Building in public means showing the work. It also means being honest about the bits that came before the work, the bits where we got it wrong.
I’m Sanj. I’m supporting appt in through funding and guidance, and like anyone close to an early-stage startup, I’ve watched a small team make some hard calls along the way. We’re still in the run-up to launch, but a lot has already happened behind the scenes worth talking about.
So I wanted to share the bumpy bits. The mistakes that taught us how to build the right team, the right way. I doubt we’re the only ambitious team to have made these calls.
Three lessons we had to pay for
Long before our development team came on board or our first 100 small businesses signed up to test the app, decisions were being made about who to build with. Some of those decisions cost us time, money and momentum we won’t get back. They also taught us how to build the right team for this company.
Here’s what we learned.
Aspiration, not desperation
When you’re bootstrapping a new business, there’s a quiet voice in your head that says “be grateful for what you can get”. That voice is well-meaning. It’s also wrong.
In the early days we chose partnerships based on what was available rather than what the company actually needed. The result was relationships that didn’t quite fit. Sometimes the skillsets weren’t right for what we were trying to build. Sometimes the partners didn’t understand the CRM and data principles that appt in is built on. Sometimes the vision wasn’t shared in the way we’d assumed it was.
We chose from a place of “what can we get?” rather than “what does this company deserve?”. When you pick partners out of scarcity, you end up with partners who suit a smaller version of your idea than the one you’re actually trying to build.
We choose from aspiration now. We ask whether someone matches the company we want to be, not the one we are right now. It’s a much harder question, and the answers take longer to find. They’re also worth the wait.
Cheap is expensive
The second lesson followed fast on the first. When money’s tight (and it always is when you’re bootstrapping), price becomes the loudest number in the room. You convince yourself that low cost is good cost.
It usually isn’t. With an early stage tech partner, cheap meant we didn’t ask the questions we should have. We didn’t push hard enough on process or on ownership. We didn’t get clarity on what good looked like before work kicked off. And worst of all, we gaslit ourselves. We told ourselves things were on track when, deep down, we already knew they weren’t.
Cheap tends to get expensive later, in delays, in rework, in lost momentum, in the energy spent steering a relationship that should have been right from the start. The cost you save on day one shows up on day ninety, and by then it has interest on it.
These days we look at value first and price second. With Propelius, the development team building appt in now, the difference is night and day. They were properly briefed before they started. We agreed clear ways of working from day one. We speak the same language about CRM, data and what we’re trying to do for small business owners. And critically, we took the time to build a real working relationship before any code got written. That groundwork has paid for itself ten times over.
Different people, different roles
The third lesson is about people, and it’s the one we held closest while learning it.
Early on, our team evolved. Someone who’d been with us through the very first stretch realised this wasn’t the journey for them, and someone new came in. That’s a normal part of starting a company that doesn’t get talked about enough. The early stage of a startup is brutally hard, and there’s no shame in anyone recognising it isn’t the journey for them. If our paths cross again, they’d be welcomed warmly.
Today, two experts in marketing and tech are at the heart of the team making appt in happen. Neither said yes lightly. They each asked themselves “is this really for me?” before committing, and they each said yes with real time, real intent and real belief. That kind of clarity at the start is worth more than any clever skillset.
What this means for appt in
These lessons are why we’re in such good shape now. They shaped how we chose our development team (more on Propelius in an upcoming post). They shape how we’re talking to our pre-launch users. They shape how we’ll onboard the first 100 businesses in batches over the coming months.
We’d rather make these mistakes once and learn from them than make them again on a bigger stage. Building this company has been the best teacher we could have asked for. The bill was steep. The lessons were cheap at the price.
Follow the series
This is the first post in our Building in Public series. Follow along here or on LinkedIn, and we’ll see you for the next one.