Assume being in startup as flying a jet plane. If I start describing how a jet plane works and the scenarios that can come up then we might think that none of us can do it. But, hey! when you are in there, it goes with the flow.

Interestingly, the same is true when you are in a startup. It’s a very different experience. There is nothing like describing the real scenario from the periphery. Just take a test drive and you will know the rules of the game. In reality, there is always a bigger goal which keeps the startup team moving. There is always a dream which keeps the flame burning in the hearts.

If God shows up some day and say that you won’t ever be successful in startup, then most of the entrepreneurs won’t like the hardships of startups. No matter how exciting they sound. Since this is an imaginative scenario hence more than half of the entrepreneurs might refute this conclusion. Anyways, the bottom line is that the purpose of being in a startup is very different; it’s like achieving stability in life at your own terms.

Travel the less traveled road for more fun and anxiety. Well, we have just got one lives!!

Ignoring guidance from intuitions won’t take you anywhere since it will come back as a lesson – it is some thing we are gifted with – Intuition

Every start-up team today starts with a business plan – company vision, mission, problem, solution, revenue projections and how the team plans to tap in the market opportunity. In most of the cases, the business plan changes a lot as startup proceeds and meets the real world. A lot of valuable inputs come from the side of customers, investors and advisors.

Startups face lot of challenges everyday and most of the bandwidth of the management team is taken up in solving these issues. Important tasks, like product roll-out strategy, investor relations, marketing & sales strategy, become the focus of the team. What gets lost in the middle of all these tasks is the vision of the company… the team becomes result oriented, starts focusing on revenues and new business laterals than ensuring that the decisions being taken are in synergy with the vision and philosophy of the company.

At times, when the startup is money crunched, the management team takes detours or takes up tasks which have nothing to do with the vision of the company. Though nothing is wrong in taking the detours while the startup is money crunched, but it is extremely important that the management team gives a serious thought to the problem. At times like these, a quick help can come from the panel of advisors and mentors.

A visionary start-up would know the value of a good advisor panel who could help the management team in preserving the vision of the company. A good mentor ensures that the bigger picture of the company is preserved during tough times. But only being visionary doesn’t help in protecting the company vision, it also requires lot of strength and character, as at times, the team needs to fight against challenges of real world like saying ‘No’ to quick money or project that doesn’t gel with the company philosophy. I guess that’s where the character of a start-up team is tested.

I believe that a start-up is only as good as its team and advisors, and the team can only progress towards excellence if the team is clear about the vision of the company. While there are many factors which make a company successful in a long run, I believe having a clear company vision and preserving it can move a start-up from the list of good start-ups to the list of excellent start-ups.

This blog is written and owned by Saurabh Gupta

Professor Nandini Vaidyanathan, an alumni of Delhi [ Images ] School of Economics, has spent 20 years in the corporate sector, working in a cross-section of industries — security, media, pharmaceuticals, gas, office automation, equity market and animation — all over the world.

She has been teaching entrepreneurship in premier business schools in India (IIMB), US (Princeton), Singapore (NUS) and UK (LSE) for the last four years. In 2008 alone, she taught over 2,300 students around the world.

She has been working in India, Afghanistan and the Sub-Saharan Africa. She is a mentor with New Ventures India, a joint initiative between World Resources Institute, Washington, CII Godrej [ Get Quote ] green building, Hyderabad and MentorPartners, an on-line enterprise support and mentoring platform for entrepreneurs.

She is also the mentor-promoter of a company called Startups that mentors young entrepreneurs.

Startups is actively involved with micro finance institutions in facilitating business models that transcend poverty lines and loan recovery.

She was in Hyderabad to speak at the TiE-ISB Connect 2009 on Incubation Centres and Mentors at the ‘Start Up Your Venture’ workshop. Soon after her speech, she was surrounded by young entrepreneurs for advice.

She took some time off from the young future entrepreneurs to speak to rediff.com.

You have spoken to many entrepreneurs all over the world. Is there any difference in the way Indians approach an idea?

I see two big differences. Entrepreneurs in India are more intelligent and better educated. That is the positive difference. But the negative difference is that there is no ecosystem in India that encourages them to be entrepreneurs.

In other parts of the world, when you say you want to be an entrepreneur, nobody raises an eyebrow. In India, if you say you have done your engineering and want to be an entrepreneur, the first thing parents ask is ‘Have you gone mad? Why do you want to do that?’

Everybody will tell you that the opportunity cost of becoming an entrepreneur is very high and after you finish your MBA, you are offered fancy salaries and why would you want to give up that? I had a student in IIM Bangalore who told me, ‘Ma’am, I have an offer of Rs 26 lakh (Rs 2.6 million). If I become an entrepreneur, I may not make Rs 26 lakh in my lifetime’!

