2年工作经验进 初创公司

by Niki Agrawal

通过尼基·阿格劳瓦尔(Niki Agrawal)

沟通是关键：通过两家初创公司获得的成长经验教训+找工作 (Communication is key: growth lessons learned through two startups + a job hunt)

It’s been a crazy two years. I founded two startups and went through a job search. And wow, do I have some stories to tell! And more importantly, some lessons to share that I picked up along the way.

疯狂的两年了。 我创办了两家初创公司，并进行了求职。 哇，我有一些故事要讲！ 更重要的是，我在此过程中分享了一些经验教训。

听80％，说20％ (Listen 80%, talk 20%)

启动1：Doornox (Startup 1: Doornox)

Six months into the startup journey, I was struggling to find clients. My large, personally-made Excel system that tracked all the potential customers I had cold-emailed and called was crashing my computer nearly every time I opened it.

在启动旅程的六个月中，我一直在努力寻找客户。 我的大型个人制作的Excel系统跟踪我冷邮件发送给我的所有潜在客户的情况，几乎在每次打开计算机时都使我的计算机崩溃。

I dialed a potential customer for the third time as a follow-up to our earlier, somewhat-hopeful conversation. As usual, when I pitched Doornox and asked if they’d be interested, I got the response that they would “think about it.” Doornox would solve some of their recruitment problems, but would still not help them fully hire new candidates.

我第三次拨打了潜在客户的电话，作为对我们较早希望的对话的后续。 像往常一样，当我向Doornox推销并询问他们是否有兴趣时，我得到的答复是他们会“考虑一下”。 Doornox可以解决他们的一些招聘问题，但仍无法帮助他们充分聘用新候选人。

At this point, I would typically launch into a deeply well-thought-out plan of exactly how Doornox would indeed solve all their issues. But perhaps because I was tired and disheartened or perhaps because I was people-watching through the window of the Starbucks I was sitting at, I simply didn’t respond.

在这一点上，我通常会提出一个深思熟虑的计划，以准确地了解Doornox将如何解决所有问题。 但是，也许是因为我感到疲倦和沮丧，或者是因为我正在人们坐在我正坐在的星巴克窗户旁注视，我只是没有回应。

Awkward silence for three seconds. And then something interesting happened.

尴尬的沉默了三秒钟。 然后有趣的事情发生了。

The potential customer went on to talk about EXACTLY what she needed. She launched into her own pre-formulated monologue about every recruitment problem she faced. She even told me, specifically, what she would pay if we offered the solutions.

潜在的客户继续谈论她到底需要什么。 她对自己遇到的每一个招聘问题发表了自己的预先设定的独白。 她甚至告诉我，如果我们提供解决方案，她将支付多少。

In 15 mins, I learned more about recruitment than I had all week. Though we didn’t offer the one thing she wanted most, we were a small nimble startup. I decided on the spot that we did offer that service, and told her the great news of “our recent pivot.” She excitedly said she would loop her other team member in and asked about next steps.

在15分钟内，我比整个星期都学到了更多有关招聘的知识。 尽管我们没有提供她最想要的一件事，但我们是一家小型敏捷创业公司。 我当场决定我们确实提供该服务，并告诉她“我们最近的发展方向”的好消息。 她兴奋地表示，她将邀请其他团队成员加入，并询问下一步的工作。

Doornox was one step closer to finding product market fit, and the secret to pivoting well was listening. With every future call, I mostly shut up. And counterintuitively, more sales happened! When I finally did talk after listening to customers for the majority of the call, I was able to customize the Doornox pitch to customers’ exact needs. In a moment they understood the value add and gave a quick yes or no (yes, you still get a lot of “no”s).

