By Javed Hasan, CEO and Co-founder, Lineaje
Airbnb, Instagram, and OpenAI are torchbearers in the startup hall of fame. While it may seem like all three companies achieved success overnight, this is far from the truth.
Airbnb was founded in 2008 but didn’t start turning a profit until 2012. The founders struggled hard at first, and most investors shied away from the idea of strangers staying in a home. Before it was known as Instagram, founder Kevin Systrom spent years working on a failed app before pivoting to the popular photo-sharing platform. OpenAI was in research mode for seven years before ChatGPT experienced its breakout moment in 2022. Before that, it was only known in academic circles.
The illusion of startup success often paints a picture of overnight victories, but the journey is usually far more complex. Sustaining momentum post-launch is a challenge many startups aren’t prepared for—90 percent of companies fail within the first five years.
Sustainable growth requires more than a brilliant idea; it requires resilience. As a startup founder with over two decades in cybersecurity and executive experience who left Big Tech to forge my path in the emerging software supply chain security category, I want to discuss the pillars that have guided my journey and can support others starting their own companies.
Summary
The Talent Myth: Why Passion Trumps Skill
As a founder, building a successful company can’t revolve around you alone. The old saying, “It takes a village,” holds power—especially in the startup world. However, it’s important not to simply pick the most talented candidates from the pool. One of the key elements in identifying the right person to help grow your company is passion.
Why? Talent without commitment won’t carry you through the bumpy road ahead. Someone could look great on paper, but if they’re not aligned with your mission and ready to go through the inevitable ups and downs, they’ll burn out or disengage.
Some questions to consider when evaluating a candidate’s passion include:
What draws you to our mission, and how does it align with your personal values?
How will you stay motivated when things get hard?
Was there a time when you went above and beyond for a mission-driven project?
Building the Right Team
Highly engaged employees can make or break a business. According to Harvard Business Review, companies with invested employees outperform their competitors by 147 percent in earnings per share. Employee engagement can also enhance overall performance by 21 percent. Passion is a starting point, but a good hire who fits well with the team culture can elevate morale.
The best way to turn any employee into a high-impact hire and build the right team is to get past your ego. As a founder, you are a thermostat, not a thermometer, for culture. The thermostat sets the temperature; the thermometer only reflects it. Setting the tone for cross-functional collaboration is key.
Chances are, you’ll be starting with a handful of people. To grow, it’s important to break down traditional departmental silos, encourage knowledge sharing, and look to the broader team to complement everyone’s strengths.
The Evolving Role of Leadership
As your organization grows, your role as a leader shifts. You move from the primary executor to the orchestrator. This brings challenges, including:
Letting go of direct control
Trusting team members
Shifting from tactical to strategic thinking
Once the organization starts to scale, you must embrace the fact that your primary tasks become building trust and delegating effectively. This helps you overcome the discomfort of being less involved in day-to-day work. It’s important to empower team decision-making. After all, you hired them to get the job done.
It’s critical to trust your instincts. Then, as CEO, you can maintain the company vision while encouraging your team with transparent communication, consistent follow-through, and a little faith.
Innovation as a Survival Strategy
The right team will get you 50 percent of the way toward a successful beginning, but an innovative product strategy will carry you the rest of the way. Many startups fail because they commit to a narrow, single path. When the market shifts, they’re stuck.
To sustain momentum, it’s important to think outside the box and adopt a mindset of strategic flexibility. For example, at my company, we were one of the pioneers of the now fundamental software supply chain security and maintenance category. While our vision has stayed consistent, new threats and technologies like generative AI have required us to evolve our product to meet our customers’ needs.
Sometimes that means throwing out ideas we’ve been working on or refining existing solutions. Though it may feel frustrating to “waste” time, it ultimately balances current revenue with future potential.
Startup founders should regularly scan the market landscape and maintain flexibility in product development. This is the foundation of a culture of ongoing innovation that can embrace emerging technologies.
The journeys of companies like Airbnb, Instagram, and OpenAI highlight the reality that success is rarely immediate. The path to sustainable growth is filled with challenges. As a founder, you must embrace resilience and adaptability and recognize that building a thriving business requires more than a brilliant idea.
Passion, teamwork, evolving leadership, and an innovative product strategy are the keys to navigating the complex startup landscape. While the road is not always linear, the lessons learned will define your company’s lasting impact.