Internal vs. external pressures impact the (potential for) success of your startup in different ways.
I’ll argue that internal pressures are the worst… how do I know? I’ve learned this the *hard way*. But remember that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger; never forget that.
When building a startup, external forces are not the worst of your enemies. Competition? Who cares? Bring it on! The economy and funding? What about IT infrastructure? Nah, don’t worry — today is very cheap to build and run your venture. People/resources? Yes, that too is available and with reasonable/negotiable terms and expectations. Guy Kawasaki writes a good summary about this new economy on his Building 43 interview by Scoble The new economics of entrepreneurship.
And I’ll argue that external pressures such as competition or potential for competition are great incentives, for example, to go to market, fast.
But it is the internal forces, the struggles within — and especially the inter-personal forces, such as lack of balance, openness and trust… ah, those are the forces that might keep you from winning. Those are forces for you to watch out for… Those are your worst enemies, and believe or not, are all within, very close to you. Otherwise, the company will kill itself from the inside; which is the worst (and stupidest) way to die…
This is why the team composition, from management and down is so important on a startup. Keep the team small, to the minimal. Cut the excess; or better, avoid excess — if you need a specific resource but deep inside you know it is not a match for your startup, bring the person as a contractor. And be open and be fair and be balanced.
If I were to put a totally non-scientific chart on this, it would look as follows:
…which in summary translates to “internal forces increases the threat levels for your company”.
Related to this topic see a couple of great pieces by Paul Graham:
ceo
P.S. This essay is part of what might become a series of related essays based on written notes on startups from previous life; notes that I thought I should share. I will be compiling these under the On Startups page on my weblog. And I’ve to admit that publishing these notes, which I recently re-discovered, is at times a bit “painful” in different ways; but hey, life goes on…