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At the beginning, you should only hire when you have a desperate need to.

Sam Altman

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Sam Altman
Age: 39
Born: 1985
Born: April 22
Entrepreneur
Chicago
Illinois
Samuel H. Altman
Samuel Altman
Hire
Desperate
Beginning
Team
Need
Needs

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1 of the hardest parts about being a founder, is that there are a 100 important things competing for your attention each day.
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Cofounder relationships are among the most important in the entire company.
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Because it's one of these sort of connections between nodes- every pair of people adds communication overhead.
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If you don't need it yourself, and you're building something that someone else needs, realize you're at a big disadvantage.
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You need to figure out what the 2 or 3 most important things are, and then just do those.
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One thing that founders forget is that after they hire employees, they have to retain them.
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Everyone starting a startup for the first time is scared, and everyone feels like a bit of an imposter.
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If you want something in a deal, just ask for it.
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Don't let the company get distracted or excited about other things. A common mistake is that companies get excited by their own PR.
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A single mediocre hire in the first five will often in fact kill a startup.
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Startups are not the best choice for work-life balance, and that's sort of just the sad reality.
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Be suspicious of any work that is not building product or getting customers. It's easy to get sucked into an infrastructure rewrite death spiral.
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Before product/market fit, your only job that matters is to build a great product.
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You think you have this great idea that everyone's going to come join, but that's not how it works.
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The single word that matters most I think to keep the company productive as it grows is alignment.
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You certainly don't need to have everything figured out in the path from here to world domination.
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