From student to CEO
Networking as the key to success
In Part 1 we discussed the driving force of your project, which is the personal vision and motivation, and now it’s time to dig into what I have found to be the most important piece of the puzzle; networking.
The team you put together is your most valuable asset you have. Just having an idea or a product in mind is not enough to get you to the ultimate goal of getting funding; people have ideas all the time, but only a few actually execute them. Carefully choosing your teammates is crucial, because you will be under a lot of pressure, will have to progress quickly and be able to adapt to ever changing circumstances and obstacles.
At MyCodi we are a highly motivated, uniquely skilled and passionate team with the same goal and vision.
Unless you’re the ultimate Jack of all Trades and can do everything yourself, then you’re wasting your time reading this and should get back to work. In my experience, I was lucky that my Co-Founder and CTO Jonathan Ankiewicz, who is a much better programmer than me, saw my original video post (that I took down later the next day) and asked if what I was working on was a real product. He was so excited about it that it motivated me enough to pursue the idea for real. Jon was my classmate in college and we made this weird funny 360 video in the only class we had together. His work ethics were phenomenal even though it was only a school project, but that is where you start making your first connections with people in your field.
Connect with as many people as you can and really grow your network. It is these connections that provide you the answers to most of the issues you face and will be dealing with; case in point, you can add me as a connection and a resource to your problems. Before really starting a company, you must have all the small pieces in place in order to be able to have a strategy on how to get your idea into an MVP — minimum viable product. The rest you will either figure out later, know someone who will figure it out for you or have a general idea of a solution. Most often that ‘solution’ is knowing what is possible and finding the right person who can do it.
Most of the connections you need you most likely know already, even if not directly just yet. In fact, all the connections I really needed to get up to this point I either directly or indirectly already knew from the start, all I had to do was actually ask them. The sooner you start asking questions, the easier things will become. In my experience the biggest mistake is worrying about everything yourself. That’s where most of my frustrations and sometimes depressions came from. Every problem no matter how small that I shared with others got solved much quicker than I would be able to on my own, and was a much needed energy boost when climbing up this seemingly never ending ladder of problems.
Through my friends and colleagues I gained connections to lawyers, programmers, designers, managers all of whom became crucial in my first entrepreneurship and I consider them very close friends as well; people that I know I can rely on.
In fact it was Jonathan’s friend Kelly Champ who helped us with writing our first major contract work (that I believe actually saved us from first-time troubles). All he asked for his amazing work was that we keep him in mind in the future. Kelly eventually became our COO and has great connections of his own that we are putting in place. Keep asking your friends for their opinions, suggestions and help because they just may be interested in working with you or help you out.
One thing I want to point out is beware of your connections who want to help you out, but ‘need’ to get paid for their work right away. While their intentions might be most likely good, they need to understand that at this early stage you are trying to build something from nothing; they have to take the ‘leap of faith’ with you. In fact our whole startup team didn’t make a single $ for seven months because we all understood that the rewards will come later (we all had our own jobs while we were putting our startup together). You need to save your money for paying contractors, designers, developers and some legal fees that will be unavoidable. Don’t lose your friends because they ask to be paid for their work (as they just might need it, especially during a pandemic), just be cautious if it’s wise.
In our experience we needed an industrial designer for our project and didn’t know anyone directly. One of my friends introduced me to a good and capable designer who was very interested in our project and we did work together for three weeks. However later he expressed an interest of receiving too much ‘shares’ of the company, which I’m quite sure we could have discussed and come to acceptable terms for both sides, but the initial high asking price just didn’t do it for me. Here I’d like to recommend the book ‘Never Split the Difference’ by Chris Voss, that has great tips and strategies when it comes to negotiating.
I turned back to Facebook asking my friends if they know any industrial designers and I got connected with an amazing industrial design company Rogue ID with whom we’re starting work on a second new product already.
All in all, keep growing your network of connections, start following inspirational people on LinkedIn, read books such as ‘Lean Startup’ for inspirations and general strategies because your connections will become the backbone of your journey. We will revisit network connections on several other occasions when talking from experience I find to be most useful, but I’d like to remind you that the core of our startup is personal connections. In case you haven’t done so yet, I invite you to add me to your connections or follow my posts so we can share our experiences.
With the basic overview of vision, motivation and teamwork covered, it is time to get into starting our business and cover the following topics in this Student to CEO series:
- Research & Business Plan
- Patenting your Idea
- Pitching for Funding
- Hiring Contractors
- Visa Options and tips for Foreigners
Next time we will discuss my favorite step in the startup process, which is ideation and coming up with the best possible solution; Execution & Research.