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. The India-specific money mechanics of an exit, laid out by a payroll company that processes them daily. It itemizes exactly... Razorpay Article · 12 min read Full and Final Settlement (FnF): All You Need to Know Razorpay Payroll
  2. This is the honest post-mortem, not the launch hype. Buffer ran fully public salaries for a decade (17 to 75 people) and this... Buffer Article · 15 min read Reflecting on a Decade of Transparent Salaries at Buffer Courtney Seiter and the Buffer team
  3. The definitive playbook for saying hard news first and plainly. Steinberg (People lead at Sennder, ex-Zynga/Facebook) is... First Round Review Article · 20 min read How to Lead and Rally a Company Through a Layoff Beth Steinberg (interviewed by First Round)
  4. Salary transparency made real in the Indian ecosystem: named founder comp across 65 founders at 37 companies. It shows the... Inc42 Article · 12 min read Founder Salaries Tracker FY25: How Much Did Startup Founders Earn? Inc42 Data Labs
  5. GitLab runs 2,000+ people across 60+ countries with zero headquarters, so their handbook is the closest thing to a field manual... The GitLab Handbook Article · 45 min read GitLab's Guide to All-Remote GitLab
  6. This is a real, published pay formula, not opinion: Salary = (SF 50th-percentile benchmark x cost-of-living multiplier x role... Buffer Article · 15 min read The Next Evolution of Transparent Salaries: Our Remote-First Formula and Salary Calculator Buffer
  7. Before you lock in location-based bands, read the honest case against them: this lays out where cost-of-living pay breeds... Sifted Article · 10 min read Should you earn less because you live somewhere cheaper? Sifted
  8. Written by a two-time exited founder who now coaches CEOs, this maps almost exactly onto our answer: split business focus... Matt Munson (2x exited founder, CEO coach) Essay · 14 min read How to Plan a Great Team Offsite Matt Munson
  9. This is the missing India cost context: real rupee numbers for a distributed team that can drive out of Mumbai instead of... StayVista Journal Article · 12 min read Corporate Offsite Destinations Near Mumbai: Where to Go, What to Spend and How to Plan StayVista Editorial
  10. This breaks down the four things you will run monthly (TDS under Section 192, PF via UAN, ESI for sub-21,000 wages, PT capped... Razorpay Article · 15 min read Payroll Compliance: PF, ESI, PT and TDS Explained RazorpayX Payroll
  11. POSH is the compliance founders skip until a complaint or a diligence checklist forces it, and this is a clean, dedicated... greytHR Article · 12 min read POSH Act Explained: Full Form, Meaning and Compliance Guide greytHR
  12. Doist runs a 100+ person team across every time zone with 80-90% of communication written, and this piece is their playbook... Doist / Twist Article · 18 min read Asynchronous Communication: The Real Reason Why Remote Workers Are More Productive Doist
  13. Newport diagnoses exactly why distributed teams end up always waiting on the founder: the hyperactive hive mind of ad hoc Slack... calnewport.com Essay · 12 min read On Productivity and Remote Work Cal Newport
  14. This is the exact scene you are dreading, in Indian parents' own words. Vineeta Singh (SUGAR) turned down a lucrative offer and... Humans of Bombay Article · 8 min read 5 Indian startup stories: founders who turned down the safe job and faced the family they had to answer to Humans of Bombay
  15. Kamath built Zerodha with zero VC, so his advice is un-hyped and unusually honest for an Indian founder of his stature. He blew... nithinkamath.me Essay · Varies (essay collection) Nithin Kamath: musings on risk, quitting, and the thin line between passion and foolishness Nithin Kamath
  16. This is the runway-and-plan-B ammunition you can literally quote to your parents. Adam Grant's research found founders who kept... tampham.co Article · 6 min read Don't quit your job to start a business (Adam Grant's research on de-risking the bet) Adam Grant (research), summarized
  17. This is the clearest naming of the exact trap in the question: Gorman, a therapist who works with founders, calls it identity... Ingmar Gorman (psychotherapist for entrepreneurs) Article · 10 min read When the Startup Becomes You: Burnout, Founders' Identity, and Therapy for Entrepreneurs Ingmar Gorman, PhD
  18. This is the piece that proves burnout is an operations problem, not a mood. Saxena's line is the whole distinction you need:... First Round Review Article · 14 min read Practical Frameworks for Beating Burnout Roli Saxena (interviewed by First Round Review)
  19. India's most respected bootstrapped founder built the exact week-level defenses this answer argues for, and runs a company of... Business Today Article · 5 min read Zerodha's Nithin Kamath stops all work chats after 6 pm; here's why Business Today staff, reporting Nithin Kamath
  20. This is a founder who built India's largest broker while being openly, publicly pessimistic about his own business for years,... Zerodha (Z-Connect) Essay · ~8 min read 15 years of Zerodha: The risk crystallises Nithin Kamath
  21. This is the scheduled brutal-honesty ritual, made concrete enough to actually run. You book a 60 to 90 minute session, tell the... stephenlynch.net Article · ~7 min read How to Conduct a Premortem Stephen Lynch
  22. An unusually honest first-person autopsy of a co-founder split, and it names the warning signs our answer says to catch early.... yirenlu.com Essay · ~10 min read My co-founder and I broke up. Here's a post-mortem. Yiren Lu
  23. A well-known Indian founder (Nearbuy, then a huge creator following) writes plainly about the one move that repairs a... Inc42 Article · ~7 min read The Founder's Role: Conflict Resolution Ankur Warikoo
  24. Horowitz names the exact thing that happens to your head in a crisis: the 3am spiral, food losing its taste, self-doubt... Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Essay · 5 min read The Struggle Ben Horowitz

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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