There is a documentary called “The Fog of War” (won an Academy Award) that describes decision making in a war. It features Robert McNamara, who was Secretary of Defense in the context of Vietnam. Wars are very messy and the information available to the generals and decision-makers is usually very imperfect and incomplete. Nevertheless, decisions [ ] The post The Fog of Startups appeared first on…
Note: This article is not intended to provide investment advice, rather it reflects my personal style and observations over the past 35 years that I have been studying and practicing investing as an startup angel, VC, real estate and stock market investor. I believe that there is a different investment style for everyone and you [ ] The post You Can’t Get Rich Selling appeared first on Howard Love…
Western thought is heavily based on reason and one of the key underpinnings of reason is scientific proof. We therefore all are somewhat slaves to that which is “proven” and this reliance produces a critical weakness in that much of what we considered “proven” is often subsequently proven wrong and much of what we intuitively [ ] The post Observational Reality vs. Scientific Proof appeared first…
Knowing your Why doesn’t seem very important when everything is going wonderfully. When life is grand we are usually not asking the deep inconvenient questions, such as: What am I doing with my life and WHY am I doing it? Frankly who cares? Life is awesome, pass the champagne! However, when things get rough in [ ] The post WHAT S YOUR WHY? appeared first on Howard Love .
It’s not unusual for entrepreneurs to get ahead of themselves. Entrepreneurs are aggressive and opportunistic, their pace accelerated by their hopes and dreams. Doing things in the wrong order, however, is one of the surest ways of sabotaging your start-up; and doing them in the right J Curve order (Create Release Morph [ ] The post Focus on the Product before the Business Model appeared first on…
Just like playing golf, investing in public markets is full of paradoxes and to do well at either, you need to often do things that are counter-intuitive. When I look back on my investments over the years, my best ones tended to be ones where had they not worked out, I would have looked like an idiot. Because at the [ ] The post The Benefits of (Potentially) Looking Like an Idiot appeared first on…
While I have been a fan of investing in index funds and ETF’s for some time, I always start to get wary when some form of investment becomes all the rage. At the moment, “Index investing” is widely touted to solve all manner of investment challenges and 16 of the 25 largest mutual funds are [ ] The post The Dark Side of Index Investing appeared first on Howard Love .
I often hear a founder get very excited about the prospect of a large customer. The implied expectation is that this out-sized customer is going to shower the startup with cash confer on them the imprimatur of legitimacy. However, when I hear a founder start talking about “the big one” I cringe. I start [ ] The post How a Large Customer Can Kill a Startup appeared first on Howard Love .
I discuss MVP’s in my book, The Start-Up J Curve, but I wanted to add some additional color because it’s so critical to get it right. As most people in the startup world are aware, MVP stands for Minimum Viable Product. Each of those words are important. Minimum means the least amount of time, money [ ] The post The Minimum Viable Product (MVP) appeared first on Howard Love .
The Power Law has become a widely accepted reality in venture, particularly as it applies to a classic venture portfolio. While it may be an important factor when understanding future or past venture returns, I think it’s a mistake to extend it to all forms of venture, especially angel investing. At the risk of oversimplifying, [ ] The post Angel Investing and the Power Law appeared first on…