Doornox距离找到适合产品的市场仅一步之遥，而进行良好调整的秘诀是倾听。 以后每打一次电话，我都会闭嘴。 与直觉相反，发生了更多的销售！ 当我在听完大部分客户的电话后终于开始交谈时，我能够根据客户的确切需求自定义Doornox间距。 片刻之后，他们就知道了增值并给出了快速的是或否(是的，您仍然会得到很多“否”)。

Founders are often aware that they should be listening to their customers in user interviews, but I found that listening is just as important on sales calls. Sales calls are like a big game of Minesweeper. You need to map out exactly what all the selling points are for each unique client. If you just click around and name all the features of your product, you will most definitely run into a bomb that explodes the whole game. But if you listen to the clues and build the relationship upon the information you slowly acquire, you’ll finally map out all the sweet spots and win the game.

创始人经常意识到，他们应该在用户访谈中倾听客户的声音，但是我发现倾听对于销售电话同样重要。 销售电话就像一场扫雷游戏。 您需要准确地列出每个唯一客户的所有卖点。 如果您只是单击一下并命名产品的所有功能，那么您肯定会碰上炸弹，从而炸毁整个游戏。 但是，如果您听取线索并根据您逐渐获得的信息建立关系，那么您最终将确定所有的优势并赢得比赛。

It’s amazing what people will say and how much you’ll learn if you stay quiet just three seconds longer. Silence is uncomfortable. Embrace that discomfort. Make it your secret weapon.

人们会说些什么，如果您再三秒钟保持安静，就会学到多少东西，这真是令人惊讶。 沉默不舒服。 拥抱这种不适。 使它成为您的秘密武器。

“运气偏爱有准备的人。” -Louis Pasteur(＆Inc.的Edna) (“Luck favors the prepared.” — Louis Pasteur (& Edna from The Incredibles))

创业公司2：Proof Inc (Startup 2: Proof Inc)

The “listen 80%, talk 20%” strategy helped with many strategic pivots that brought Doornox closer and closer to product market fit. But the hard truth was that startups take a really, really long time (something many wise entrepreneurs had told me long before I started the startup journey). Doornox was going to take three times longer than we expected to become profitable. It was time to abandon the idea for my side hustle that was already impactful and generating revenue.

“听80％，说话20％”策略有助于许多战略重点，使Doornox越来越接近产品市场。 但是硬道理是，创业公司要花很长时间，这是真的(很多聪明的企业家早在我开始创业之前就告诉过我)。 Doornox所需的时间将比我们预期的要多三倍。 现在是时候放弃已经让我产生影响并创造收入的我的忙碌想法了。

Proof Inc helps high school students navigate the college admissions process. What started out as my one-on-one tutoring side-gig turned into a trove of knowledge from years of experience. Clients (and their referrals!) wanted more and more access to this knowledge.

Proof Inc帮助高中生导航大学录取过程。 最初是我一对一的辅导技巧，后来变成了多年经验积累而成的知识宝库。 客户(和他们的推荐人！)希望越来越多地获得这种知识。

The one thing that made client relationships most successful was the detailed preparation I would conduct before every meeting. With my quick excel tracking system, I documented when every call took place and what exactly was discussed. Whether it was the student’s concerns about their personal statement or the parents’ comment that the family would be vacationing in Mexico for two weeks, I wrote down the information.

使客户关系最成功的一件事是我在每次会议之前都要进行的详细准备。 借助我的快速excel跟踪系统，我记录了每个呼叫的发生时间以及确切讨论的内容。 无论是学生对个人陈述的担忧，还是父母对全家将在墨西哥度假两个星期的评论，我都写下了信息。

And before every meeting, I would spend a few mins skimming the notes from the past few meetings. My call might start with, “Hey, how was Mexico?” Later I’d ask, “So where are we with that concern about your personal statement?’” Small and large insights like this made the most of our time together, and clients knew they were receiving a customized service. They knew I cared.

在每次会议之前，我都会花几分钟时间浏览过去几次会议的笔记。 我的电话可能会以“嘿，墨西哥怎么样？”开头。 稍后我会问：“那么，关于您的个人声明的关注点在哪里？”这样的小见解和大见解充分利用了我们的大部分时间，客户知道他们正在接受定制服务。 他们知道我在乎。

People love being prioritized, and a few minutes of preparation generated loyalty. Over 95% of future business came through referrals, and the most frequent praise I received was that I really cared. A few minutes is all it took to create customization.

