Aidi — How to Ruin Your Startup in Record Time: 7 Easy Steps

The thought of being a founder and owning your own startup excites you so much; in fact, maybe it’s been your biggest dream for as long as you can remember– but for all the wrong reasons. Now, you’ve started your company or are this close 🤏🏼 to starting. Bravo! You’ve probably read tons of articles out there on how to be a great founder and how to build a successful startup, but none of them appeal to you– same boring stuff. You still want to embark on this journey with all the wrong reasons for starting a company being your motive. I totally get you and I promise you, you’re in the right place! This is the article you’ve been looking for.

These 7 steps will be providing you with the easiest way to end the sleepless nights, investor meetings, the stress and heartbreaks involved in building a startup, and your founder journey as a whole. In fact, if you follow these steps, you’ll be out of the door, faster than you came in…if you still remember how you came in in the first place.

1. Ignore Market Research, Trust Your Gut: Data where? That’s for people who have no vision or confidence– weaklings! You don’t need to waste your time validating your idea, talking to potential customers, or even understanding the market demand. The startup idea came to you and since you think people need the solution, they won’t hesitate to pay. And when customers start complaining or investors and employees offer suggestions, ignore them all. You know better than everyone else and adjusting your product or strategy will make you look weak. Bonus point: If someone tells you you’re going about it the wrong way, block them! 
2. Chase Investors, Not Customers: But seriously, who do customers help? The profit from customers compared to investors should be around 10%, give or take. That’s a tithe. You’re not in this business to grow slowly because the patient dog might end up dying before eating the fattest cow. The real goal is raising money, right? So, spend all your time perfecting pitch decks, networking at VC events, and throwing around buzzwords like “AI-powered,” “disruptive,” and “next-gen.” Customers? Revenue? Sustainable growth? Who cares! Just keep raising money until you’re the biggest in the industry.
3. Spend Your Investors’ Money Like You Just Won the Lottery: After you’ve done the hard part of asking investors for money and receiving funding, you deserve to treat yourself too! Don’t create a separate account for the money you just raised because “why waste time and resources to open another account?” Move your office to a high brow area so people will know that you are not small. Hire too many unnecessary staff– you can fund it. Lastly, launch a celebratory party for you and your friends in a suite because raising money from investors is not easy.
4. Have Zero Financial Discipline: Who needs financial planning when you have “vibes?” Money should not be caged. Instead, like a river, it should be free to flowwww. Don’t track expenses, don’t set budgets, and definitely don’t worry about runway. If your bank account is starting to look low, just speak more money into existence or chase another investor around. You know how to do your thing, right? Type shit. Also, don’t be accountable to your co-founders. If they’re not on the same boat with you, ignore them or let them know you care more about the business than they ever will, and you know what you’re doing. No long talks.
5. Ignore Legal & Compliance (You Are the Law): Legal paperwork can be super boring and time consuming. You have a whole startup to run so why waste time on incorporation, tax compliance, contracts, or intellectual property protection? Someone woke up one day and put all these regulations, so you can also wake up any day you like, remove them, and operate however you want. You run the startup world! And if you’re expanding internationally, don’t worry about different laws in different countries. What’s the worst that could happen? If they try to arrest you, mention your startup’s name. Like I mentioned earlier, you too are not small. Aura for aura.
6. Scale Too Fast: If you start seeing a little success in your startup, that’s a sign that you need to expand quickly! Immediately expand like you’re Amazon or Shoprite. Open offices in different cities, build unnecessary features before you find product-market fit, and hire aggressively– but make sure they’re your buddies, people you vibe well with, or family members– and let them do whatever they want. You’re not a micromanager.
7. Do Everything Yourself and Burn Out: Delegating? No thanks. You’re the founder, the CEO, the marketer, the accountant, the product manager, and the customer support rep. Who needs a team when you can work 20 hours a day? Don’t even ask for help from anyone, even family members. Your startup is your life now and that’s the only thing that truly matters– not your friends, family, health, and even sleep. If you’re not working every second and don’t have eye bags to show proof of your hard work, are you even a real entrepreneur? 

Now that you’ve followed these 7 steps, if everything comes crashing down, here’s the best escape route to take. Blame everyone for everything but yourself. Yes, trust me. Blame the investors, the economy, the government, the customers, your co-founders, your staff, and even the market. Then the best part (this always works like magic!) write a long, self-pitying LinkedIn post about how failure is a great learning experience.

See, you did it! You’ve successfully ruined your startup. Now, you can start all over and do the opposite of everything I mentioned in this article, and actually build a successful and sustainable business. Or, you can just dust your CV and start applying for jobs.

Many are called, few are chosen. Many desire to be founders, few actually know what it takes to grow a successful business.