Starting Up

The resources founders actually use.

Every essay, video, podcast, book and tool behind 1,046 answered founder questions, in one place, each with a note on why it is here.

What founders use most, ranked by how many answers lean on it.

  1. This is the tactical companion to the framing: it hands you the actual structure of the ask so you show up with a specific... Dreamit Ventures Article · 10 min read Startup Funding Explained: How to Raise a Bridge Round Steve Barsh
  2. A first-timer's operating manual for the meeting itself, not the deck. Its sharpest rule is the one founders get wrong: never... F2 Venture Capital Article · 10 min read Let's Talk About Your First Board Meeting Tal Zackon
  3. The Silicon Valley playbooks skip the part that will fine you: Section 173 of the Companies Act requires your first board... IndiaFilings Article · 12 min read First Board Meeting of a Company IndiaFilings
  4. Suster, a former founder turned VC, hands you the exact line for the advise-versus-decide boundary: when he disagrees with a... Both Sides of the Table Article · 12 min read 8 Tips To Get the Most Out of Your Investors and Board Mark Suster
  5. Gil (angel in Airbnb, Stripe, Coinbase) treats the board as something the CEO actively manages, not answers to. The tactic that... High Growth Handbook Book · 20 min read The Role of the CEO: Managing Your Board of Directors (High Growth Handbook) Elad Gil
  6. This is the original essay that coined "lines, not dots," the exact idea behind the opinionated answer. Suster (a VC who... Both Sides of the Table Essay · 9 min read Invest in Lines, Not Dots Mark Suster
  7. This is the template resource: it hands you the exact soft-ask script to add a target investor to your list ("I'm not raising... Foundersuite Article · 10 min read How to Use Investor Updates to Raise Venture Capital Faster Nathan Beckord
  8. This is the India-specific version of the same advice, and the numbers make the case sharper than any global source: warm... Swimming With Sharks (Indian Startup Funding Guide) Article · 20 min read Preparing to Fundraise (The Founder's Guide to Startup Funding, Indian Ecosystem) The Founder's Guide to Startup Funding
  9. This is the founder-voice argument for our exact answer, written by the founder of EchoSign. Lemkin's four reasons map... SaaStr Article · 7 min read 4 Reasons to Send Investor Updates Even When Times Are Tough Jason Lemkin
  10. Written from the investor's side of the table by Elizabeth Yin, who backs pre-seed founders for a living, so it answers the... Hustle Fund Article · 6 min read Why You Should Always Send Your Investor Updates Elizabeth Yin
  11. This is the reset playbook in one page. Lemkin makes the distinction that saves you from panicking: a soft miss (still growing... SaaStr Article · 9 min read How to Gracefully Miss a Quarter. And Take The Right Actions Afterward. Jason Lemkin
  12. The first-hand cautionary tale our answer needs. Kwan went 50/50 across two startups over nine years, put in 100k of her own... Melissa Kwan (eWebinar founder) Essay · 10 min read Why cofounders should not split equity 50/50 Melissa Kwan
  13. The India edge on paper. It states plainly that "equal splits are often unfair," then does what the US pieces skip: it turns... Razorpay Rize Article · 12 min read How to Draft a Co-founders Agreement: A Complete Guide Razorpay Rize
  14. This is the plain-English explainer that says the quiet part out loud: the 4-year schedule with a 1-year cliff exists so a... HSBC Innovation Banking Article · 9 min read Founder vesting: what early-stage founders need to know HSBC Innovation Banking
  15. GitLab runs a fully remote company on exactly the rule your answer prescribes: every area has one named owner who holds the... GitLab Handbook Article · 15 min read Directly Responsible Individuals (DRI) GitLab
  16. A concrete account of co-founders going full-time on a stagger, not in lockstep: Erich left his job in July 2018 to run sales... Indie Hackers Article · 12 min read Quitting Our Jobs to Follow Our Callings Alessandro DiSanto and Erich Kerekes
  17. Two working VCs answer the exact question, and they answer it like operators, not lawyers: run the split through a neutral... BetaKit Article · 9 min read Ask an Investor: How do I fire my co-founder? Katherine Hague and Roger Chabra
  18. This is the India-specific mechanics your answer demands. It lays out both routes: a co-founder who resigns (company files Form... ClearTax Article · 10 min read Change in Directors: Appointment, Resignation and Removal ClearTax editorial team
  19. A VC opens its own portfolio: 35 of 100 companies had a founder leave, most inside two years, so a split is normal, not a... Icehouse Ventures Article · 8 min read 35% of founders break up. Here's what we've learned. Icehouse Ventures
  20. This draws the exact line you are asking about with Indian numbers: a late-joining co-founder lands at 20 to 40 percent, while... EquityList Article · 18 min read ESOP 101: How to Set Up Your ESOP Pool as an Indian Company EquityList
  21. Most of the solo-vs-team debate is written for US VCs writing US-sized cheques. This one is written for the Indian raise, where... Xartup Article · 9 min read Solo Founder vs Co-Founders: What VCs Really Think Asmita (Spotlight by Xartup)
  22. A YC-caliber founder (later YC's own CEO) tells the specific story of watching his co-founder relationship at Posterous rot... Initialized Capital / Medium Essay · 10 min read Co-founder Conflict: Lessons learned the hard way, and how to avoid them Garry Tan
  23. The Tuft and Needle founders ran a distributed founding team on purpose (Palo Alto and Tempe) and wrote down exactly how they... Entrepreneur Article · 9 min read The Survival Guide to Co-Founders Living Far Apart JT Marino and Daehee Park
  24. A first-person account of a founding team split across Hong Kong and Estonia (7,852 km apart) who made distance work because... Kipwise Blog Article · 7 min read How We Started Kipwise as Remote Co-Founders Kipwise founding team