人们喜欢被优先考虑，几分钟的准备就产生了忠诚度。 超过95％的未来业务来自转介，而我最常得到的好评是我真的很在意。 创建定制只需要几分钟。

It’s not possible to remember every detail that clients tell you. But it’s possible, with a little effort, to show that you care down to the smallest detail. And if you do miss something, people are very forgiving, and things still work in your favor. Being prepared is the best way to be lucky.

不可能记住客户告诉您的每个细节。 但是有可能通过一点努力就表明您关心最小的细节。 而且，如果您确实错过了某些事情，那么人们会非常宽容，而事情仍然会对您有利。 做好准备是幸运的最佳方式。

全职工作称为求职 (The full-time job called job hunting)

At the end of the day, I didn’t want to create a consulting business, and that’s more or less what Proof was turning into. I wanted to work on software that impacts thousands of people with a mission I cared about. My mentors and family suggested working at a startup.

归根结底，我不想创建一家咨询业务，这或多或少就是Proof变成的东西。 我想从事对我成千上万的任务有影响的软件，该软件可以影响成千上万的人。 我的导师和家人建议在一家初创公司工作。

Thus began the brutal journey of finding a Product Management job. Ironically, this was what my first start-up Doornox was trying to solve.

于是开始了寻找产品管理工作的残酷旅程。 具有讽刺意味的是，这就是我的第一个初创公司Doornox试图解决的问题。

Here are some quick lessons from those six-plus months.

这是六个多月以来的一些快速课程。

时间杀死交易 (Time kills deals)

A designer once told me that when she’s getting feedback from customers on new prototypes, she purposely shows them crappy, unpolished versions. These take very little time to produce and are known as “low-fidelity mocks.” When I asked why, she said that people are more likely to give honest feedback this way. People are generally too hesitant to alter mocks that look highly polished and well-thought-out.

一位设计师曾经告诉我，当她从客户那里获得有关新原型的反馈时，她特意向他们展示了粗糙，粗糙的版本。 这些制作时间非常短，被称为“低保真模拟”。 当我问为什么时，她说人们更可能以这种方式给出诚实的反馈。 人们通常不愿更改看起来很精致且经过深思熟虑的模拟。

The same low-fidelity concept is largely true in the job hunt. If a recruiter emailed me at 2pm asking a few basic questions, a response from me at 3pm would be read with lower expectations than a response 24-hours later.

相同的低保真概念在求职中大体上是正确的。 如果某位招聘人员在下午2点给我发电子邮件询问一些基本问题，那么比起24小时后的答复，我在下午3点收到的答复的期望值要低。

Low-fidelity responses make the job search process move much faster. You start winning out over other candidates who take longer to respond. The more time you take to respond to something, the higher you’re stacking the expectations against yourself. And the higher the chances are that you’re killing that deal.

低保真度的响应使求职过程移动得更快。 您开始击败需要更长时间响应的其他候选人。 您对某事做出回应的时间越多，您对自己的期望就越高。 而且，您杀死这笔交易的机会就更高。

This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t respond well. But I’ve found that responding quickly with perhaps a small tradeoff in quality separates a candidate from the pack. You become known for your reliability in communication, and when you do need more time to respond, people let you have it.

这并不意味着您不应做出很好的React。 但是我发现，快速做出响应，也许会在质量上进行少量折衷，从而使候选人与众不同。 您以沟通的可靠性而著称，当您确实需要更多时间做出回应时，人们就会喜欢它。

Value time as much as quality. As they say in product management, “ship fast.”

珍惜时间和质量。 正如他们在产品管理中所说的那样，“快速发货”。

跟进 (Follow Up)

Another thing that <5% of people do is follow up. Following up might take the form of a two-line thank you note after an informational interview. It might be a reminder email after a hiring manager doesn’t respond for a week. Something along the lines of “Hey, I wanted to circle back on my last note and see if you had any thoughts?” can go a long way in advancing career prospects. There were countless times when, after several follow-up reminders in a row, someone would get back to me thanking me for following up and then moving me on to the next steps.

