The Indian startup ecosystem needs to address the harassment issue as a matter of urgency now. Because time's up.
Category: governance
Rebuilding Trust: A Manifesto for 2018
When I take a painkiller, I trust that a reputed company's product, bought at my local trusted pharmacy, will just make my pain go away, not kill me. My pharmacist in turn believes the company's promise that it is shipping a painkiller - not cyanide - under its brand, and that the currency note I … Continue reading Rebuilding Trust: A Manifesto for 2018
How to prepare for wild success
This article is the final one in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on September the 11th, 2017. Even if the widely accepted statistic “8 out of 10 startups fail” is wrong, it is true that a vast proportion of startups are likelier to fail than to succeed. As a result … Continue reading How to prepare for wild success
“I failed. Now what?”
This article is the twenty-first, and the penultimate, in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on August the 21st, 2017. “I failed. Now what?” Whenever I hear these words, the first thing I do is remind the founder: People don't fail or succeed, ventures do. A “failed” venture can mean various things … Continue reading “I failed. Now what?”
Founder conflict: disagreement on fund raising
This article is the nineteenth in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on July the 12th, 2017. Is there such a thing as disagreement among founders on fund raising? Isn’t external fund raising seen as some kind of marker of validation for startups, one that sets them on the growth path like a … Continue reading Founder conflict: disagreement on fund raising
Of untenable CEOs
The positions of two CEOs are being discussed this week as untenable. One of them is the British Prime Minister Theresa May, fresh from the weak and wobbly win at an election where she campaigned as the "strong and stable" alternative. The other is Travis Kalanick, the CEO of Uber, who is currently running an … Continue reading Of untenable CEOs
Founder Conflict: Key Asset Ownership
This article is the seventeenth in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on June the 7th, 2017. In this and the next couple of columns, I shall write about founder conflicts commonly encountered but not often easily resolved. Some are foreseeable e.g. what happens to the equity of a co-founder who … Continue reading Founder Conflict: Key Asset Ownership
Attracting talent
This article is the sixteenth in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on May the 25th, 2017. Apart from having a strategic direction and enough money to execute on the vision, the key challenge for founders is talent. Based on my experience, I will go out on a limb and say … Continue reading Attracting talent
Early employees and the art of equity distribution
This article is the fifteenth in the Startup Series on FirstPost’s Tech2 section and first appeared on May the 10th, 2017. As a professional and an advisor, I have been on both the founder’s and the early employee’s sides of the question of equity for early employees. In an early stage venture, equity is an … Continue reading Early employees and the art of equity distribution
Leadership and the importance of changing one’s mind
Martin McGuinness, former deputy first minister of Northern Ireland and also former IRA commander, died today. I was shocked to learn he was only 66. Shocked because I have known his name since I was a child growing up in India, and had always thought he was much older. But he wasn't. In that short … Continue reading Leadership and the importance of changing one’s mind
