Linkedin Advice for kicking off a new company or project

I subscribe to a lot of mailing lists that bring articles to my inbox. Most I simply skim through.

However, some of them are interesting and relevant. These I want to refer to later, and some I want to share! And with many of those that I share, I'll add why...

This is one of those articles that pretty much stands on its own. I'm including with few comments. If you're interested, you can follow the link at the bottom. It's a good read...
"...for example, we have to answer the following questions before we kick-off a project:

• What problem is the client trying to solve?
• How does their product solve that problem?
• Who is the target customer?
• How is it different from other products in the same space?
• What do they stand for? What are their core values?
• What kind of pain points are existing users experiencing?
• What are existing users loving about it?
• In one sentence, how will we know we’ve been successful?

When you build a framework of values for your company, most questions that come up are answerable without your involvement.
Here’s a list of values that we share with everyone who joins our team:

• A job that doesn’t feel like a job: We want to give our team the freedom and autonomy to work when and how they please. We hire smart people, give them great work, and treat them like adults — even if they want to start work at 4PM, work from a cafe, or road trip across the United States.
• A focus on craftsmanship: We take a breath before we ship and ask “Is this the best we can do? Are we proud of this?” If the answer is no, we go back to the drawing board. We don’t ship work we aren’t proud of, even if it means having an uncomfortable conversation.
• No jargon or buzzwords: We think jargon destroys companies. It’s designed to make one person feel superior, while the other feels less than and nods along. We use simple terms that everyone understands, and we do the same with our clients. Our work speaks for itself, there’s no need to dress it up.
• No assholes allowed: This one is pretty self-explanatory. No political climbers, bullies, yellers, or machiavellian BS. We operate in a climate of mutual respect, and when one bad egg crosses the line, they need to go before they sour the whole bunch, regardless of how talented they are. This goes not only for our team, but for our clients too.
• People over profits: We’d rather break even than run a company that isn’t enjoyable to work at. Profits are important — they keep the lights on and give us long term security — but we will not compromise the quality of our work or make ourselves miserable in pursuit of financial gain.
• Be honest, not perfect: We all make mistakes and have flaws, and we should be comfortable owning our mistakes and knowing it’s ok to mess up once in awhile. This isn’t about being kumbaya, but accepting the gap between where you are and where you want to be. We think the gap makes us do better work, especially when we’re honest about it.

Most important questions can easily be answered by going back to these core values.

Lazy Leadership: Why I rarely go to the office,

only see my team a couple times a week, and let other people make important decisions