Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

generalist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 121 posts

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#101

Post by nickpinkston »

peterjancelis wrote: post #76

My experience: Psychological orphans with a basic income. "Psychological orphans" i.e. kids who had shitty parents and learned to adapt to survive. Then this behavior became a habit and a game. "Basic income" i.e. kids from middle and upper middle class backgrounds so there was no food poverty in the family and long term thinking was possible by the kid, even in the context of the dysfunctional setting. The above is…

Yea, I definitely have seen this same pattern, nice description.

Though there is the "upper class" founder background that still had shitty parents and something to prove, and often they can get really far because of the $ and connections, though often have the issue that their alternative life is a bit "too easy" so they don't execute hard enough / close enough, or they just give up.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#102

Post by mattgreenrocks »

dagorenouf wrote: post #61

I left a 6 figure engineering job to build my own startup with my wife. For the past 5 years, we spent 2/3rds of our savings on it and almost didn’t take vacation. This year we finally reached ramen profitability. When I look at where we would be if I had kept the job, we would be homeowners, be able to buy new clothes regularly, go to restaurants and take awesome vacations a few times a year. But the missing thing w…

This is really cool. I'm in the branding phase of an app on the side at the moment, and I absolutely loathe trying to pin down the name and the logo because it is dark alley after dark alley until you reach some okay-enough state to launch with.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#103

Post by dagorenouf »

mattgreenrocks wrote: post #102
dagorenouf wrote: post #61

I left a 6 figure engineering job to build my own startup with my wife. For the past 5 years, we spent 2/3rds of our savings on it and almost didn’t take vacation. This year we finally reached ramen profitability. When I look at where we would be if I had kept the job, we would be homeowners, be able to buy new clothes regularly, go to restaurants and take awesome vacations a few times a year. But the missing thing w…

This is really cool. I'm in the branding phase of an app on the side at the moment, and I absolutely loathe trying to pin down the name and the logo because it is dark alley after dark alley until you reach some okay-enough state to launch with.

This is exactly why we built this. Allows you to get a professional branding to start with even on low budget. Then you can go ahead and launch, validate your product, and come back to get custom work done when you need it / can budget for it.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#104

Post by JohnFen »

dagorenouf wrote: post #61

I left a 6 figure engineering job to build my own startup with my wife. For the past 5 years, we spent 2/3rds of our savings on it and almost didn’t take vacation. This year we finally reached ramen profitability. When I look at where we would be if I had kept the job, we would be homeowners, be able to buy new clothes regularly, go to restaurants and take awesome vacations a few times a year. But the missing thing w…

> The reason why I’m willing to sacrifice so much is because i fundamentally don’t like having to follow orders from a boss or manager.

This is why I do it as well, at least in part. The other part is that I get to control what projects I get to work on.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#105

Post by ianandrich »

antiviral wrote: post #96
jl2718 wrote: post #90

I ran a large, somewhat infamous hacker house, and watched the beginning of a few unicorn founders. My observation is that everybody talks about being an entrepreneur, but the only people that actually do are the people with no other options. They'll never admit those painful and repeated failures at normal employment, or other areas of normal life. For instance, I have rarely seen men in relationships succeed. Their…

> "Partnered women usually end up quitting in disgust or dumping their partners to gain the benefits of being single when soliciting potential investors" > "Most young people don't realize that the majority of middle-aged men in this country are legally barred from leaving their state of residence without permission." I am curious whether you'd like to elaborate on these points you made above.

Seconded. I've noticed the same patterns, but I want to hear you elaborate further.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#106

Post by s1k3 »

dagorenouf wrote: post #61

I left a 6 figure engineering job to build my own startup with my wife. For the past 5 years, we spent 2/3rds of our savings on it and almost didn’t take vacation. This year we finally reached ramen profitability. When I look at where we would be if I had kept the job, we would be homeowners, be able to buy new clothes regularly, go to restaurants and take awesome vacations a few times a year. But the missing thing w…

I literally just wasted so much money on a logo. Coulda used this post last week.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#107

Post by garrickvanburen »

ilamont wrote: post #45
1970-01-01 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The secret sauce is "Make something people want" (YC's motto)

Make something people want, and will pay for.

I’ll take it a step further: Only make what people have committed to paying for.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#108

Post by tccole »

mjfl wrote: post #38
jossclimb wrote: post #36

I tell you what its not, being a great engineer. That can help in someways in understanding the technical aspects, but the amount of startups I know who have written incredible clean code with beautiful architecture who have run out of funding compared to the folks who wrote a janky frankensteins monster which they sold to customers, is very high.

correct. writing "clean code" is for pedants at big orgs.

Though if you have clean code… it makes it easier to iterate

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#109

Post by sivadass »

dagorenouf wrote: post #97
redmaverick wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you end up finding customers? And particularly customers who are willing to pay for logos? Any marketing strategies you implemented?

We started by sponsoring newsletters and google ads. But it didn't convert and we didn't have the budget to keep experimenting. Then I started being active on indiehackers.com and reddit to first ask for feedback, then eventually sharing my learnings and lesson in blog post format. This showed promise and got us to a couple sales per week as other founders got curious about us and then considered us when they needed…

Thanks for sharing this, i can understand now, how long it will take for SEO take effect and mediums to focus.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#110

Post by Delento »

dagorenouf wrote: post #61

I left a 6 figure engineering job to build my own startup with my wife. For the past 5 years, we spent 2/3rds of our savings on it and almost didn’t take vacation. This year we finally reached ramen profitability. When I look at where we would be if I had kept the job, we would be homeowners, be able to buy new clothes regularly, go to restaurants and take awesome vacations a few times a year. But the missing thing w…

Tbh it looks more like the dream of being independent was more important to you than actually solving a real problem.

I find it very interesting that you value 'any startup' more than owning your own flat for example

Post reply on HN