All Aussie Accounting Adventures Podcast’s Post

💥 Have you listened to the latest episode on the All Aussie Accounting Adventures Podcast - Tech Edition? In this episode, Amy & Jack navigate the tricky subject of merging firms (and how to manage the tech-side of it!). They go over all the tools you need to help you make your life easier when it comes to managing these challenges. 🔊 Listen to the episode here: https://shorturl.at/jlhMO

The two huge callouts here for me are Customer Understanding and Quick Iteration. We're often too reactionary when considering our customers. Get to know them in an intimate and nuanced way. It's how great companies build essential product experiences often without anyone ever asking for it directly. Few things can crush customer confidence in a product like a slow and underwhelming release cycle. With every delay the pressure mounts on an individual release. I would argue that Continuous Integration & Deployment (CI/CD) is less tactical and more psychological. Embrace the power of now!

The market isn’t some distant entity; it’s made up of real people – your friends, family, neighbors, and your entire country. Your value determines your income. The more value you provide, the more the market will be willing to pay you. Sam Altman solved a problem and he is currently rewarded heavily for that. It isn't money you should be chasing. Instead, chase problem and when you find one, provide solutions, then make money around the value you offer. Read more: https://lnkd.in/dB88MsTD

We should all watch this video. When and how to grow your business smartly

This is a master piece for all startup and entrepreneurs

Golden rules 1) Customer centricity, obsession and intimacy 2) Stay lean, respect frugality 3) short cycle times 4) long-term commitment, Patience and a cash runway to support it 5) Dont hire till you are sure of your PMF and ability to capture value 6) Don't hire mediocre people; hire the best when you are hyper-scaling and hiring for the long term. Spend time on both recruiting and retaining. A leader is as good as his team, and the company is nothing but the Product and the Team 7) Relentless Execution 8) Don't give up, Resilience, Courage, Optimism, Adaptability, etc 9) Take care of yourself 10) Clear mission, think and evaluate it deeply and Communicate passionately

Great thoughts founders should use when building a great startup....

In connection with the best #startup failure I ever add, the below presentation by Sam Altman is broken down perfectly, a reflection of why a once promising Stash Duell failed. We knew our #users but not very well, we introduced the #product but quickly realized we needed the real users we originally researched, not founders grandmas/grandpas to make the sign ups growth look good. I remember a cofounder asking what does vanity metric means at the time. Data misinterpretation due to lack of planning and bad #leadership, including misconceptions that hundreds of LinkedIn/social followers is the same as a waitlist, apparently it wasn’t. We launched without any of those vanity metrics coming in to play. Lack of long term commitment by one of the #founders who mentioned we were wasting time on nurturing team #culture, relationships and stopped showing up to weekly huddles. We were told they’re making revenue on a different venture while Stash Duell was pre-revenue and taking too much time. Two different #business models that should never be compared. On staying #lean, we had 11 individuals working on the project at some point but the progress was mute. Apparently, knowing what not to do is just as great as knowing what to do, leading to adding members without actual activities to signify real growth. Aimlessly adding people without a vision of strategy and day to day task execution doesn’t help. That changed when we downsized, but it was too late as we all decided it wasn’t worth the effort, given the lack of founder’s support/commitment. To understand compound #growth, we spent 2 years marketing and creating community awareness, we were featured in a random blog as promising and we welcomed the free media. There was a misguided individual who mentioned we didn’t have to do anything to get featured in that piece. So for that reason, we shouldn’t waste time on current #marketing efforts since there’s no evidence it’ll work. They were right, you will always miss every shot you didn’t take. A few weeks later, we decided to shut down. #Entrepreneurs know that thousands of small stuff leads to the big picture, while one tiny detail can lead to destruction. The three billion dollars #space shuttle challenger crashed because of the “#failure of the primary and secondary redundant O-ring seals in a joint in the shuttle's right solid rocket booster (SRB)”. So sweat the small stuff wherever necessary, every little detail is what makes the whole. Kynetic Technology DelivaRx

Great insights on developing a great company

Another great summary from Sam Altman. Nine things to focus on - 5 Mins 1. Get close to your customers. This is how you build a great product. 2. Understand customer pain, and release something to solve it quickly. Quick iterations create compounding value that makes you unbeatable. 3. Think long-term, it's the only real gap left in the market. It's a ten-year project if you want it to work. 4. Stay lean until everything is working really well. You can't grow before PMF. 5. Stay flexible. Flexibility decreases with the square of the number of employees. You want to be a speed boat until you have locked in and have PMF. 6. Once things are working well scale quickly to be the battleship that dominates the sector 7. Never hire mediocre. The team you build is the company you build. The best CEOs are involved in hiring and retention and spend 40% of their time on the team. Many CEOs that spend 5% of their time or less hiring and on the team fail because of the team. 8. Relentless execution. Keep going, keep going, and focus on the details of every customer interaction. Startups are about not giving up. It's a ten-year marathon, take care of yourself, for you, your family and your team. 9. Have a clear mission. You may not start with one but it has to come. Communicating your mission is how you get people to join and support you so be good at articulating it.