<5％的人要做的另一件事是跟进。 在进行信息面试后，可以采取两行感谢形式进行跟进。 招聘经理一周未回复后，可能是一封提醒电子邮件。 类似于“嘿，我想回想一下我的最后一个音符，看看你有什么想法吗？” 可以大大提升职业前景。 在无数次连续提醒您之后，有人会回覆我，感谢我的跟进，然后继续进行下一步。

People are human. We may concoct internal hypotheses of how recruiters are plotting against us. But they often just forget to respond. Following up in a polite, quick manner is not annoying — it actually shows that you’re organized and reliable.

人是人。 我们可能会捏造关于招聘者如何阴谋反对我们的内部假设。 但是他们常常忘了回应。 礼貌，快速地跟进并不令人讨厌-它实际上表明您有组织且可靠。

知道你的故事 (Know Your Story)

Communicating your journey is critical to the job search. Almost every employer starts with “tell me about yourself.” At first, I would only talk about the highlight reel of my professional journey. But I found much more success when I authentically laid out the startup struggle, the lessons learned, and how that’s shaped me into a product manager today. Good stories are personal AND professional, and they discuss both the good times AND the conflicts. Talking about my startup journey in just highlights was extremely boring for people.

沟通您的旅程对求职至关重要。 几乎每个雇主都从“告诉我自己”开始。 首先，我只会谈论我职业生涯中的精彩片段。 但是，当我真诚地开展创业斗争，汲取的教训以及如今如何将我塑造成产品经理时，我发现了更多的成功。 好故事是个人和专业的，他们讨论好时光和冲突。 仅仅以亮点谈论我的创业之旅对人们来说非常无聊。

Communicating your story makes a ten-fold difference in making job hunt progress. Big shout out to entrepreneur and podcast-creator Ruben Harris who helped me break into startups with story crafting!

交流您的故事在求职过程中产生了十倍的差异。 向企业家和播客创建者鲁本·哈里斯 ( Ruben Harris )大喊大叫，他们通过故事制作帮助我闯入了创业公司！

Along the same lines, don’t stress about the precise things you should do or say when communicating your value. It’s what you make people feel that is most important. Don’t micro-manage your speech in real-time — this will free you up to communicate yourself in a way that engenders trust and a genuine awe of you in other people.

同样，不要在传达自己的价值时强调您应该做或要说的确切事情。 这就是让人们感到最重要的事情。 不要实时管理您的语音-这将使您解放出来，以引起信任和对他人真正敬畏的方式进行交流。

“The true spirit of conversation consists more in bringing out the cleverness of others than in showing a great deal of it yourself; he who goes away pleased with himself and his own wit is also greatly pleased with you.” -Jean de La Bruyere

“对话的真正精神更多在于展现他人的智慧，而不是自己展现出很多智慧； 走开的人对自己和自己的智慧感到满意，对你也很满意。” -让·德拉·布鲁耶尔(Jean de La Bruyere)

没有新闻就是新闻 (No News Is Still News)

Sometimes you make a promise to respond by a deadline, but for external reasons, you can’t keep that promise anymore. For example, I once told a friend who was pulling a favor referring me into her company that I would send her my resume by Thursday afternoon. Thursday afternoon rolled around, and a resume-guru whom I had asked for advice still hadn’t provided his feedback on mine. I didn’t yet feel comfortable sending the resume to my friend.

有时您承诺在截止日期前做出回应，但由于外部原因，您无法再履行该承诺。 例如，我曾经告诉一个朋友，这个朋友正在帮我一个忙，将我介绍到她的公司，我会在周四下午之前寄给我我的简历。 周四下午到处转悠，我向他征求意见的履历大师仍未提供他对我的反馈。 我还不满意将简历发送给我的朋友。

I received an awkward text from my friend later that week, asking if I still wanted a referral. Of course I did! Here was this person, who was going out of her way to help me in my job search, thinking that I didn’t care. She was following up with me! This unreliability wasn’t the impression I wanted to give. And thinking about it from her perspective, I would have done much less for a person who wasn’t reliable enough to follow-up with me.

