your computer setup says a lot about you

1. I’m just your average joe
2. I’m more into gaming than my job
3. I have a lot going on, but my brain is only so big
4. I’m a killer engineer
5. I can multitask but it’s mostly with linkedin and slack
6. I’m day trading in company time
7. I’d rather not be using the computer
8. I’m running 10 coding agents while I code too
9. I’m richer than your wildest dreams (or going to be)

I’m usually 1, but since I started coding I might upgrade to 4. One day I’ll be 9 :)

#career #work

Brett Goldstein

Founder/CEO/Designer @ Micro | Investor @ Launch House | micro.so

10 things I wish I knew before starting a company:

1. no one is coming to save you - there is no magical CTO, advisor, or investor who fixes your problems

2. your first idea probably sucks - the only way to find the best idea is to ship fast enough that reality slaps you in the face early

3. there is no competition - Thiel is right: you’re far more likely to die from self-inflicted wounds than from an actual competitor.

4. your company sucks because you suck - your team only works as hard as you, cares about the things you care about, etc. every weakness of yours is amplified and appears in the whole company.

5. no one cares about your company - attention is the hardest resource to attain and you start with 0 of it (no matter who you are). just keep shipping and making noise.

6. speed > strategy - startups win not by being smarter but by iterating faster than everyone else. leave the vision at home and get to work.

7. your psychology is the real battlefield - most founder pain comes not from work but from fear, overthinking, loneliness, and ego.

8. earn the right to be in the game - you must hit the basic milestones each round to be able to raise and go to the next. don't try fancy stuff, just get there.

9. you probably don't care enough - anything you focus your attention and effort on improves, so anything that is a mess is because you don't care about it

10. most advice is worthless - the best advice you can get is from your intuition, the second best advice is from another founder at your same level. everything else is noise.

the funny thing about this list is that there are actually hundreds of things I wish I knew.

starting a company is one of the hardest things you can do but it is one of the most rewarding.

#founder #startup

I know a lot of people will hate this but it needs to be said

IF you want traditional success - money, notoriety, impact, etc.

you MUST put in the work, especially in your 20s and 30s.

of course there are levels to success and you don't really need much to live a very happy fulfilling life.

hell... you could even argue that many of the happiest people are NOT traditionally successful.

BUT for the crazy ambitious rest of you, NOW IS THE TIME

as Hemant says, we're entering one of the greatest wealth-creating super cycles in human history.

the playing field has been leveled and the opportunities are endless - I'm living proof.

last week I calculated I wrote more code than 99% of engineers at any other startup... and I'm NOT TECHNICAL.

thanks to the latest AI models, I can now make any software idea I have come to life.

the opportunity is available to you do, you just have to put in the work to capitalize on it.

#founder #career

what you eat for lunch says a lot about you as a person

1. sandwich/wrap - I'm too busy to have nice things
2. homemade (by you) - I am picky as hell
3. homemade (by partner) - I do what I'm told
4. salad/bowl - I want you to know how great I am
5. heavy food (like chipotle) - I hate my job and coworkers
6. no lunch - I have high functioning anxiety
7. sushi - I'm already rich, don't know why I'm here
8. company cafeteria - I'm just trying to get by man...

and me? I ate half of a raw salmon today.

I'm not sure what that means, but I don't let traditions or rules get in the way of doing what I need to do (get my protein).

#career #lunch

this chinese coffee chain is about to destroy starbucks

like stock price cut in half in 5 years

luckin coffee has 22,000 locations in china and it opened its very first near me in NYC a few months ago

meanwhile starbucks seems to just be closing locations

the reason this is happening is a very very common story in business:

incumbents getting eaten from both ends of the market

- starbucks can't compete with the multitude of high end cafes popping up that offer 10x the quality for the same price. their brand is also not associated with high end.

- starbucks also can't compete with low end cafes like luckin popping up that offer equal or better quality at literally half the price. 

and they can't change much because billions of dollars of revenue is dependent on their very specific supply chain and pricing structure.

I predict in 5 years, luckin replaces starbucks as the dominant coffee chain in major metros in the US.

lesson here is to always create room to experiment with new products or business models.

#business #coffee

this video got hundreds of thousands of impressions and only cost $700

the main reason it was so cheap was because I personally wrote, directed, filmed and even did a little editing for it.

its the ultimate lesson in founder mode - I wasn't satisfied with any of the creative work I was seeing so I just did it myself

we may do the same for the next video.

also - link to our product waitlist in the comments!

#founder #content

the main reason your startup will fail isn't about money

its because it is a bad idea

good ideas make lots of money easily and sustainably, which makes every other problem go away

cofounder disputes, fundraising problems, etc just don't exist when you have a good idea

but the AI revolution is changing what good ideas look like - especially now that anyone can ship products.

here's the shape of good startup ideas in 2026 and beyond:
- they are hard to build (means you won't have vibe coded competition)
- they target a massive or growing market (means it will be worth at least $1B and you can raise VC for it)
- they are deeply personal and relevant to the founder's skills and experience (means they can really nail it)

I'm going into a lot more detail on this topic as part of an incredible series on Maven called Velocity Coding!

link in the comments

#founder #startup

this marketing screw up is an incredible business and life lesson

don't boast about things that are not true (or worse, opposite)

the temptation is there because "it's just sales," but it will wind up embarassing you at some point.

I saw this Rippling poster on the subway the other day, and while its a pretty confusing ad, the message seems to be 

"other software is bad and Rippling is great"

its ironic because the exact opposite is true: Rippling is terrible software generally hated by its users.

I posted the photo, made this comment and it went viral.

I'm sure they fired the marketer responsible for the ad, but what they really need to do is get back to basics and make sure they're delivering a great product.

at the end of the day, if people love your product, nothing can touch you.

