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"The human challenge of a start-up"
Eric Ries's lean start-up approach is both popular and rightly praised for offering sensible
advice on starting on a new business venture. In essence this draws on work by W. Edwards
Deming and others, which is also at the core of lean production. In the start-up environment,
this amounts to building the minimum viable construct that allows you to test the market
quickly and iterate from there.
Nick Rosa, co-founder of Sandbox, in a recent talk, puts it slightly differently but rather
succinctly as being courageous enough to ask the "killer questions early” – the questions
around why the business might not work. Answering those questions usually makes you take
the right actions early to avoid that fate, acting almost like an adaptive and evolving strategic
plan which is more appropriate for a start-up.
While lean rightly focuses on the market, failure in a start-up can come about in other ways.
Anecdotally, you usually see failure coming from one or more problems with the market,
funding or people. The people or team dimension however often gets less focus in a start-up,
something those who have experienced the time poverty in your life when working on a start-
up can readily understand.
Anyone who has been through the daily rollercoaster ride of a start-up will easily identify
some of the "killer questions” in the people/team dimension. However, when on that roller-
coaster dedicating time to tackling these questions can feel impossible and not immediately
urgent to the 'pulled-in-every-direction” reality of the start-up. But it is!
Almost nobody builds a business on their own, so creating the team is part of the building
process. So what might be some of the "killer”people/team questions in this space?
· Among the founders is there one with the passion and desire to struggle through the
problems that arise, who when totally flat themselves, will pick themselves and those around
them up to carry on?
· Is there clear "subject matter expertise”centred on the value of the business in one of the
core people?
· Is there a sense of curiosity among them – do they ask questions?
· Are they flexibility enough to adapt to the wind of change but confident enough to stay the

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course?
· Will they admit to not knowing or getting things wrong?
· Do they (really) share common values?
· Do they (really) share common purpose?
In the same presentation Nick Rosa said at the heart of a new business you need a hacker and
a hustler – the hacker who figures out how to get things done no matter what and the hustler
who brings the innovation, passion and drive to the business idea. Around these you build the
team.
As that team builds, so does the culture. That culture in turn should help bind the team further
together, while populating the business with the needed diversity in thought, experience and
mindset required.
Asking early the relevant killer questions here can help with that process. The challenges this
can identify are often ones others have met and overcome before. Accessing that knowledge
now can be of immense value in helping minimising future risk. Some risk points can be
worked on and resolved. Some, such as a clash of values, cannot and addressing the
implications of this early avoids probable serious interpersonal problems later.
We see four aspects to an approach to dealing with these risks.
It starts with the founders in having them make explicit the vision and values that they really
operate to. In working with start-ups as consultants we actually need to do this with them
anyway to properly understand the intent behind the business.
Making it explicit comes from getting answers to questions around the individuals' visions,
understanding of what success might mean, what each brings to the endeavour, what they
require of the other, how decisions are made, what behaviours are acceptable, how problems
are resolved etc. The requirement is not agreement but rather gaining mutual understanding,
honesty and trust about the way they will actually work with each other, how they will
behave and what they stand for.
This will be the seed from which the embedded culture will sustain itself and grow. This
growth comes through the various people they begin to interact with especially with the
people they will hire. So it is not surprising the quality of hiring will have a huge impact on
how things develop. This is the second aspect.
Partners and employee selection is a tough process to get right. Firstly the impact of getting it
wrong is severe. Secondly the needs of the business are evolving rapidly and the required
competencies of a new employee can be utterly different in a year.
For this reason start-ups need to use a range of hiring approaches – e.g. contracts,
consultancy, out-sourcing – as well as creating employees. With an early employee the
founders are inviting that person to join them on their adventure, an invitation that should be
closely guard. In giving those invitations it needs to be to someone who will add the right

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combination of experience, enthusiasm and knowledge that growing the business requires.
The key is not hiring just for the work today but rather hire someone who can contribute as
the journey unfolds.
The third aspect is remembering that hiring is the start of a new relationship. The first day is
one filled with great expectation but what is needed is that six months forward that
expectation persists supported now by strong progress to a needed purpose. While much
depends on the employee the founders also need to work for that. Most founders almost
inevitably also become a manager which for many is yet another transition. (Pat Cunneen's
book "Becoming a Manager: Thoughts & Tools for Your Transition - Learning from
Experienced Managers” is a good guide on how to handle this properly.)
Sometimes things won't work out for whatever reason. These situations are difficult but need
to be dealt with quickly, effectively and in keeping with the desired culture. Ignoring or
hoping it will sort itself almost inevitably makes the final solution worse.
The final aspect is simply the awareness that things will arise outside the knowledge and
experience of people within the business. Having access to a trusted network of external
people to contact when at these points is important. As mentioned earlier most problems will
have been encountered by someone before and the time saved from accessing their expertise
can be of immense value. Building that network needs effort and willingness to contribute to
others outside the business as well!
Start-ups often do feel like a roller-coaster ride, exhilarating and exciting but they can also be
brutal. How hard they might be can be eased by facing the challenge of addressing some of
the "killer questions” early and revisiting them on some regular basis. The human challenge
is tough but also one where the experience of others is usually very relevant. Utilising what is
already known not only makes the human challenge far easier to handle but also helps tap
into one of the joys of a start-up, a motivated, passionate set of people working collectively to
a clear purpose.
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