Creating a tech start-up from scratch is brutal.
Building your own start-up is actually the best thing you could do, especially if you are in your 20s. You will be able to learn so much that you won’t regret it.
I started late at the age of 34, after a few experiences in corporate in Italy and Malaysia, and if I could go back in time, I would start as early as possible.
I felt the need to start something on my own, to make a difference, create my own life journey, and above all, to solve a problem people were facing regularly.
If you are on the fence about embarking on building a new start-up with your friends or by yourself, make sure you adhere to 3 key points.
Get comfortable with change
At the beginning of my start-up journey, after building the first version of our platform, we worked hard to envision, design, and build version 2.0. Unfortunately, instead of the planned 3 months, development took over 12 months and by the time it was ready, I had a beautiful product that I could throw in the rubbish bin.
That’s because by then I had already spoken to several clients and gained enough insights that pointed to a few changes that needed to be executed before launching version 2.0
We had no choice but to re-design and rebuild.
This process, it’s a non-stop iteration process that will teach you a lot about product development, listening to your clients, capturing insights, reading between the lines, and dealing with developers, unless you are one of them.
During this process, you will enhance your ability to deliver, understand the market and your target client, and keep pivoting towards your product market fit.
Once you stop learning you will be out of business
When I started, it was challenging for me to communicate effectively with the developers.
Then I decided to learn a few basic coding skills. That is when I realized the world of matrix that these developers were living in. Now I was able to communicate with the development team better and understand their “language”. After that I learned some no-code platforms as well, to be able to develop and keep iterating the product and testing a few functionalities with real users.
As a start-up founder, you will wear several hats and you will be learning several tools and skills in a very condensed period of time. You will also learn a lot about yourself, developing a higher self-awareness.
You will have the opportunity to learn and practice skills that are very sought after in the market, from coding languages to digital marketing, creating and running advertising campaigns, creating client proposals, and much more. If you are lucky enough to grow your team, you will learn to hire, manage a team, and sometimes fire them.
One thing is for sure, you will not feel bored at any point in time!
Continuous learning is important for everyone, but for tech-startup founders is even more critical since technology evolves at a faster pace than everything else.
If you think you have the right blend of courage, grit, and determination to thrive in this adventurous journey and a burning desire or interest to solve a specific problem that you care about, just do it!
I actually believe that if you start very young in your early 20s you have a few advantages on your side:
- can easily recover and start again if things go wrong
- you have very limited responsibilities/commitments
- you most probably can rely on your family’s support
You can start with something small with the intention of experimenting and learning.
The right time is now!
If you were looking for the 3rd reason, keep following me and I will write about that and more. This is what happens, things do not always according to plan.
