Thread by @dunkhippo33

For today's thread, I want to talk about ambition. Are you born with it? Can you develop it?

I want to tell you about a founder I backed several years ago which really changed my opinion a lot on this topic.

Story time >>

1) First some context. A lot of VCs think that you're born with ambition. Or at the very least have to have developed it *before* you try to raise money from VCs.

2) A few years ago, I was mentoring some startups. And so I sat down and had my 1st mtg w/ a startup I was assigned to mentor.

And in that conversation, somehow we got to talking about something a rather, and the CEO mentioned that she would be ok selling the business for $1m.

3) Now, to be clear, if you are bootstrapping your business, you can sell for whatever you want. And $1m is interesting money for sure.

But if you get VCs involved, this is a red flag.

4) And this startup had taken some VC money.

So in my head, I'm thinking "Ugh, the investors made a terrible decision. This company has no ambition. I don't see how anyone is going to make money here."

5) But keep in mind, I was mentoring the company. I was not an investor. I was supposed to be helping the company w/ their customer acquisition. That's it.

So I kept my mouth shut about it, and just focused on helping them w/ their outbound sales.

6) At the beginning of coaching them, their outbound sales was a disaster. They had some revenue, but there was nothing methodical about it.

But it had glimmer of hope. Ppl were interested in buying and some ppl were buying! So, it just needed some basic optimization.

7) Fast fwd a few weeks later, they are doing $30k/mo in revenue. And a few more weeks later, $50k/mo. They are starting to fly!

And less than a year later, they are well past the $1m runrate mark.

8) And around then, the founder was back in town, so we grabbed lunch, and we caught up on life and the business.

And in that conversation, it somehow came up, that she said "She would NEVER sell this business."

9) And that whole experience always stuck with me. I went from thinking this team was not at all ambitious to very ambitious.

What changed? Honestly, it was just product-market fit.

10) And when I think back on that experience, it all makes sense.

When things are really not going well, if someone offered you $1m, you would take it.

But if things are going well, and you can see your company have endless potential, there's almost no price that you'd sell for

11) There was nothing about the founder that informed "her number". It was all about how the business was going.

And there are many points - esp in the beginning when you have nothing -- where you feel down in the dumps.

12) The only difference is that some ppl say outloud just how down in the dumps they are (perhaps reflected by a number) and others don't.

13) Since then I've observed similar behavior in MANY founders. Founders who seemingly had "less" ambition in the beginning, but those same ppl who found PM fit are now running $100m+ valuation companies (on their way to $1B valuation ventures), can't imagine selling now.

14) On the flip side, I've also coached a number of ambitious founders who never found PM fit. Unfortunately, ambition alone in startups doesn't really help you unless you have PM fit.

15) So my biggest takeaway from all of this -- and I know many will disagree -- is that "helpful ambition" is driven by product-market fit.

And that really is *mostly* what matters in the end.