Show the next 24

Playbooks

A goal, and the route through it a step at a time.

Find an idea worth pursuing Spot problems worth solving and find the one that actually fits you. 4 steps Validate before you build Get real evidence people want it before you write a line of code. 4 steps Understand your customers Talk to real users, define who you're for, and read the market clearly. 4 steps From idea to first customers The idea-stage spine: find a problem, prove it, talk to customers, and land the first ten. 4 steps Build an MVP without code Ship a first version with no-code tools before you hire anyone. 4 steps Build and launch your first product Turn a validated idea into something real people can use. 6 steps Find and work with developers Hire, brief, and work with builders without getting burned. 4 steps Name and brand your startup Name it, design an identity, and say what it does in a line. 3 steps Build a landing page that converts A page that loads fast, earns trust, and turns visitors into signups. 4 steps Get your first customers The scrappy, unscalable work of going from zero to your first paying users. 5 steps Sell it yourself, founder-led Reach out, run the conversation, and close before you have a sales team. 4 steps Grow with content and SEO Compound reach with content, search, and a founder audience. 3 steps Grow with paid ads Spend that returns: the channels, metrics, and loops behind it. 4 steps Price and package your product Charge for value, package it right, and check the numbers work. 3 steps Bootstrap instead of raising Fund growth from revenue, and keep control of your company. 4 steps Raise your first round Understand the game before you pitch: whether to raise, from whom, and on what terms. 5 steps Find a co-founder, split equity Find the right partner and split equity without regret. 3 steps Set up the company right Incorporate, split equity, protect your IP, and make your first hires. 4 steps Survive founder life Mindset, burnout, the leap, and the parts nobody warns you about. 5 steps Build in India The India-specific playbook: schemes, government, enterprise, and the local market. 5 steps

The questions founders start with

I want to start a startup but I don't have an idea. Where do I even begin? Stop hunting for a billion-dollar idea and start collecting problems. The best ideas come from noticing things that annoy you or people around you ... Beginner 19 resources → What does 'validating an idea' actually mean? Validation is gathering real-world evidence that a specific group of people has a painful problem AND will change their behaviour (pay, sign up, sw... Beginner 20 resources → Do I actually need a co-founder, or can I go solo? You don't strictly need one, but the data says teams outlast solos: complementary skills, shared load, and someone to argue you out of bad calls al... Beginner 3 resources → What actually counts as an MVP, and what's the smallest one I can get away with? An MVP is the least you can build (or fake) to test your single riskiest assumption, not a shrunken version of your dream product. Ask 'what's the ... Beginner 20 resources → How do I talk to customers without them just telling me what I want to hear? Stop pitching and start interrogating their past. Ask about what they actually did last time the problem hit, what it cost them, and what they trie... Beginner 23 resources → How do I actually get my first 10 customers when nobody has heard of me? You go get them by hand, one at a time, email people you already know, people your investors/friends know, and strangers in the exact niche you're ... Beginner 19 resources → How do I decide how much to charge for my product? Stop guessing and stop pricing off your costs, price off the value the customer gets and their willingness to pay. Talk to customers about pricing,... Beginner 3 resources → Should I raise venture capital or bootstrap my startup? Raise VC only if your business needs a big pile of cash to reach escape velocity before someone else does, and if a 10x-in-a-few-years outcome is g... Beginner 3 resources →

Questions for your situation

The Aspiring Founder The Idea-Stage Founder The Builder The Launcher The Grower The Student Founder The Indie Hacker The Technical Solo Founder The Non-Technical Founder The Domain Expert The Women Founder The Anywhere Founder The Corporate Switcher The Repeat Founder
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