Building a High-Performance Startup Team

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Building a High-Performance Startup Team
Akira Hirai ? Cayenne Consulting ? www.caycon.com
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Importance of the Team

• What matters is not ideas,
• but the people who have them.
• Good people can fix bad ideas,
• but good ideas can't save bad people.
• -- Paul Graham, Y Combinator

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Roles of the Co-Founding Team

• Really Important Folks
• Product / Technical
• Fairly Important Folks
• Sales / Marketing
• Less Important Folks
• Business / Numbers / Operations / MBAs

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Key Considerations

• Character
• Compatibility
• Commitment
• Conviction
• Challenge
• Competence

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How Do You Find Them?

• Networking
• Networking
• Networking
• Networking
• Everything Else

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Big Mistakes(Especially for Startups)

• Marquee names
• Snap decisions
• Legal stuff
• Headhunters
• Not checking references

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Further Reading

• Guy Kawasaki
• Reality Check
• The Art of the Start
• Paul Graham
• paulgraham.com

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MoreWisdom

• Startup happiness is all about getting to solve
  problems you care about alongside people you
  like and respect.
• -- Dharmesh Shah, HubSpot

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Building a High-Performance Startup Team
Akira Hirai ? Cayenne Consulting ? www.caycon.com