optimized for companies that have already succeeded, and it’s given out by people who have never grown a company from zero themselves.
The conventional advice given to start-up founders about scaling their companies is wrong.
According to Paul Graham, the conventional advice is basically “hire good people and give them room to do their jobs.”
At first glance, this seems like good advice. Delegate. Don’t micromanage. Check in only when needed.
But, as PG describes, this advice is based on pattern matching to big companies. It’s advice for running a large, well-established company, not a small, rapidly growing one. It’s advice for managers, not founders.
What founders have learned through experience is that this advice basically equates to “hire professional fakers and let them drive the company into the ground.”
A founder has been with their company since day 1. They’ve watched things break. They’ve talked to the angriest users. They know which details matter because they’ve personally tripped over them. They have battle scars.
Jason used to onboard every Math Academy customer on an individual video call to make sure they knew how to get the most out of the product. Sandy handles literally all our customer support. We managed classes using the system every weekday for years. We worked hands-on with hundreds of individual students.
There’s no replacement for that kind of experience down in the trenches.
This is why founders need to be heavily involved with their teams. They can’t be hands-off, existing in “manager mode” once their company starts to gain some traction. They have to stay close to the product and the customers. Founder involvement is what keeps everything on the rails.
Discussed further: Math Academy Podcast #6 Part 2: On The Rails and Out Of Scope
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