Steven S. Hoffman - Surviving a Startup: Practical Strategies for Starting a Business, Overcoming Obstacles, and Coming Out on Top

Successful startups require courage and perseverance. Thank you, Steve, for taking the time to share these insights. Your book is a gift to every entrepreneur!

Carol Sands Langensand, Managing Partner of The Angels Forum

Dont run a company without reading this book. It will save you time, direct your energies, and sharpen your ability to execute. Hoffmans writing is clear, smart, and important.

David Eagleman, PhD, Neuroscientist at Stanford, Bestselling Author, Entrepreneur

The book provides a wealth of practical information and inspiration.

Jonathan Littman, Coauthor of the international bestsellers The Art of Innovation and Ten Faces of Innovation

Surviving a Startup takes you into the specifics of what a real business needs to go through. Flowing sweat and tears, both practical and spiritual, have a very big, guiding significance for entrepreneurs to highlight the encirclement, exceed the limit, and give birth to the next commercial unicorn.

Bowen Zhou, Vice President of JD.com

Entrepreneurship requires not only courage but also methods. This book is the secret of Mr. Hoffmans investment and thinking in Silicon Valley. With these methods, you will make fewer mistakes, improve your probability of success, and make your enterprise bigger. It is worth reading carefully!

David Xu Yong, CEO of Angel Camp

Surviving a Startup recognizes the character and traits of risk in entrepreneurship so that we can better understand the mystery of successful entrepreneurs and venture capitalists.

Yuan Yue, Cofounder of Pegasus Brigade

Surviving a Startup unveils a wholly new world about everything an entrepreneur needs to run a successful startup.

Mike Xu, Managing Director of Fosun Capital

This book will not only broaden your horizons, it will help you break through obstacles and realize your dreams.

Sam Gui, Founder of Jingbei Investment and Angel Teahouse

With Surviving a Startup, Steve Hoffman has captured what its really like to be a founder and the traits that separate out the good ones from the run-of-the-mill ones.

Larry Namer, Cofounder of E! Entertainment Television

I believe entrepreneurs will find spiritual resonance, direction, and guidance from this book while enjoying every chapter on the way to realizing their dreams.

Hu Yu, President of China University of Science and Technology and iFLYTEK

Brilliant and authentic. Hoffman provides a window and perspective to simplify and humanize the tumultuous journey of entrepreneurship. It is a great read for every aspiring individual and team daring to embark on such a journey.

Tae Hea Nahm, Managing Director of Storm Ventures

So direct and real yet still able to feel and see the lightness of it all and remain engaging throughout. This may become the essential compendium for all entrepreneurs and executives.

Roland Van der Meer, Managing Director of Ultra Capital

In this book, Steve Hoffman tells entrepreneurs all the elements needed for successful entrepreneurship.

Jia Junxin, Chairman of Shenzhen Xinheng Lida Capital Management

The art of entrepreneurship is to acknowledge that a startup is a process, and success only comes by doing it and continuously learning from failures and mistakes.

Ronald Chwang, Chairman of iD Ventures

Surviving a Startup is an important guide for todays entrepreneurs, filled with practical knowledge for those who need to understand the real mechanics of startup funding, avoid mistakes, and break through to commercial success.

Alex Chompff, Managing Director of Evolution Accelerator

As an entrepreneur and investor, Captain Hoff accepts the challenge to put into words the harsh reality of being an entrepreneur.

Ricardo Politi, General Partner at Mindset Ventures, Forbes 30 Under 30

To Douglas, Zachary, and Skylar Hoffman

Special thanks to Naomi Kokubo

2021 Steven S. Hoffman

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or otherexcept for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published by HarperCollins Leadership, an imprint of HarperCollins Focus LLC.

Any internet addresses, phone numbers, or company or product information printed in this book are offered as a resource and are not intended in any way to be or to imply an endorsement by HarperCollins Leadership, nor does HarperCollins Leadership vouch for the existence, content, or services of these sites, phone numbers, companies, or products beyond the life of this book.

ISBN 978-1-4002-2321-3 (eBook)

ISBN 978-1-4002-2319-0 (PBK)

Epub Edition February 2021 9781400223213

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020950411

Printed in the United States of America

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Information about External Hyperlinks in this ebook

Please note that the endnotes in this ebook may contain hyperlinks to external websites as part of bibliographic citations. These hyperlinks have not been activated by the publisher, who cannot verify the accuracy of these links beyond the date of publication

Im convinced that about half of what
separates the successful entrepreneurs from
the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.

Steve Jobs, cofounder and CEO of Apple

When starting a company,
Id advise people to have a high pain tolerance.

Elon Musk, cofounder of Tesla and SpaceX

LET ME INTRODUCE MYSELF. MY name is Steve Hoffman, but in Silicon Valley, they call me Captain Hoff, because Im the captain and CEO of Founders Space, one of the worlds leading startup incubators and accelerators.

Ive learned a lot over the past two decades launching, mentoring, and accelerating new businesses. Ive been in the trenches and seen it all. Having founded three venture-funded startups and two bootstrapped ones, I know what its like to be on the front lines. I know how tough it can get when the battle turns against you. But I also know what its like to taste victory and overcome impossible odds.

I wrote this book to help you learn not only from my experience but also from what Ive seen firsthand coaching hundreds of entrepreneurs. Some have gone down in flames, while others blazed a path into new territory that even they did not know existed. I will help you navigate the minefields. I will show you strategies that work. And Ill dive deep into the tactics smart founders use to maximize their chances of success, while minimizing the inherent risks.

People see me now and think it all came easily. But it was brutal getting here. I learned a lot the hard way, and I want to share those insights with you. I want to show you the nuts and bolts and sweat and tears of running a real business. Its about dealing with dysfunctional teams; hitting dead ends; messing up half the time; losing money, motivation, and self-confidence; and then moving forward. Its about what its actually like to be an entrepreneur when things go wrong. Its about becoming a survivor.

By the time youre done with this book, I hope you will learn both how to survive your startup and how to embrace the unpredictability, never-ending challenges, and pure chaos of running your own company.

L ets begin by addressing the concerns every founder must face when launching a startup. Its no easy decision to quit your day job, risk your life savings (and possibly your marriage), and embark on a voyage that has a 90 percent or higher chance of failure. But thats what entrepreneurs do every day, and thats what makes them special.