Adeo Ressi was first known for his audacious and controversial company TheFunded.com, a forum where CEOs can comment and review global funding sources worldwide.
His latest and all-encompassing project- the Founder Institute has taken his vision of helping entrepreneurs to the next level.
The definition of internet entrepreneur used to be 97% failure but Ressi is changing that. His dream of training people who build meaningful and enduring companies is revolutionizing the way incubators work. His success keeps going from strength to strength as his students graduate to viable start-ups.
What is it that he actually tells these sophomore students? What can we learn if we’re not in a city where the Founders Institute offers their 12-week courses?
This business guru offers us the following guidelines for staying on top of the competition:
On getting your business online
First, get a good name. Nothing anchors your product and your vision like a solid title. It will be how you are known and if your idea is good enough: your legacy.
Ressi is adamant that sometimes only external pressure can help you meet your deadlines, whether it is telling family that you’ll launch your site by Christmas or borrowing money off a friend- the pressure of honoring those announcements will drive you forward.
When you don’t have those external demands, you’ll start to tinker, always finding excuses to never get their site up and going. The more you tinker the more expectations you’ll have and the less happy you’re going to be to jump into going live.
When your idea is fully set and viable, and you have bounced the idea off people, get it live. Being a First Mover is the reason to launch because you don’t want to lose that competitive edge of timing.
On Pitching
Assessing people is probably the hardest thing you’ll need to get good at which is the essence of pitching. Pitching ideas will never stop. You. Will. Always. Be. Pitching.
For example, you’ll be pitching your ideas to secure a good team. Without a good team you cannot pitch to investors, partners, customers or users. Refine those pitching skills.
Remember you will hear “No.” a million times but you still have to stay positive and that takes vision.
Staying Positive
Everybody gets down and loses steam on seeing ideas through but taking the time to read the good feedback will keep you strong. Even CEOs suffers from bad company reviews but our guru’s suggestion is to rationalize the negative. Contextualize who said what and analyze why that No wasn’t a Yes and see how you can make the changes needed to start getting the positive reactions.
Fear of Success
You’d think that should read fear of failure, wouldn’t you? Ressi says most people either suffer from one of the other. The fear of failure is obvious- “what are the financial/social or even health impacts if I do not succeed” is what keeps all of us going but weirdly there are people who suffer from the other side too. Examples of fear of success are things like tinkering with a site and never getting it up and running, pivoting what it is the company actually does too quickly or even sticking to that cushy job and not taking the plunge on your sweet idea.
When all is said and done, keeping hold of your vision is vital.
It is going to be that thing that keeps you hungry and awake at night to get it done. If you are true to your vision, you’ll never compromise on quality either. The passion you bring to the table will be the thing that inspires others to work for you, will definitely get you your angel investors and make your customers recommend you.
So endeth the lesson…
