9/52: Defaults

#CapitalAtRisk

Above: Law 10 from The 48 Laws of Power (Special Edition) by Robert Greene

The 2010s was the decade of the Entrepreneur. The 2020s will be the decade of the Investor.

“Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

A problem for every solution

In October 2015 Paul Graham wrote about being ‘default alive or default dead’, here. When looking at startups that have been operating for a few months he wrote, “Assuming their expenses remain constant and their revenue growth is what it has been over the last several months, do they make it to profitability on the money they have left? Or to put it more dramatically, by default do they live or die?“

I reread this over the weekend and wondered what I could compare this to when thinking about the quiddity of founders. Is there anything that, once the startup has been operating for a while, I can look at to get an indication of the founder’s character?

I came up with three defaults¹ that it might be wise to think about²…