- Founder relationships are critical to the success of a startup
- Founder breakups can be detrimental to a startup's productivity and morale
- Making something people want is extremely difficult and a major cause of failure for startups
- Startups often have to change their ideas multiple times before finding success
- Even successful startups like Dropbox had to refine their ideas and execute well to succeed

In this excerpt from Jessica's talk at the 2014 Female Founders Conference, she discusses the two most common reasons startups fail: cofounder disputes and not making something people want.

All right, so now we're going to move on to another monster, co-founder disputes.

I think people underestimate how critical founder relationships are to the success of a startup.

Unfortunately, I've seen more founder breakups than I care to even count.

And when it happens, it can crush a startup.

Be very careful when you decide to start a startup with someone.

Have you worked with them or gone to school with them?

Don't just slap yourself together with someone just because they're available and seem good enough.

And if you start seeing red flags, do something about it.

It's a red flag when you find yourself worrying whether your co-founder is trustworthy or whether he or she works hard enough, or is competent.

When founders break up for whatever reason, it's a blow to the startup's productivity and morale.

If there's 3 and 1 leaves, it's not so bad.

But if there's 2 and 1 leaves, it's hard, because now you're a single founder.

Okay, now we come to the fiercest monster of all, the difficulty of making something people want.

It's so hard that most startups aren't able to do it.

You're trying to figure out something that's never been done before.

Not making something people want is the biggest cause of failure we see early on, with the second biggest being founder disputes.

In order to make something people want, being brilliant and determined is not enough.

You have to be able to talk to your users and adjust your idea accordingly.

And ordinarily, you have to change your idea quite a lot, even if you start out with a reasonably good 1.

Airbed and Breakfast was a rather narrower idea when they first launched.

They started out as a site that let people rent out airbeds to travelers for conferences.

Then they changed to renting out airbeds.

Then they changed to renting out a room or a couch, but the host had to be there to make breakfast.

Then they finally realized that there was all this pent-up demand to rent out entire places.

This evolution shows that you may begin with a general vision of what your startup is doing, but you often have to try several different approaches to get it right.

And sometimes you have to totally change your idea.

Order Ahead, which lets you order takeout on your cell phone, was the founder's sixth idea.

We funded them for the first thing, I think they presented on demo day with the third, and it wasn't until order ahead that they hit on their big idea.

Even if you don't need to change the overall idea much, you still tend to have to do lots of refinement.

And 1 of the best examples of this is Dropbox.

Here's a photo of Drew Houston during YC in the summer of 07.

He and Arash were working on something that was obviously necessary.

But the reason it was hard to predict early on whether they'd succeed is that there were lots of people doing this.

The way to win in this world was to execute well.

They had to get a thousand and 1 details right.

There were a lot of unglamorous schleps between that photograph and this 1.

Between starting the company and being on the cover of Forbes, you're going to have some dramatic ups and downs.


Speaker 0: All right, so now we're going to move on to another monster, co-founder disputes. I think people underestimate how critical founder relationships are to the success of a startup. Unfortunately, I've seen more founder breakups than I care to even count. And when it happens, it can crush a startup. Be very careful when you decide to start a startup with someone.

Do you know them well? Have you worked with them or gone to school with them? Don't just slap yourself together with someone just because they're available and seem good enough. You'll probably regret it. And if you start seeing red flags, do something about it.

Don't think it'll just go away. It's a red flag when you find yourself worrying whether your co-founder is trustworthy or whether he or she works hard enough, or is competent. When founders break up for whatever reason, it's a blow to the startup's productivity and morale. If there's 3 and 1 leaves, it's not so bad. But if there's 2 and 1 leaves, it's hard, because now you're a single founder.

Okay, now we come to the fiercest monster of all, the difficulty of making something people want. It's so hard that most startups aren't able to do it. You're trying to figure out something that's never been done before. Not making something people want is the biggest cause of failure we see early on, with the second biggest being founder disputes. In order to make something people want, being brilliant and determined is not enough.

You have to be able to talk to your users and adjust your idea accordingly. And ordinarily, you have to change your idea quite a lot, even if you start out with a reasonably good 1. Remember this website? Airbed and Breakfast was a rather narrower idea when they first launched. They started out as a site that let people rent out airbeds to travelers for conferences.

Then they changed to renting out airbeds. Then they changed to renting out a room or a couch, but the host had to be there to make breakfast. Then they finally realized that there was all this pent-up demand to rent out entire places. This evolution shows that you may begin with a general vision of what your startup is doing, but you often have to try several different approaches to get it right. And sometimes you have to totally change your idea.

Order Ahead, which lets you order takeout on your cell phone, was the founder's sixth idea. We funded them for the first thing, I think they presented on demo day with the third, and it wasn't until order ahead that they hit on their big idea. Even if you don't need to change the overall idea much, you still tend to have to do lots of refinement. And 1 of the best examples of this is Dropbox. Here's a photo of Drew Houston during YC in the summer of 07.

He and Arash were working on something that was obviously necessary. But the reason it was hard to predict early on whether they'd succeed is that there were lots of people doing this. The way to win in this world was to execute well. And it didn't happen overnight. They had to get a thousand and 1 details right.

There were a lot of unglamorous schleps between that photograph and this 1. Looks good. Between starting the company and being on the cover of Forbes, you're going to have some dramatic ups and downs. You

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Jessica Livingston on Cofounder Disputes and Making Something People Want