OnStartups.com offers the following tips for startups including:

1. Seek transparency and understanding with your partners early.  Issues get harder as time passes.
2. Startup founders work long hours for a reason.  There’s more work than there are people.  If you’re seeking balance, seek it elsewhere.
3. Bad customers will drain you of passion.  Really bad customers will drain you of both passion and profits.  Unfortunately, most bad customers will degenerate into really bad customers if you don’t do something about it.
4. If you’re changing direction often, worry a little.  If you’re changing people often, worry a lot.
5. It’s lonely at the top, but even lonelier at the bottom.  In the early days of a startup, hardly anyone wants to talk to you (except some desperate vendors).
6. Eventually, your product will need to work and do something useful.  No amount of marketing or strategy will get you around this.

Some are definitely “tough love” but valuable nonetheless.

Related posts:

1. Taking the Hassle Out of Startups
2. Staying Excited
3. Business Quote of the Week – Seth Godin

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 27th, 2006 at 9:37 am and is filed under Starting A Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.