那周晚些时候，我从朋友那里收到了一封尴尬的短信，问我是否仍然希望转诊。 我当然做了！ 这个人正竭尽全力帮助我寻找工作，以为我不在乎。 她正在跟着我！ 这种不可靠性不是我想要给的印象。 从她的角度考虑，对于一个不够可靠不能跟我跟进的人，我要做的事少得多。

I quickly gave her an update and realized the lesson. No news is still news. At the time of the deadline, a simple text saying that there wasn’t an update actually increased the other person’s trust in me. It hardly mattered that I was pushing back the deadline (other than the fact that time kills deals, but in that case I was gaining much more quality).

我很快给了她一个更新，并意识到了这一课。 没有新闻仍然是新闻。 在截止日期时，一条简单的文字说没有更新实际上增加了对方对我的信任。 不必推迟截止日期(时间会扼杀交易，但在那种情况下，我可以获得更高的质量)。

People largely understand that things take time, and they are much more forgiving about a delay that is communicated than a delay that isn’t.

人们在很大程度上理解事情是需要时间的，他们对沟通的延迟比没有的要宽容得多。

简单电子邮件>复杂电子邮件 (Simple Emails > Complex Emails)

Yep.

是的

与自己沟通 (Communicate with yourself)

The job-hunt journey can be long, and sometimes amidst all the external communication, it can be easy to forget to communicate with yourself. Journalling and guided meditation (like the app Headspace) go a long way in making communication with other people better. It enables an internal dialogue with yourself.

找工作的过程可能很漫长，有时在所有外部沟通中，很容易忘记与自己沟通。 日记和引导式冥想(例如应用程序Headspace)在改善与其他人的交流方面大有帮助。 它可以与您自己进行内部对话。

I highly recommend this game-changer, as it helped me center myself after every rejection and resume black hole (and there were hundreds…). Meditation is that eagle-eyed view that helps you remember that your current struggle is temporary.

我强烈推荐这个改变游戏规则的人，因为它可以帮助我在每次被拒绝后将自己置中并恢复黑洞(有数百个…)。 冥想是一种鹰眼的观点，可以帮助您记住您当前的斗争是暂时的。

最后的想法 (Final Thoughts)

Working on my communication has enabled me to make some really fantastic relationships. Their value ironically cannot be communicated because the serendipity is too random. Be it an intro, a resource, a knowledge drop, interview-practice time, career advice, or mental support along the way, I have a village of people to thank. So thank you!! You know who you are, and I could not have done it without you.

通过交流，我建立了一些非常棒的关系。 具有讽刺意味的是，它们的价值无法传达，因为偶然性太随机了。 无论是介绍，资源，知识的缺失，面试时间，职业建议还是一生中的心理支持，我都有很多人要感谢。 所以谢谢！！ 你知道你是谁，没有你我做不到。

My last big piece of news is that I will be a Product Manager at the meal-kit-delivery startup, HelloFresh, and that I will have the exciting opportunity to work with a talented team at headquarters in Berlin, Germany!

我最近的一大新闻是，我将成为送餐包交付初创公司HelloFresh的产品经理，并且我将有激动人心的机会与德国柏林总部的才华横溢的团队合作！

If you’d like to be in touch about entrepreneurship, or talk about product, or teach me German, I’d be happy to help how I can. Please feel free to reach out. And if you just want to say hi, that’s great too.

如果您想与企业家保持联系，谈论产品或教我德语，我很乐意为您提供帮助。 请随时与我们联系。 如果您只想打个招呼，那就太好了。

Best way to contact me is to slide into my DMs: Twitter (@nikiagra), and Fb Messenger (@nikiagra).

与我联系的最佳方法是进入我的DM：Twitter(@nikiagra)和Fb Messenger(@nikiagra)。

翻译自: https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/communication-is-key-growth-lessons-learned-through-two-startups-a-job-hunt-ca171a2fd8a4/

2年工作经验进 初创公司