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I have a friend, a founder of a pre-loved electronics goods website. He is a wonderful guy. But he is an addict.

He is addicted to raising funds.

At any given moment, he is a part of multiple accelarators, pitching to multiple angels and funds, flying from one part of the country to another.

I think now, after 4 years, he is just raising for the thrill of it.

And this problem is not uncommon. For a lot of founders, starting up has almost become synonymous with fundraising today.

They measure success by the amount raised.

Capital is a means through which driven entrepreneurs can reach their goals more efficiently, but it’s not the goal post itself. Fundraising alone cannot build a thriving business.

In the words of one of my early mentors, “Money only solves money problems!”

If after raising you do not spend time to build systems, then it will be very soon that you would need to jump in the bull-pen again to raise more, and more, and more… the cycle just continues.

Capital is a great catalyst to speed up things that would otherwise take much longer. But it is not the only catalyst.

Raise, then build, then optimize. Else you would soon be riding the tiger.

It’s not easy being a founder.

The odds are heavily stacked against you and at each step, there is a new problem waiting to be solved.

And unlike yesteryears, now, the challenge is not lack of information around a problem and it’s solution, but, on the contrary, it’s the problem of plenty.

There is so much information floating around today, that it becomes almost impossible for you to find the most effective solution without wasting hours.

And before you know, you are caught up in an unending spiral of information consumption – the typical analysis paralysis.

Having worked with over a hundred startups, I can confidently say that one of the most coveted ability of a super-founder today is the ability to learn, just-in-time.

To drown out all the noise and to filter out all unnecessary information. The ability to stay away from learning new things all the time and focus on what matters at that moment.

And then implement them fast.

If you are naturally good at selective learning, you are blessed. If not, then this is what you should be working on now.

In this era of easy content creation, every chap round the corner is now an expert. You would be drowned in a sea of gibberish masking as knowledge. And you need to guard every second of your time from being wasted down a rabbit hole.

While you work on the efficiency of your startup, you also need to improve the efficiency of knowledge consumption.

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