This is the case with educated people. What about the not-so-educated people who start various businesses in their little space?

I work with women in the micro-enterprise space in India, Addis Ababa, Rwanda, Kabul, etc. Kabul is very difficult for women entrepreneurs.

Are these people bigger risk-takers?

They don’t look at it as risk-taking. For them there is no other option to come out of poverty and build a meaningful quality life. So, they see entrepreneurship as the only option for a better life. This is how it should be.

I feel this should be the attitude of all. I was saying the same thing to some youngsters who said, ‘We are engineers, how do we go about as entrepreneurs?’ I said, first, you don’t go for placement, be an entrepreneur. That is the only way you do it.

How does being an entrepreneur enhance the quality of life of an individual?

If you are an employee, it will take about ten years to learn all the aspects of business. If you are entrepreneur, you pretty much learn it in one year.

The downside of it is that you get grey hair faster when you are an entrepreneur! The upside is, the learning compression is phenomenal. And that makes you a better person. If you are working for somebody, you may be a marketing person or a finance person or a technology person but if you are an entrepreneur, you are all rolled into one.

The kind of exposure across functions and the ability to think on your feet, the ability to take risks, the ability to visualise tomorrow, the ability to plan for tomorrow – I think those are skill sets you are able to acquire literally overnight. It’s a hard knock. I am not saying it is easy. But you do it the hard way and you learn them at the end of it. That makes you a better person.

How should an entrepreneur look at becoming an entrepreneur — as a wealth creator or creating something more for society?

Primarily, the motive of an entrepreneur should be creating meaning in life, enhancing the quality of life around him. It is not about making money. He wants to be an entrepreneur because he wants to create meaning for other people and himself. He is creating a better quality of life, the way it can be done.

The unintended consequence of that is wealth creation and wealth distribution, but that can’t be the primary motive. Having said that, I don’t mean he does it for charity; not at all. Every entrepreneur, every enterprise has to have wealth creation in the agenda. He can’t keep making losses for the rest of his life because he can’t sustain it. But that is an unintended consequence.

The primary reason why you become an entrepreneur is because you want to create meaning and you want to leave a footprint! That is the only way you can do it.

You said ‘they leave a footprint’. In the last few years, can you name a few entrepreneurs who have impressed you?

There are many. In the last three years, I worked with over 300 entrepreneurs. Each one of them is unique. To me, every one of them is a hero. They are doing something phenomenally out there.

What will you tell those young people out there who have a desire to be entrepreneurs?

Go ahead and be an entrepreneur! Don’t keep saying, ‘I want to be an entrepreneur’ and ‘One day I will be one’. There is no ‘some day’; just go out and chase your dreams!

Few example for correlation of existence of this moment:

• The day you lose your job, the number of people calling you drop drastically. Suddenly no one in the world is bothered about you and you meet the moment of perception shift questioning everything about yourself.
• The day you are caught by cops for some thing wrong, boom!people gone and you meet the moment.
• The day you are bankrupt, boom!
• The day you move to the startup life, boom!

I have a strange feeling from the day I started working on my start-up. Earlier, people had a different way of discussing stuff but now the equation seems skewed. I can clearly see the theory being applicable in my life and hence I am better prepared for it. I don’t think that we can really change.. I truly believe that attitude matters in life and just screw it, don’t give a damn to the suckers.. Let’s see the world truly believing in who we are!

Its been quite a ride since I decided to work full time with WKI Solutions in May 2009. Few things that I have learned from my experience and I hope would help people jumping from a well settled job life to startup life:

• Do check out the team potential – Team is every thing for a successful venture and you can only fight limited battles in life, hence validating team strength is a must
• Do some primary research about the idea – It’s not cool at all to re-invent the wheel, hence it’s worth checking out the market for the idea
• Do continue focusing on social-networking – It’s friends & family who help you during the tough times, hence social circle helps a lot in making you succeed in start-up world
• Don’t over-heat yourself - Things in the outer world have a tendency to run at a slower than expected pace, so over-heating is not an option for start-ups
• Don’t plan a lot – Nothing rolls out the way they are planned initially, so don’t get demoralized by feedbacks and changes. Remember “Rome was not built in a day”

And here’s an insider tip:

• Financial planning for some extra time – Things around have a hidden tendency to test you when you jump in for a start-up, so keep some extra bucks in bank for these rough patches

These are some of my dos and don’ts that might help you make the move. I have moved to Mumbai and would love to catch up for any help. Thanks for your time and feedback.