A VC in Vacationland

Cover of Only the Paranoid Survive

Andy Grove had it right: 'Only the paranoid survive'. Building a successful start up means lying awake many nights thinking about what could go wrong, and how to prevent it. What can go wrong will go wrong in a young company. One bad hire who becomes an energy vampire for the rest of the employees, releasing a product too early that fails in the field, a poor decision on features and functionality can all create failures that can be hard to recover from.

So celebrate those successes–customer acquisition, a new release, hiring a key employee–with lots of gusto, them get back to worrying…