Become information consuming machines. The amount of relevant insights and upskilling opportunities you are exposed to in the early days of starting up is extremely high.

High development velocity without compromising on good coding standards is difficult but important.

Measure worth based on output delivered. Time and effort spent is inconsequential.

Your workflow is a constant tiff between Maker’s schedule vs Manager’s schedule - http://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html.

A good engineer is a function of their pace of development + level of optimisation.

The number of people willing to provide unfiltered and exhaustive feedback to your product is usually always a positive surprise.

Indirect feedback channels reveal strong patterns if received in volume.

If your product has multiple features that users would be unfamiliar with, segment those features based on a user’s behaviour or reveal them progressively.

Frequent life-threatening challenges and constant ups and downs feel difficult at first but you surely gain a level of mental immunity after sometime.

“Over the years, I’ve come to see that the best programmer doesn’t add 10 times the value. He or she adds more like a 100 times.” - Reed Hastings This is especially more relevant when the number of jumps to reaching the end-user are few.

There tends to be an unspoken distance between employer and employee.

A 40 hours work week is a part-time job.

If you were a coder, continue to be a coder.

Every founder is a de-facto product manager. Every founder is a de-facto seller.

“Careers are dead. Every employee is an unrestricted free agent” - Mark Cuban

It is extremely easy to get busy. It is important to spend time on the right busy.

Major reason for your existence is your power to go faster than the incumbents.

Be a good builder. Be a good seller.

If hiring freshers, find individuals with an inherent passion for excellence in their vertical. The rest would lack a good work ethic.

Mutual respect and fostering an ownership mentality drives throughput far more than micromanagement.

Gaining back momentum once lost is actually very difficult.

Efficient sprints pre-emptively and pessimistically account for stakeholder timelines.

“Make error free production deployments a foregone conclusion.”

Building culture is similar to building SEO. Doesnt show results immediately but helps compound your growth in the long term.

Your moat should be built in-house. If you’re selling a better looking experience as compared to existing players, then the product should be designed inhouse.

Your ad can only have one call-to-action. Choose wisely.

Product and Distribution are yin and yang for a B2C. Equally tough. Equally important.

Habit building products are wildly difficult to build retention for.

Your tech stack is only as strong as your weakest third party plugin.

An incomplete team is better than a team of low performers.

Domain edge and conviction through numbers usually trumps silver tongue or emotional narratives while raising capital.

Building pathways to reach the right audience/tools/investors are extremely important to grow faster. Accelerators and incubators that provide this edge are worth the equity to gain that leverage.

Building in solitude rarely works out.

At some point, you move from an idea/product to a company. Outlook should change accordingly.

Market can be local but the tech should always be compared to a global standard.

Effective compartmentalisation and ability to context switch will go miles for you.