Many Entrepreneurs are driven by the mission, hence they almost nearly forget about the need to have a salary and grow fat at expense of the business. A real Entrepreneur is ready to work out her heart and ensure her idea moves from virtual to visual.
If you wish to label yourself as an Entrepreneur but cannot work with such a mindset, you have work to do.
The team on the other hand are not so. You would need to go a long way to keep your team encouraged and motivated enough to give you their best.
One of the greatest frustrations you will face is the fact that your co-founder and team members are not as fired up as you to pour out their hearts into the work. Especially if you are a crappy startup working without any real capital investment from anywhere and looking instead at how you can compensate them in the long term by giving up stakes in the startup.
I have been in this position before and I still meet a lot of people who are trying to get their ideas off the ground and the result is almost the same: the team just is not working. I still spoke with someone who angrily disbanded his team last week over the same issue and I could resonate with him. I think my decision to disband my team in 2013 ranks among the smartest business decisions I have ever made.
I am not suggesting that teams dont work, far from it. What I want you to realise is that you cannot expect your team members to be as vested in your idea as you. You cannot expect them to work harder at the idea as you, you need to keep them motivated and interested.
You would not know these because you are 100% committed and will work for free as long as you have to, but do not expect the same from your team.
So, what can we do?
I think the answer is obvious, find a real co-founder that can see things at a higher level, a co-founder that is sound and exposed and really understands what you are trying to achieve and can also see the future you are seeing.
Many of the people we marshal into a team are either short-sighted and want the good things now (which you cannot provide) or just senior members of your fans club (they admire you but cannot cultivate your kind of work ethics). Neither classes of people are really needed at this stage.
Do not build a team for team building sake, you can explore freelancers, contract staff and marketing agents who are only paid a commission (I discuss this in some deeper detail in the BUILD YOUR IDEA course).
For projects to stay on course, you must not forget to concern yourself with your team and their motivation, if you cannot get them to believe in the mission and work their hearts out, if you cannot meet their needs or pay a good decent salary, then kindly let them off the boat.
The team has got to be motivated.
