Entrepreneurship Tips — Pre-Startup

  Of course. Agree on a price (the hardest part) Write a check and both sign a transfer agreement to put in the company’s board of Director minutes Change the company cap table and ownership name Of course, this is not always easy, as usually the departing founder wants way more than the shares are worth today. The more common scenario is when the other founder leaves (early, before the company has any profits or revenue often) the company issues more shares that dilute down the old founder because they should have never vested it all and the founding agreements...

  A good question, and one most professionals get wrong. Even professional recruiters. Although this can depend on many factors, generally speaking the CEO does not need to come from the industry.  The existing employees and team should bring the industry and domain expertise. If it is a raw startup with no staff, that is really a co-founder, not a “CEO hire”. And no good CEO is going to work for a founder that has little experience. Most experienced CEOs do not want to take raw startup risk, they come in later when the risk is fleshed out and scaling...

There are many factors, and it is too complex to offer a standard answer. You need to hire a consultant that is a CEO/Founder with lots of experience to discuss things for 1–2 hours. One way around this is to set hourly rates for the founders and track time to allocate it according to contribution. Shares are earned with seat equity. A simple spreadsheet with monthly invoices submitted by everyone is easy to do. There are plenty of software solutions for this too, but likely best only when it gets complicated with many founders. People and Founders are never “equal”...

Ideas are worthless. And it would be totally legal for them to steal them. Maybe you are confusing patents, copyrights and other intellectual property. An “idea” has no legal protections. And you can be pretty sure you are not the first one to have any given idea too. And if anyone can steal a single “idea” and replicate your business, it is a very bad business. What you need is lots more including many things like a business model, target market, product/service and hundreds of ideas. Companies need a team, plan and many protectable ideas. These are protectable intellectual property...

It all starts with a strong, documented values statement that is taken very seriously at every stage. This means enforcing it and using it as a basis for reviews, bonuses, and promotions in a visible way. Here are more key component of a process that will work: Training for employees in this and your company's value proposition. Including ethical behavior for long-term, mutual benefit. A win-win relationship with customers, not a transactional one. A culture of customer service. Employees are not allowed to bad mouth customers. That is attitude and can run off the rails if not limited. Use video...