Speed is often your only advantage in a startup. Simply given your sheer size (or lack thereof), your nimbleness, your grit, your willingness to do what it takes to get shit done — you can easily outcompete even some of the biggest, baddest mega-companies in the world. You’re not smarter, better funded, have better market access or lots of other things than your well established competitors. But while they are still trying to figure out who the right people are to even get the committee started to eventually figure out if they should build “the thing”, you and your buddy have already done it.
Speed is every startup’s superpower.
But beware: It can become your Kryptonite as well. When you lack direction and try to make up for it with sheer speed. When you congratulate yourself that you pushed to production 5 times last week — and yet each revision didn’t actually matter to your customers. When you don’t stop every once in a while, reassess the terrain, learn from your actions and develop a plan for the future: Then speed will become Kryptonite.
P.S. And before someone calls me out on this — when you run it’s not about raw speed. It’s about the measured approach: When you race you need to know when to push, when to back off, where on the course you focus your energy for a decisive win over your competitors…