Startup Secrets Sandbox

Welcome to the Startup Secrets Sandbox

FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions

FAQ:

Who is Startup Secrets for?

Founders, innovators, entrepreneurs and business builders.

Interested in building and scaling a startup from the earliest stages.

It’s principally based on experience of early stage tech founders who want to take their ideas through to an IPO.

When designing it for Harvard, we wanted it to appeal to the first time founders and entrepreneurs across all the Harvard schools, and the content continues to evolve beyond just tech.

We thought it too basic for the Business School, though surprisingly we do even use the material there, particularly to bridge academic and practical application of startup best practices, using real world examples of the frameworks being applied.

With a focus on first time founders

Though we’ve been very surprised to see how many repeat entrepreneurs engage with the content to review what they missed first time around, as well as share their experience to improve our materials.

We think of startups as a mutual journey of learning for all involved.

Community

I am a big believer in community and peer mentoring, so please do help each other. If you see a question on this site and feel you can genuinely help, feel free respond to it in the comments. Note that this will be done on a trust basis, so please respect each other and bring a positive attitude at all times.

Innovation is nearly always a gradual, not a sudden thing. Eureka moments are rare, possibly non-existent, and where they are celebrated it is with the help of big dollops of hindsight and long stretches of preparation, not to mention multiple wrong turns along the way. - Matt Ridley

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What can I expect from interacting with this Sandbox?

Consider Startup Secrets a ground zero for entrepreneurs wanting a consistent set of frameworks to architect their venture covering all the basic aspects of a startup

Frameworks not answers.

Startup Secrets frameworks are designed to elicit your own thinking, create your own authentic approach to problem solving and possibly even inspire your own “AHA!” moments.

Honest case studies that share both success, failure and most importantly learning

We will listen your feedback and comments as to how to improve the Sandbox.

Note: we cannot respond to requests for help directly as there simply isn’t enough time to help the thousands of entrepreneurs who request it. Hence providing this resource to try to provide a broader resource

Your thoughts, questions and input will inform how we continue to develop this Sandbox and that in turn may influence the main Startup Secrets program. So thank you!

Other:

What happened to the original Startup Secrets site?

It became too much to manage as I started

Underscore.VC⁠

and ultimately

Claire Crowther⁠

at Underscore jumped in and took it over to run within the firm. Thank you Claire and all my partners for supporting it!

There was real mutual motivation for that. We believed, as has proven out, that our Core Community could contribute greatly to expanding the Startup Secrets content and that’s what you’ll see if you go to

StartupSecrets.com⁠

now - integrated into the

Underscore.VC⁠

site.

So why have this Sandbox?

As is often the case in startups, where you may have a lab to experiment before releasing things to customers, I wanted to keep a sandbox to experiment with new content and keep testing and iterating rapidly. Again just like an agile startup, I believe in being fully customer driven and validated. So please give your feedback!

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