| > The alternative is to forgo raising money and creating a sustainable business from the beginning, growing linearly with the number of people that give you money for your product. Assuming that it doesn't require money to build, which is dubious in many cases, but alright. > Not only that, but because you don’t have the safety net of a pool of money, you are forced to find the fastest path to sustainable growth. Sustainable growth? Or just the fastest path to growth at any non-monetary cost so you can make the next payroll? Sure it might be cash sustainable growth but could be unsustainable in other ways such as making ever higher promises to keep customers buying more, allowing all sorts of unscrupulous purchases of user data, or shipping software without any modicum of security. > You now have no choice but to be ruthlessly focused on the things that impact your bottom line (i.e. pay the bills) Or you end up cutting corners and compromising on the product just to get some cash in the door. A lot of ethical red lines become maybes when the bank account declines. I have a lot of friends in the startup space and they have amazing stories of suddenly cash short companies burning up their reputation just to get the next sale. Crises don't lead to clearer decision making. A constant threat doesn't lead to clearer decision making. It leads to shorter-term thinking. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0146167299025001006 Would you do a better job for your company if they kept you one paycheck away from eviction? Or would you play politics, become a sycophant, hide errors you made, and be heavily focused on just making it to the next week no matter the cost? |