People are often persuaded to buy something they otherwise wouldn’t when the alternative is to lose their chance forever.

The Threat of Loss Is More Motivating than the Promise of Gain

Alarm gives people a surge of adrenaline that provokes them to act. The threat of negative consequences combined with a deadline can be very effective at strengthening your argument and giving people the last push they need take action.
– The Startup Daily

Even the best employees have strengths and weaknesses.

If you have a talented employee who is not performing as well as they should, perhaps they have not yet been placed in the right role.

You Have to Have the Right Employees in the Right Positions

It’s the leader’s job to understand each employee’s strengths, and to place them in the role where they can add the most value.
– The Startup Daily

Employees who are mediocre and insecure about their own abilities tend to hire others who are not as good as they are so they can feel superior to them. B players will hire C players, C players will hire D players, and so on down the line until your organization is filled with bozos.

Hire Only People Who Are Better Than Yourself

Hire only A players, who will have the confidence and self-awareness to hire people who are better than themselves, and prevent the bozos from getting a foothold.
– The Startup Daily

When you start a new business you default to handling everything yourself. As your business grows so does the list of new responsibilities. There is an endless stream of new skills to learn, new problems to solve, and new decisions to make.

If you continue to do everything yourself, you will eventually reach capacity and have no more time or attention available for new tasks. The growth of your business will stall.

Your Business Can Only Grow as Fast as You Delegate

Free your time and attention for the challenges of continued growth by delegating everything you possibly can. Make yourself as unnecessary as possible for the day-to-day operations of your business.
– The Startup Daily

When making a request of someone, be sure to leave them a graceful way to decline your request. You may have failed to ask in the right way, there may be circumstances you aren’t aware of that affect their ability to fulfill the request, or they may not like feeling forced into doing something.

People Are More Likely to Comply with a Request When They are Offered a Graceful “Out”

When making the request, acknowledge that they may be too busy or the request may be too much to ask.

If you fail to leave them a face-saving way out, you may burn that bridge for any future requests. Giving them a graceful “out” means you still have a potential “in” with them next time.
– The Startup Daily

Shouting is not the best way to be heard, nor is it the best way to convey passion. Raising your volume also raises people’s defenses.

The best way to get people to listen carefully is to lower your voice.

People Speak Softest When it Matters Most

To further emphasize a statement, leave plenty of silence both before and after.

This is true in visual design as well. If you want something to emphasize a message, it needs to be surrounded by plenty of whitespace.
– The Startup Daily

Many people postpone their plans because they don’t yet know the details of what they will create, how to get where they are going, or how the industry they will be entering works. A little preparation is helpful, but don’t overdo it.

The Stuff You Learn Along the Way Is Ten Times More Valuable than What You Could Learn Beforehand

You don’t need to be an expert in everything that you might face in the future. You don’t need a plan for every contingency. And you don’t need to gain the approval or permission of industry insiders.

Everything that you really need to know can be learned along the way.
– The Startup Daily

The most powerful ideas are the simplest—and in retrospect, the most obvious. But it’s the obvious ideas that are the hardest to see when you’re focused on the day-to-day activities inside your organization.

The Best Insights Come from Watching Customers Use Your Products

Get out there with your users. See the world from their perspective first, and then observe as they interact with your offering. Obvious improvements will become apparent when your product or service is viewed in the context of the customer’s life.

If you always look at something from the same point of view you won’t see anything new. Sometimes you have to change your perspective to see what is most obvious.
– The Startup Daily

Failure happens. Products fail, bad hiring decisions are made, and even the best leaders make mistakes. One of the best tests of an organization is what happens when people fail.

Is the organization able to openly discuss its failures, learn from them, and use those learnings to improve the system? Or do failures lead to witch hunts and placing blame, creating a climate of fear and discouraging people from taking risks in the future?

The Best Companies Don’t Avoid Making Mistakes, They Avoid Making the Same Mistakes

Learning from past failures is crucial to innovation. When you foster a climate of psychological safety that allows people to honestly discuss and learn from their failures, you can turn those failures into a competitive advantage.
– The Startup Daily

Not all customers are created equal. Find out who your very best customers are—the ones who buy the most, fastest, and most frequently—and then figure out what they have in common. Do they live in the same neighborhood, frequent the same websites, or share some other trait that you can use to find them. This is where your marketing budget is best spent.

Don’t Market to the Most Customers, Just the Best Customers

Marketing is about building top-of-mind awareness among your potential customers. It’s more effective to get your message in front of the same “dream customers” three times than it is to get it in front of three times as many customers just one time.
– The Startup Daily