Dharmesh Shah

I'm having a better time at HubSpot now at 7,000 people than I was having at 70 people. I get all the upside of scale with very little of the downside.

To evaluate any startup idea, score it on 4 Ps: 1. Potential — how big could it be? 2. Probability — what are the odds? 3. Passion — do you care enough to work on it for 10 years? 4. Prowess — why you? What's your unfair advantage? And always assess potential BEFORE probability.

Measure the cost of a feature at three levels: (1) cost to build, (2) ongoing maintenance, (3) dimensional complexity added. The third is the most important and the most ignored. Going from 1 product to 2 doesn't add complexity linearly — it multiplies it.

Some of the best startup advice I've heard is startups should focus on one thing and be really, really exceptionally world-class at that one thing. And one of our early zigs is we are going to do exactly the opposite of that.

Most people say 'first principles' when they really mean 'things I believe.' First principles are physics — the laws of the universe. Transparency isn't a first principle. It's a founding principle. There's a huge difference.