Dear Team,

I hope this message finds you well. I recently came across Sam Altman’s Startup Playbook and found it incredibly insightful. As we continue to grow and evolve, I believe it’s crucial for us to align our strategies and mindset with these valuable principles. Here’s a distilled version of the playbook tailored to our journey:

A Great Idea:

  • Clarity and Conciseness: Let’s ensure our ideas are clear and easily communicated.
  • Target User Focus: Identify and understand the users who desperately need our product.
  • Validation First: Validate our ideas by launching or selling before fully building them.
  • Evolve with Feedback: Be open to evolving our ideas based on user feedback.
  • Innovation Over Imitation: Aim to create something fundamentally new.
  • Ignore the Naysayers: Many great ideas initially sound bad—stay resilient.

A Great Team:

  • Unstoppable Founders: Embrace determination, resourcefulness, and an unstoppable mindset.
  • Complementary Cofounders: Work with cofounders who complement your skillset.
  • Quick Decisions on Bad Fits: Avoid bad cofounders and part ways quickly if necessary.
  • Early Equity Splits: Decide equity splits early on to avoid future conflicts.

A Great Product:

  • User Love: Building a product that users love is our ultimate goal.
  • Product Improvement Engine: Constantly focus on improving our product.
  • Direct User Interaction: Talk to users directly to understand their needs.
  • Early User Acquisition: Do things that don’t scale initially to recruit early users.
  • Simple Product Launch: Launch a simple version of our product sooner than later.
  • Focus on Betterment: Don’t make excuses for slow growth—focus on making the product better.

Great Execution:

  • Maintain Momentum: Growth and momentum solve problems and keep morale high.
  • Aggressive Goals: Make growth our top priority and set ambitious goals.
  • Metric Tracking: Track the right metrics and ensure internal transparency.
  • Internal Cadence: Establish a rhythm to maintain momentum.
  • Focus and Intensity: Stay focused and move decisively.
  • Hire Quality: Hire great people without compromising on quality.
  • Fire Quickly: If necessary, fire quickly to avoid negative impacts.
  • Value Aptitude: Prioritize aptitude over experience.
  • Managerial Growth: Invest in becoming good managers and support team growth.
  • Competitor Focus: Ignore competitors until they beat us with a real product.

These principles will be our guiding light as we navigate our path to success. Let’s internalize these values, incorporate them into our daily work, and continue striving for excellence.

Thank you for your dedication and hard work. Let’s make this journey remarkable!

Best regards,

Yves