My biggest challenge is to not be so hard on myself. I’m constantly second guessing decisions, directions and focus. Lately I’ve taken a step back from the keyboard and refocused.

One small thing that has helped me in a big way was not using pseudonyms online. It’s been the norm for me to stay anonymous because it’s a safety shield. If I said something stupid, it didn’t matter, nobody knew who I was. When I removed the “mask” it felt a little weird for a short time, but I got over it quickly. Now, whatever I say reflects on me and my business. This creates accountability and motivation.

Paul Dessert, Resume Beacon

Finding product-market fit.

We’ve built a team that can iterate through ideas very quickly. Our business teammates come up w/ ideas, and then our technical teammates build them out. We’ve been able to get down to weekly iterations, which has accelerated our ability to move towards product/market fit.

Aki, MarketMuse

People. Finding the right leadership team – and then convincing them this is the right “next opportunity”! and then of course every last appointment under that team. We start with ownership – everyone at ShippingEasy has options in the business.

Then, we set goals and invest the time to communicate progress against them continuously. Transparency is probably the word I would choose for overcoming the people challenge. We just don’t have turnover – our team feels ownership and they stay.

Katie May, ShippingEasy

Confidence. It’s very easy to fall victim to Imposter Syndrome, especially when you’re striking out on your own. Do I know enough to justify asking people to pay me? Am I really an expert?

Reaching out to other people in my network helped me realize that a) pretty much everyone feels this way, even the ‘successful’ people and b) you don’t have to know everything to be an expert to the clients you serve – you just need to know more than they do (and, of course, enough to be able to solve their challenges). Once my confidence improved, my business started to take off.

Tracy Bradley, webbedUP

As a non-technical co-founder, one of the biggest challenges is finding technical talent and eventually a CTO. You don’t just want someone with technical ability, you want a person who buys into the vision, understands the business, and can grow to manage others.

Believe it or not, that person is probably somewhere in your network, you just have to dig deep. Put out feelers to every groups of friends, family, former co-workers etc., that you can think of and you’ll be surprised what you find. Our CTO is a friend of a friend from college.

Grant, Curbside Care

The founders are 3 creatives so the the biggest challenge was finding the technical right team to build what is a very sophisticated personalisation platform. To overcome this challenge we had to immerse ourselves in the technical side of things and decipher the technical talk and finally find the right people with the right personality and skills to do the job. It’s a steep learning curve but we’re getting there.

Jonny, The Book of Everyone

The hardest thing is building the team. Everyday you have to fight to hire talented people and keep the people you’ve already hired, motivated.

David Okuniev, Typeform

I think one of the challenges that many startups face is getting the word out. Our team is engineering-centric, which means we’re able to build an awesome product quickly, but we’re not always as good at the ‘softer’ side of things.

We’ve tried to meet in the middle with our marketing efforts, applying an engineering and analytical mindset to how we reach people. Doing that may not work as well for a huge mega-brand, but for a startup it really lets us focus on what works… and we still get to be engineers while doing it!

P.S. We’re also on the hunt for an ‘analytical marketer’ right now: somebody that can bridge the gap between the business side and hardcore analytics. If that’s you, we’d love to talk!

David Ordal, EverBooked

The biggest challenge for any start-up entrepreneur is to find a calm and consistent focus amongst the many ups and downs. One minute you’re experiencing great euphoria as you make your first sale and then the next minute you’re in deep despair because you only made one sale.

Start-ups take time. Progress takes time. Dealing with and enjoying these ups and downs is a big part of running a start up. Learn to deal with them and you’ll keep a clear head ready to deal with the many other challenges you’ll face.

Henry Walton, PrizeAid