Reflections on startup life: Week 53

I admit to some nagging thoughts in the back of my mind.

Last week was busy — we are delivering two contracts between Alex and I, continuing to operate Tribalytic and work on our own projects. But that’s not exceptional or even interesting, lots of people are very busy. For us the novelty is perhaps that whilst we are very busy, we are actually being paid this time around. But that’s not exceptional or even interesting, lots of people get paid for the work they do (just not us normally!).

I did attend a networking event (Hive Melbourne) which had an excellent talk by Nathan from Inspire9 which I largely agreed with — about doing work your passionate about. This is something I believe strongly in — doing work aligned to what you know and love.

So if we’re being paid, doing work that aligns with our goals and in areas that are interesting to us, why does it nag at me?

I worry that we will slip into the lure of the lucre. It’s very easy to be tempted by making some cash, and it’s essential that we do — we both have bills to pay and families to contribute to and feed.

But if we do contract after contract, we’ll end up a contracting company and won’t be a startup anymore. So at the heart of what’s bothering me this week is how do we take what I think will work well for us (bit of contract, work on startup, another contract, work on startup) and find that equilibrium that lets us do a great job for clients, but also lets us be 100% focussed on our own projects.

I guess I’ll just have to wait and find out — with these two contracts almost completed we’ll have money in the back to see us through the Christmas period until end of January and at least 6- 8 weeks of work on our own projects.

Highlights

• 1st draft report done on one contract
• Testing of new release of super-secret-project which I should announce to all here in the next day or so.
• Networking at Hive

Lessons Learned

• When you’re at your most stressed and busiest, exercise is the LAST thing you should drop, not the first.
• Even when things are going well in a startup you can find things to worry about!

Goal this week

• Announce super-secret project to more people.
• Finish first contract off.
• Near-completion of second contract.