{"id":47197,"date":"2023-10-20T15:52:47","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:52:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/startupsmart.test\/2023\/10\/20\/how-to-survive-the-first-year-of-building-a-startup-startupsmart\/"},"modified":"2023-10-20T15:52:47","modified_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:52:47","slug":"how-to-survive-the-first-year-of-building-a-startup-startupsmart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/uncategorized\/how-to-survive-the-first-year-of-building-a-startup-startupsmart\/","title":{"rendered":"How to survive the first year of building a startup – StartupSmart"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Your first year is what you\u2019re going to look back on with an incredible weight of emotion.<\/p>\n

Because in 10 years\u2019 time you\u2019ll either be raising a glass to the success that your initial 12 months set you on, or drinking by yourself listening to Tom Waits and hating whatever it was that made you quit.<\/p>\n

When you\u2019re starting a new project, the first lifetime is the hardest. But that lifetime starts with one year, one single year that you\u2019re going to struggle through and fight through, one single year that will make you want to throw in the towel every day.<\/p>\n

So how do you survive your first year as a creative entrepreneur?<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t matter how you\u2019re starting out, whether you\u2019re working on a book in your spare time, or diving head first into founding a company, or just starting to sell some hand-made products on Etsy.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re going to face the same challenges and obstacles, and you\u2019re going to need the same skills and tool kits.<\/p>\n

Be sure about what you\u2019re trying to do<\/span><\/h3>\n

One of the biggest reasons that people give up in their first year is that they don\u2019t have a handle on what they\u2019re actually trying to achieve.<\/p>\n

Sure, they\u2019ve got a vague notion around starting a business to solve a problem they\u2019ve encountered, or writing a book about a dragon, but it\u2019s not clear. If you asked them to explain what they\u2019re working on, they\u2019ll never be able to get it down to one sentence.<\/p>\n

A mate of mine, a VC who I used to work with back when he founded his first startup, says that people will pitch him all the time without really being able to explain anything to him in plain language. He finds himself asking them to go all the way back to the first slide in their presentation and sum their product and company up plainly. And they can\u2019t do it.<\/p>\n

The same goes for artists, authors and musicians. Have you ever tried asking them what they do? The answer could fill a goddamn volume, when it should be as simple as saying \u201cI do X because of Y”.<\/p>\n

If you can\u2019t define what you\u2019re attempting to do, you\u2019re going to spend your first year with no clue about whether or not it\u2019s working, whether or not you\u2019re succeeding, whether or not you\u2019re having any impact or gaining any traction or just pissing your time up a wall.<\/p>\n

Drink your own Kool Aid<\/h3>\n

The only person who really believes in you throughout your first year is you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Your mum probably tells people she\u2019s proud of you but I can guarantee you she\u2019d be a lot prouder if she honestly believed you were going to make it. Same as your partner\u200a\u2014\u200ahe says he\u2019s supportive, but he\u2019s not as invested in it as you are.<\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019ve got to have faith in what you\u2019re doing, and you\u2019ve got to have enough faith that it keeps you warm at night when your brain won\u2019t stop working and you can\u2019t count sheep because they keep morphing into potentially project destroying worries that keep jumping over your head.<\/p>\n

This means that when someone asks you what you\u2019re doing, the response isn\u2019t, “well\u2026I\u2019m trying to write a little book”. It\u2019s not, “oh\u2026I kind of started a small business, it might not go anywhere, but I\u2019m giving it a shot”.<\/p>\n

The response you give has to be proud. You\u2019ve got to stand by your work, and say you\u2019re proud to be doing it, and show that you believe so fully in what you\u2019re doing that you\u2019re not going to hide behind self deprecation and so-called humility.<\/p>\n

When you hide behind that bullshit, you\u2019re teaching yourself to put a caveat on everything you do. You\u2019re going to start believing that it\u2019s not a big deal, and if you believe that there\u2019s going to be no resistance when you want to quit.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Tell so many people that you\u2019ll be too embarrassed to give up<\/h3>\n

This is one of my favorites. If you want to become a creative entrepreneur, whether you\u2019re an author or a developer or a designer or a metalcore drummer, the biggest danger is that you\u2019ll chicken out. You\u2019ll pull the trigger, you\u2019ll begin the race, and then suddenly you\u2019ll back down and rationalize a bunch of reasons why you shouldn\u2019t have started in the first place.<\/p>\n

