Startups & Hard Work

Great post on startups and hard work as a guest post on Guy Kawasaki's excellent blog, but his entry this morning comes from RedFin's CEO, Glenn Kelman

Lately I've been thinking how hard, not how easy, it is to build a new company. Hard has gone out of fashion. Like college students bragging about how they barely studied, start-ups today take care to project a sense of ease. Wherever I’ve worked, we’ve secretly felt just the opposite. We’re assailed by doubts, mortified by our own shortcomings, surrounded by freaks, testy over silly details...

Like the souls in Dostoevsky who are admitted to heaven because they never thought themselves worthy of it, successful entrepreneurs can’t be convinced that any other startup has their troubles, because they constantly compare the triumphant launch parties and revisionist histories of successful companies to their own daily struggles. Just so you know you’re not alone, here’s a top-ten list of the ways a startup can feel deeply screwed up without really being that screwed up at all.

1. True believers go nuts at the slightest provocation.

2. Big projects attract good people.
   

3. Start-ups are freak-catchers.
   

4. Good code takes time.

5. Everybody has to re-build.
   

6. Fearless leaders are often terrified.

7. It'll always be hard work.
   

8. It isn't going to get better--it already is.
   

9. Truth is our only currency.
   

10. Competition starts at $100 million.
    

It's an awesome post and I highly recommend reading the whole thing.

Glenn/Redfin - ROCK ON.