Sam Altman
Sam Altman
Samuel H. "Sam" Altmanis an American entrepreneur, programmer, venture capitalist and blogger. He is the president of Y Combinator and co-chairman of OpenAI...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBusinessman
CountryUnited States of America
thinking years want
You also really want to take the time to think about how the market is going to evolve.You need a market that's going to be big in 10 years.
real thinking long
So it's worth some real up front time to think through the long term value and the defensibility of the business.
running team thinking
Firing people is one of the worst parts of running a company. Actually in my own experience, I think it is the worst.
team thinking firsts
I think the best thing you can do is be aware that as a first time founder you are likely to be a very bad manager.
team thinking employee
Founders are usually very stingy with equity to employees and very generous with equity to investors. I think this is totally backwards.
team thinking giving
I think as a rough estimate, you should aim to give about 10% of the company to the first 10 employees.
team thinking bars
... you can think about that for everyone you hire: will I bet the future of this company on this single hire? And that's a tough bar.
thinking numbers squares
As you grow, the productivity I think, goes down with the square of the number of employees if you don't make an effort.
thinking matter company
The single word that matters most I think to keep the company productive as it grows is alignment.
thinking path firsts
You want to think about what is the path for my first 10 or 15 employees going to be as the company grows.
thinking years leaving
You never want to be in a place where an employee has vested 3 out of the 4 years of stock and they start thinking about leaving.
thinking years giving
You should think about for the next 10 years, you're going to be giving out 3-5% of the company every year.
thinking ideas trying
If you have several ideas that all seem pretty good, work on the one that you think about, when you're not trying to think about work.
thinking long advantage
Long term thinking is so rare anywhere, but especially in startups. This is a huge advantage if you do it.