So here\u2019s a fun thing to do. Tell a bunch of people what you\u2019re up to. Tell so many people, people you know and people you\u2019ve only connected with on the internet, your ex-boyfriend, your pizza delivery guy, that friend of your Dad\u2019s who\u2019s kind of a jackass.<\/p>\n

Because if you tell enough people, you\u2019re going to be way too embarrassed to quit. You\u2019ll know that down the track, every one of those people will ask you how it\u2019s going, and you won\u2019t want to be shuffling your feet and making excuses. So you\u2019ll have another reason not to give up.<\/p>\n

The other benefit of doing this, is that you start to get used to hearing yourself talk about your project and it becomes a little more real. It stops being some concept or idea floating around in your head and starts being something tangible.<\/p>\n

Put in the work, and make yourself focus<\/h3>\n

This should be obvious, but I\u2019ve definitely had experiences where I\u2019ve \u201cstarted\u201d a company, by throwing up some fucking website and then leaving it there and expecting people to give me money.<\/p>\n

I know hard work ain\u2019t fun, and it ain\u2019t easy, and it\u2019s bloody depressing to have to do it when you want to drink absinthe and eat vegan brownies instead.<\/p>\n

But you\u2019ve got to do it. You\u2019ve got to meet your deadlines, and in your first year of business, you\u2019ve got to be able to show that you can get things done. You\u2019ll start to find ways to make yourself work, that will match your lifestyle. Everyone works differently, so don\u2019t put too much store in those 57 articles you bookmarked about how to manage your tasks.<\/p>\n

Just do what works for you. That\u2019s what I do. The thing about any work flow or productivity tip is that you can\u2019t try and make your entire life conform to it as though it\u2019s a rigid structure of rules.<\/p>\n

I tend to find that what works for me, what just gets me over the line in all my chaos and the hot mess that is my life, tends to be a bunch of weird, random shit that I\u2019ve come up with because they beat my personal quirks and problems.<\/p>\n

Once, struggling to reach deadlines and get my shit done, I found myself losing hours of my time to my beautiful, new Xbox One. It was frustrating, and I can admit that I don\u2019t have anywhere near the amount of self control I need to just say No to myself.<\/p>\n

So I shoved my only controller into a box and mailed it to myself. It took days to turn up, and in that time, I couldn\u2019t game and I couldn\u2019t goof off. That\u2019s not something you\u2019re necessarily going to find in anyone else\u2019s methodologies, because it\u2019s a reaction to a problem that\u2019s super personal for me.<\/p>\n

Take a break, or it\u2019ll break you<\/h3>\n

Finally, take some time off. I know you think that working non-stop is the way to go, and I know you believe that taking a break is a waste of time. But you\u2019re not a machine. You\u2019re going to wipe out if you don\u2019t let yourself have some space and learn how to breathe.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve met founders and artists who are proud of working 20 hour days. They wear it like a badge of honor, and it\u2019s depressing\u200a\u2014\u200abecause I\u2019ve been there and I know what happens. I used to take pills meant to keep me awake and wash \u2019em down with red bull, believing that if I just pushed myself to my limits for a while it would pay off someday.<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t. Your body holds grudges. It never forgives and it never forgets. All the pressure and the push that you\u2019ve got going right now will eventually come back to haunt you, and when it does, your body will fail. You can\u2019t be productive on years of exhaustion, and nobody is going to back an entrepreneur who\u2019s 3 weeks away from a total shut down.<\/p>\n

Take a break, or it\u2019s going to break you. Ask anyone, and they\u2019ll tell you the same.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/section>\n

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The first year is the hardest to survive. It was for me, it was for your idols, it was for your mentors, it was for the Beatles, it was for George Lucas, it was for J.K. Rowling.<\/p>\n

We all battle through the first 12 months feeling as though everything could go completely to shit at any given moment.<\/p>\n

But we all got through it. We fought tooth and nail, and we scratched and clawed our way over the finish line, and we coasted into our second year on fumes, but we made it.<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t have to do it with dignity. You just have to survive.<\/p>\n

This piece was first published on Medium.<\/em><\/p>\n

Follow StartupSmart on<\/em> Facebook,<\/em> Twitter,<\/em> LinkedIn<\/em> and<\/em> Soundcloud.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Your first year is what you\u2019re going to look back on with an incredible weight of emotion. Because in 10 years\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47197"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}