Quote

Most good founders that I know at any given time have a set of small overarching goals for the company that everybody in the company knows.

Sam Altman

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Sam Altman
Age: 39
Born: 1985
Born: April 22
Entrepreneur
Chicago
Illinois
Samuel H. Altman
Samuel Altman
Good
Overarching
Time
Founders
Goals
Small
Everybody
Company
Goal
Given

More quotes by Sam Altman

Image
In YC's case, the number one cause of early death for startups is cofounder blowups.
Sam Altman
Image
The way to have a company that executes well is you have to execute well yourself.
Sam Altman
Image
You don't get to make their decisions but you do get to choose the decision makers.
Sam Altman
Image
A single mediocre hire in the first five will often in fact kill a startup.
Sam Altman
Image
Another way of looking at this, is that the best companies are almost always mission oriented.
Sam Altman
Image
... but actually it sucks to have a lot of employees, and you should be proud of how few employees you have.
Sam Altman
Image
If you compromise in the first five, ten hires it might kill the company.
Sam Altman
Image
The best ideas often look terrible at the beginning the truly good ideas, don't seem like they're worth stealing.
Sam Altman
Image
Later, you should learn to hire fast and scale up the company, but in the early days the goal should be not to hire. Not to hire.
Sam Altman
Image
The hard part is that this is a very fine line. There's right on one side of it, and crazy on the other.
Sam Altman
Image
Startups are not the best choice for work-life balance, and that's sort of just the sad reality.
Sam Altman
Image
You're saying no ninety-seven times out of a hundred, and most founders find they have to make a very conscious effort to do this.
Sam Altman
Image
... for the top twenty most valuable YC companies, all of them have at least two founders.
Sam Altman
Image
... you can think about that for everyone you hire: will I bet the future of this company on this single hire? And that's a tough bar.
Sam Altman
Image
Why now, why is this the perfect time for this particular idea, and to start this particular company?
Sam Altman
Image
No matter what you choose, build stuff and be around smart people.
Sam Altman
Image
You should be able to describe any employee as an animal at what they do.
Sam Altman
Image
Most startups are not nearly focussed enough. They work hard...maybe, but they don't work hard on the right things.
Sam Altman
Image
Don't let the company get distracted or excited about other things. A common mistake is that companies get excited by their own PR.
Sam Altman
Image
Because so few people make an actual long term commitment to what they're building, the ones that do have a huge advantage.
Sam Altman