Learn to Duck

Over the past couple of months, I have been hearing more and more entrepreneurs tell me about the multiple startups they are working on concurrently.

Really? Do you live in a 40 hour day world?

Startups are hard, they take time and focus. There are periods of time where there is nothing you can do PHYSICALLY but focus on your startup. There are no breaks; there are no girlfriends; there are barely any showers.

But, amazingly, people seem to be able to run multiple startups.

This morning I came across this article How (and Why) to Stop Multitasking in the Harvard Business Review blogs. Its a great post with some solid links, that show that our brains CANNOT multitask. We, instead, split our focus among multiple activities.

I have yet to see an entrepreneur build a successful business by splitting his focus among multiple businesses.

In fact, anything that pulls your focus away from building that business is a potential catalyst for failure. Take me for example. I travel a ton. About 95% of the travel is work-based, but on occasion, I will speak at a conference that has–at best–a tangential relationship to the company. I do it for fun and for the opportunity to meet awesome people.

About a month ago my friend Mark Suster DM’d me: “You travel a lot, if I was your investors I would question that.”

I was pissed. Fuck you Mark.

Then, as I often do, I started to think about the WHYs.

Mark’s right. Its my job to build a business — yes it requires a ton of travel now, but for every day I am out of the office, sitting on a plane, thats a day I could be with the team building, strategizing, adding value.

How then can you have multiple startups? Can you provide the proper amount of focus to each?

Its impossible.

The more likely answer is one of your startups has failed, and you are unwilling to realize it.

Stop working on multiple projects. Stop spreading yourself too thin.

Be realistic. Be pragmatic. Be real.

If your multiple startups are really companies, then one has to rise to the top and require your complete focus. If they are projects, then stop calling them startups.

The truth is, if you have two startups, you have two failures.

Stop fooling yourself.