Here's the best way to prepare to be a startup founder, according to a Silicon Valley veteran
Sep 1, 2016, 02:05 IST
Advertisement
Now that launching a startup has become a popular career goal for a generation of digital-savvy, Mark Zuckerberg-inspired entrepreneurs, Livingston offered some advice on The Macro for how ambitious teenagers or college students can prepare to one day start their own.
Here's what she recommends:
- Learn to code: "There is a lot of great online courses now, if you don't already know how to code, but I would strongly recommend that everyone learn to code. Even if you are not great - we don't know how to do it - it helps you sort of judge other programmers."
- Build stuff with people: "Work with other people, especially if you are in college. That is just the best place to meet potential co-founders and get to know people and talk about interesting problems and try to solve them."
- Build something that you might like to use: "Try to solve your own problem. It does not have to be the next startup, but it will at least get you to thinking about problems, it will get you like practicing, launching something and listening to users and talking to users."
- Go work at an early startup: "After [trying to solve a problem], if you are not ready to start a startup right away, go work in an early stage startup. You can learn so much working at an early stage startup that you wouldn't working on a big company."
These aren't guarantees that a founder is successful, but it's a place to start. Livingston says the most successful founders she has seen are determined and focused on two things: building their product and making something people want.