Cutting your own pay first is a strong signal of commitment, and many founders do it, but do it with a plan rather than as a reflex. Trimming your salary buys the team a little more time and shows you share the risk, which matters to employees and investors. The danger is cutting so deep that money stress starts driving your decisions, which is exactly when founders make scared, short-term choices. Keep enough coming in to cover your real basics and protect your emergency fund. If the gap is large, a temporary cut with a written trigger to restore it is cleaner than an open-ended one you quietly resent. Talk to co-founders so cuts are shared fairly. Salary changes affect your tax and take-home, and those rules shift, so confirm the numbers with a CA. The aim is to extend runway without breaking the founder.
A curated summary to orient you, not advice. The resources below are the real value.
2 hand-picked resources, 2 India-specific, 1 link-checked. Pick how you want to dig in.
Why we picked it The free, India-first grounding in what to do with cash once you have it: goals, allocation, SIPs, and not losing it to fees.
From Zerodha Varsity by Zerodha Varsity
Open zerodha.com →Why we picked it A no-nonsense, ad-light India personal-finance site: plain math and free calculators for emergency funds, goals, and asset allocation, with no product to sell you.
From Freefincal by M. Pattabiraman
Open freefincal.com →The same ground, over in Money, pricing & model, our Starting Up track.
