Most Important Skills For A Founder At YourNegotiations.Com
For a founder, the ability to prioritize tasks, being "the 80/20 person," and not being a perfectionist are crucial, as there are "not enough hours in the day to do everything." This necessitates making "difficult decisions," even if it means accepting imperfection for a higher return on investment.
Negotiation, Prioritization, Decision-Making, Adaptability, Entrepreneurship
Advizer Information
Name
Job Title
Company
Undergrad
Grad Programs
Majors
Industries
Job Functions
Traits
Gerta Malaj
Founder
YourNegotiations.com
Wellesley College
MIT
Mathematics, Data Science, Statistics
Coaching, Speaking & Writing
Entrepreneurship and Business Owner
International Student, Honors Student, Scholarship Recipient, Immigrant
Video Highlights
1. Prioritization and Focus: The ability to identify and focus on the 20% of tasks yielding 80% of the results is crucial for founders. This involves setting clear priorities and not being a perfectionist.
2. Decision-Making: Founders must make difficult decisions quickly, often with incomplete information. This includes balancing competing priorities and accepting that some things might not be perfect.
3. Negotiation Skills: While specific to Gerta's role, strong negotiation skills are paramount for securing deals, partnerships, and funding, which are essential for startup success.
Transcript
What skills are most important for a job like yours?
Of course, my role as a negotiations expert is very specific to my job, and I need to be good at negotiations. That's actually why we started this in the first place, so it's kind of a given.
More broadly, the job of a founder is to be the 80/20 person. This means focusing on the 20% of tasks that yield 80% of the results. Essentially, it means not being a perfectionist.
There are people who want to complete every item on their to-do list thoroughly and carefully. As a founder, there aren't enough hours in the day for that. You need to be crystal clear on your priorities and stay on top of them.
This is why, in a previous question, I mentioned having two meetings with our assistant to help us stay focused on our priorities. Not being a perfectionist is very important because a startup is a messy stage. If you're a perfectionist, competitors might get ahead of you, or you might not be focusing on the right things. This can lead to no revenue coming in.
Along those lines, the third point is being able to make difficult decisions. Sometimes I have speaking engagements, and we want to present ourselves professionally. However, I have to make the difficult decision about whether spending another hour perfecting a deck, making it beautiful, aligned, and with cool images, is the best use of my time.
That one hour could be spent on another aspect of the business with a higher return on investment. So, being able to make those difficult decisions, like putting something out that reflects on me but isn't perfect, is crucial. I need to be okay with that because that time can be spent on something even more impactful.