Startup Blabber #002: Most Important Aspect of a Startup

Dear Steemians,

Wanted to talk today about what I personally think is the most important aspect of a startup.

I asked a few of my colleagues on what their thoughts were. Some keywords that came out were idea, location, luck, perserverence, team, communication, etc. While all of these are important, if I were to pick one out of all of these great keywords, it would be team. Some of you might disagree, but I believe there are not that many stupid ideas out there. There will always be a niche to fill. What is hard is ultimately the execution of that idea. That's why when people pitch ideas to me, I get interested initially, but once they can't back up an execution plan, that's where my interest begins to die.

While I don't have many startup experiences under my belt, I can share about the two that I have had.

TMON (An e-commerce company)
With TMON, it was actually 5 cofounders, Dan, another Chris, DH, Kihyun, and myself. This one was just lucky in how the team was formed. Dan, Chris, and I were all friends from college. While Dan and I were working in New York, we came across a basketball group, where one guy introduced us to DH and Kihyun. When we arrived in Korea, we met at this burger joint, and I guess, we can say the rest is history. The reason why I say that this group was lucky is that we all seemed to strengthen each other's weaknesses. People always laugh on how our roles came to be. Dan had the most charissma, and therefore, became the CEO. Kihyun was the only guy interested in photography and the only one with a DSLR camera ... our creative and product guy. I was good at excel and became the finance guy. The other Chris was always on some sort of communications platform, and therefore naturally became our customer satisfaction guy. DH was the best at speaking in Korean ... our sales guy!

Top left, Dan; Top right, myself; Bottom left, DH; Bottom right, Kihyun (The other Chris had to go back to school to graduate)

Althea (SEA Korean beauty portal)
This time, we thought we could do a startup with a little less founders. We went with three. Frank had the most experience in Southeast Asia, lived in Malaysia for the better part of a decade now, and had a Malaysian wife. He was the most outgoing of the group, and became our CEO. Jae with his experience in finance was our finance guy and myself, with the TMON experience under my belt, became the sales guy.

#01: Don't go in by yourself on your first try
This brings me to my first point, work with at least one other partner (who strengthens your weaknesses and vice versa). Unless you have a tremendous amount of work experience already, you probably will need not only physical help, but also mental help and support from your partner. You always have to be strong to your employees, but sometimes times can get tough, and you will need someone to lean on.

#02: Various strengths needed
Whenever you decide on doing a startup, there cannot be too many overlapping strong skill sets. Nine times out of ten, this will ultimately result in the dissolution of the group. In the beginning, everyone comes together with the naivete mindset with just an idealistic common goal in mind. While the business progresses, there will always be multiple issues to solve in a given day, and if two of the same people are always trying to tackle the same problem day in and day out, there are always bound to be problems.

#03: Clear CEO
Now my third point, when working with a partner, there always needs to be a clear number one that all of the team acknowledges. While this person will bear the brunt of the responsibility, there will always be times that you need to bulldoze through with someone holding the baton. I am all for equality, but in a startup, in order for the speed of a startup to maximize, there will be a need for a number 1 guy in the company.

Hope this helps anyone who is thinking of doing a startup in the future!

Here is a link to my Startup Blabber series:
Startup Blabber #001: Communication Within a Team

Chris