Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
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Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#2Ben Jones (one of the authors of this article) talks about this research on an episode of NPR's Planet Money Indicator. In the episode they make the case that older startup founders are actually more successful than their younger peers for a number of reasons. It's a short listen, if you want to hear more
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2018/05/02/607815836/agin...
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#3> there is a more benign possibility: VCs are not simply looking to identify the firms with the highest growth potential. Rather, they may seek investments that will yield the highest returns, and it is possible that young founders are more financially constrained than more experienced ones, leading them to cede upside to investors at a lower price. In other words, younger entrepreneurs may be a better “deal” for investors than more experienced founders.
Seems plausible, but is it true? Anyone have experience to back it up? There are obvious downsides of a better deal with worse odds.
I’ve certainly heard this theory before, so maybe there’s something to it. I’ve heard a few stories of more experienced founders failing to get a term sheet after negotiating well. It’s hard to ever know the reasons, and from what I’ve seen founders tend to take VC rejections personally and/or jump to negative conclusions about VCs when they don’t close, so I tend to take rejection stories with a grain of salt.
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#4I have been an entrepreneur for 17 years and am now “middle aged”. In my early years, I made many, many mistakes that could probably be pegged to youthful hubris. I also had no idea how to run a real business because I had scant experience even working for one let alone crafting anything approaching a “go to market plan”.
If I were to start a new company today, I would probably lack the carefree creativity of a 23-year-old, not to mention the energy to work crazy hours. But everything about execution would be better, and as it happens, assuming you have a decent idea at the right time, execution is everything.
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#5Age could be a factor, but I think it’s all about grooming and connections. You can have Google on your resume and get funded. You might have been groomed from birth for success and you’ll get funded.
Success itself is whether the idea had merit and a solid team is built.
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#6Honest and possibly ignorant question here.
Wouldn’t the median be more representative of how old the common founder would be?
In a very simplistic example with a data set of two people aged 20 and 70 you would get 45 as the average age when in fact that doesn’t reflect the reality.
I always struggle when thinking about average vs median.
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#7And yet, the first thing companies do when there's any hint of trouble on the horizon is layoff anyone over 40-45.
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#8Honest and possibly ignorant question here. Wouldn’t the median be more representative of how old the common founder would be? In a very simplistic example with a data set of two people aged 20 and 70 you would get 45 as the average age when in fact that doesn’t reflect the reality. I always struggle when thinking about average vs median.
Yes, the median would be a better data point. Even better would be a qualification of "successful".
Are they equating successful startups that are worth a million to trillion dollar companies like apple and amazon?
> I always struggle when thinking about average vs median.
Median takes away the bias of the extremes that averages can include.
For example, if 9 people make $1 and 1 person makes $1000000, the average is about $100,000 while the media is $1. The $1 is more representative of the sample.
But in this "research", there are far more data to unpack. Like the quality and quantity of "successful".
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#9Honest and possibly ignorant question here. Wouldn’t the median be more representative of how old the common founder would be? In a very simplistic example with a data set of two people aged 20 and 70 you would get 45 as the average age when in fact that doesn’t reflect the reality. I always struggle when thinking about average vs median.
Yes, the median would be a better data point. Even better would be a qualification of "successful". Are they equating successful startups that are worth a million to trillion dollar companies like apple and amazon? > I always struggle when thinking about average vs median. Median takes away the bias of the extremes that averages can include. For example, if 9 people make $1 and 1 person makes $1000000, the average is…
>Median takes away the bias of the extremes that averages can include.
What sort of extremes do you expect to see in age data for starting a business?
There will be no 10 years olds, and likely no 90 years olds.
>But in this "research", there are far more data to unpack.
Why the quotations? Do you not believe this is research? This is a 1000 word summary of their work; do you think these researchers, from some of the best schools on the planet, didn't consider the sorts of questions you pose?
Re: Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45
#10Age could be a factor, but I think it’s all about grooming and connections. You can have Google on your resume and get funded. You might have been groomed from birth for success and you’ll get funded. Success itself is whether the idea had merit and a solid team is built.
> Success itself is whether the idea had merit and a solid team is built.
Even the concept of an idea being meritable is relative -- it depends on who is making the assessment.
Fred Wilson didn't think AirBnB had merit, in fact he thought the whole thing was ridiculous [0], no matter how hard pg tried to convince him otherwise [1].