After working for years in early-stage startups and as a journalist, here are three hard truths I’ve learned:
1. Success in Silicon Valley hinges on connections, hard work and luck.
2. Startups often fail because founders lack fundamental business knowledge.
3. Real, actionable advice comes from those who’ve actually done it.
There’s no such thing as “founder DNA.” If you’re willing to take on risk and invest years of your life in something that has maybe a 10% chance of paying off — less if you’re a woman or person of color — you can be a startup founder.
Here’s why I founded Fund/Build/Scale:
1. To help founders make fewer mistakes.
2. To share successful strategies that can accelerate your go-to-market journey.
3. To inspire more people to see themselves as potential founders. There’s a lot of overlooked talent out there, and we are missing out.
This podcast is for anyone who’s interested in learning the basic skills required to launch a startup, secure initial funding and transform an idea into a sustainable business.
I’m talking to guests about everything: finding a co-founder, conducting customer discovery, recruiting early employees, developing a PLG strategy, fundraising when you’re outside a major tech hub — all of it.
Interested? Subscribe to Fund/Build/Scale on all major platforms and follow the podcast on LinkedIn or Substack to get articles, excerpts, transcripts and more.
All content for Fund/Build/Scale is the property of Walter Thompson and is served directly from their servers
with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.
After working for years in early-stage startups and as a journalist, here are three hard truths I’ve learned:
1. Success in Silicon Valley hinges on connections, hard work and luck.
2. Startups often fail because founders lack fundamental business knowledge.
3. Real, actionable advice comes from those who’ve actually done it.
There’s no such thing as “founder DNA.” If you’re willing to take on risk and invest years of your life in something that has maybe a 10% chance of paying off — less if you’re a woman or person of color — you can be a startup founder.
Here’s why I founded Fund/Build/Scale:
1. To help founders make fewer mistakes.
2. To share successful strategies that can accelerate your go-to-market journey.
3. To inspire more people to see themselves as potential founders. There’s a lot of overlooked talent out there, and we are missing out.
This podcast is for anyone who’s interested in learning the basic skills required to launch a startup, secure initial funding and transform an idea into a sustainable business.
I’m talking to guests about everything: finding a co-founder, conducting customer discovery, recruiting early employees, developing a PLG strategy, fundraising when you’re outside a major tech hub — all of it.
Interested? Subscribe to Fund/Build/Scale on all major platforms and follow the podcast on LinkedIn or Substack to get articles, excerpts, transcripts and more.
Avoiding Founder Burnout and other Early-Stage Startup Pitfalls
Fund/Build/Scale
42 minutes 38 seconds
2 months ago
Avoiding Founder Burnout and other Early-Stage Startup Pitfalls
Pro tip: If you can’t see yourself getting up every morning for the next ten years and being excited about going to work, don’t launch a startup.
Ajay Prakash co-founded Rinse in 2013 to take the friction out of laundry and dry cleaning — for consumers, and for the small, family-owned businesses behind the counter.
Since then, Rinse has scaled into a national brand, and Ajay has become a lecturer at Stanford Graduate Business School’s Startup Garage, where he teaches frameworks for validating ideas, testing business models, and knowing when it’s time to take the leap into entrepreneurship.
I invited him on to share what he’s learned about developing domain expertise from scratch, building trust with co-founders, and avoiding the early mistakes that can derail a promising business.
RUNTIME 42:38
EPISODE BREAKDOWN
(2:22) Ajay talks about two trends that led him to co-found Rinse in 2013.
(4:15) Rinse co-founder James Joun was “one of my best friends from college.”
(5:29) “When we started, we spent a lot of time with James’ parents in the dry-cleaning store.”
(6:40) Before taking the leap, founders should identify their “passion, expertise, and market opportunity.”
(9:11) “As you build a company, answering the question of ‘why now’ and ‘why me’ is really important.”
(11:19) “We signed up 11 of our friends. We picked up their clothes.”
(14:17) “Every smart investor we talked to… told us we had to be on-demand.”
(17:41) Early signals led Rinse to pivot from pricing per pound to adopting a subscription model.
(20:23) His approach to crafting customer personas.
(22:05) “We always envisioned helping the local cleaners.”
(27:11) From the start, Rinse used Net Promoter Scores and surveys to glean customer insights.
(30:44) The “two general areas of lessons” Ajay teaches at Stanford’s Startup Garage.
(34:53) Why he encourages Startup Garage students to keep asking themselves, “Am I still excited?”
(37:41) How to prepare for the mental challenges of being a startup founder.
(40:01) Is Rinse’s operational model adaptable to other industries and services?
LINKS
Ajay Prakash
James Joun
Rinse
The Four Steps to the Epiphany, Steven G. Blank
The Lean Startup, Eric Ries
Startup Garage at Stanford Graduate School of Business
SUBSCRIBE
📥 Get the Fund/Build/Scale newsletter on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/7249143254363856897/
📸 Follow Fund/Build/Scale on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fundbuildscale/
Thanks for listening!
– Walter.
Fund/Build/Scale
After working for years in early-stage startups and as a journalist, here are three hard truths I’ve learned:
1. Success in Silicon Valley hinges on connections, hard work and luck.
2. Startups often fail because founders lack fundamental business knowledge.
3. Real, actionable advice comes from those who’ve actually done it.
There’s no such thing as “founder DNA.” If you’re willing to take on risk and invest years of your life in something that has maybe a 10% chance of paying off — less if you’re a woman or person of color — you can be a startup founder.
Here’s why I founded Fund/Build/Scale:
1. To help founders make fewer mistakes.
2. To share successful strategies that can accelerate your go-to-market journey.
3. To inspire more people to see themselves as potential founders. There’s a lot of overlooked talent out there, and we are missing out.
This podcast is for anyone who’s interested in learning the basic skills required to launch a startup, secure initial funding and transform an idea into a sustainable business.
I’m talking to guests about everything: finding a co-founder, conducting customer discovery, recruiting early employees, developing a PLG strategy, fundraising when you’re outside a major tech hub — all of it.
Interested? Subscribe to Fund/Build/Scale on all major platforms and follow the podcast on LinkedIn or Substack to get articles, excerpts, transcripts and more.