#marketing #tech

I finally figured out the secret for managing tons of projects

my productivity has literally 10x'd

take a look at this rundown of how many of the most successful people in the world did it.

there's one thing in common: FOCUS

paradoxically, if you stay relentlessly focused on single things at a time and say no to everything else, you get WAY more done.

here's how I do it:
- every week I figure out the most important things to do for my company in order
- I block 4 hours every morning to do those things
- I DO NOT move on to other things until they are done

most importantly, though, I've used Micro, a kind of all-in-one tool that automatically keeps everything organized.

I've also started to use AI agents in the product to automate mundane tasks like labeling emails, updating my CRM pipelines, etc.

the product is still in private beta but if you want an invite sign up for the waitlsit below and let us know you came from linkedin

#founder #productivity

I saw the future last night and it’s fighting robots

there are few times in your life where you feel like you’re at the inception of something big

the Rek robot boxing match in nyc last night was one of those moments

this is the kinda stuff I live for - an ambitious project and talented team building a much more entertaining world.

#ai #robot

what’s the lore behind choosing your career path?

I'll start... I got laid off from a job I didn't like during the pandemic. No one else was hiring, so I was basically forced to start my own company. It went pretty well and was the most fulfilling work I'd ever done, so now I just build companies for a living.

#career #jobs

had a career breakthrough yesterday and it's totally radicalized me.

I'm non-technical. I took some CS classes in college but was terrible so stayed away from programming my whole career.

then this past weekend, I wrote 5,689 lines of code.

I took a bunch of ideas for how to make our product better that would have sat in a list that our engineers may never get to, and made them reality myself.

thanks to AI.

this would not have been possible even 6 months ago.

this is where I've become radicalized:

YOU NO LONGER HAVE AN EXCUSE TO NOT BE TECHNICAL.

especially over the next 6-12 months, AI is so easy to use that:

- designers must now code frontends
- sales people must now code integrations
- anyone with an idea must now code their MVP

basically, if you don't make your ideas a reality, you are literally just lazy.

which is the only bad news here.

IF YOU ARE LAZY PEOPLE WILL FIND OUT.

good luck out there and happy coding.

#startup #AI

elon musk will be the first trillionaire in human history

his ~500B net worth today is already more than most countries' GDP

and he's got a lot more coming with Space X going public and the tesla comp package getting approved

one thing that comes to mind is something a very wealthy friend of mine said to me

"there's honestly nothing to buy"

after a certain level, more money doesn't benefit you much and that level is actually a low lower than you think.

an in a world where AI could dramatically reduce the need to work to live a fruitful life, a lot of people will be asking themselves this question

"so now what do I do?"

however you would answer that question is actually what you should be doing NOW before you've made your money.

for me, it's creating things - companies, music, art, writings, etc.

if I had a trillion dollars I'd probably be doing the same thing I'm doing now, but maybe live in something bigger than my shoebox apartment :)

#elonmusk #career

this sounded totally crazy until I did it and 5x'd my productivity

this guy says "laziness is thinking about the cost of things instead of the payoff"

so if you want to get something done.... just think about the payoff!

that's it!

sounds so simple but it really is universal

even manifestation says to get something you should visualize the feeling of having it already (and the universe gives it to you)

think about your laziest friends - they are always talking about how much effort things are to do!

I had a few projects that have been dragging lately and got them both done when I wrote down all the great things that will happen when they're done.

amazing stuff tbh

#productivity #startup

if you're fundraising you should read this.

you probably see the headlines about $50M seed rounds at crazy valuations but know people who only raise $2M at modest ones.

do you start your raise on the high or low end?

my rec is to take a look at the data (like this chart) and then make an educated guess about where compared to the average round size you should go for based on:

- company traction - revenue, growth, etc

- you - doesn't feel great to say this, but the fancier your resume is, the easier it is to raise

so you're on the lowest end if you went to Rutgers, worked at IBM and are pre-revenue and pre-product

and you're on the highest end if you went to stanford, worked at open ai, and have $2M ARR

good luck out there

#founder #fundraising

if you're going to fundraise, you should do it right now.

this analysis shows that the week of december 15th sees nearly DOUBLE the average number of funding rounds close than any other

that's because VCs want to wrap things up so they can head out for the holidays

it hints at a classic fundraising strategy that closes the biggest rounds even in slower weeks:

CREATE URGENCY

VCs like to drag their feet - they're biased to waiting and collecting more data on you.

in the worst fundraises I ran, I had VCs literally drag out conversations months only to ghost me entirely - only a few gave me a lukewarm yes or no.

this is death for startups, and the way to avoid it is to create urgency.

here's a few ways to do that:
- group all your VC meetings around the same period and remind them all how many other folks are interested
- give a clear date that you will be making allocation decisions and apply the pressure beforehand
- do your raise ahead of a big moment (launch, press story, or even a fake "fundraise") and remind VCs how much attention you'll get

#founder #fundraising

taplio

Brett Goldstein's Linkedin Analytics

Brett Goldstein

Performance ScoreBrett Goldstein's LinkedIn Performance

Brett Goldstein's Best Posts (last 30 days)

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

.css-6ytdur{background-image:linear-gradient(284deg, rgba(39, 43, 72, 1) 0%, rgba(33, 47, 183, 1) 100%);color:transparent;-webkit-background-clip:text;background-clip:text;}Brett Goldstein's Linkedin Analytics

Brett Goldstein

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Brett Goldstein's LinkedIn Performance

Brett Goldstein's Best Posts .css-1emoo84{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:400;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);}(last 30 days)

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Brett Goldstein's Linkedin Analytics

Performance ScoreBrett Goldstein's LinkedIn Performance

Brett Goldstein's Best Posts (last 30 days)