If you are an introvert founder, build the one skill that matters mostby Derek Lidow Last week we discussed how skilled you need to be at something in order to succeed at it. This week we begin a series on the traits that worry aspiring entrepreneurs and on the fears those traits produce. We start with introversion, because it is the trait we are asked about more often than any other. As a reminder, traits are psychological or physiological characteristics that develop early in life and are embedded so deeply in how we think and behave that they are extremely difficult to change. Handedness is a trait, as is introversion, as is the degree to which your body chemistry reacts to stress, and as is whether you enjoy making decisions or would rather go on thinking about them. There are thousands of traits you could have, and there are no traits that are all bad. Every trait carries benefits as well as costs for helping humans survive and reproduce, and a trait that was purely a liability would have been evolved out of the gene pool long ago. Hold onto that principle as we work through this series, because the entire approach depends on it. Introversion is a trait in which a person's brain chemistry registers unease upon entering unfamiliar social situations and upon meeting new people. It is not the same thing as being shy or being socially awkward, although all three produce similar feelings and the advice that follows applies equally well to any of them. Introverts find social interaction genuinely exhausting and strongly prefer spending their time with people they already feel close to. A great many introverts conclude from this that they are poorly suited to founding a company, on the reasonable-sounding grounds that sales, marketing, and recruiting all reward people who inherently enjoy meeting strangers. There is something to that concern. But the response to any trait that makes you uneasy is always the same, and it comes in two parts: develop a strategy that exploits whatever the trait is good for, and develop the specific skill or skills that offset what the trait costs you. You are not attempting to become an extrovert, because you could not manage it, and because you would be surrendering some real advantages if you could. Consider first what the trait is good for. Introverted founders spend less of their time in social situations, which leaves them more time to think, and they tend to convert that time into better preparation than an otherwise similar extrovert would. They generally arrive at more robust competitive strategies, and they are frequently unusually effective at leading small teams of capable and self-motivated people, which happens to be exactly the sort of team an early-stage startup has. Two books make this case at length and are worth your time: Quiet by Susan Cain, and The Introvert's Edge by Matthew Pollard. Now the mitigation, which is the part that matters most. There is one thing that introverted founders must become very good at, and that is building relationships. Relationship building is a skill and not a trait, which means that almost anyone can reach competence at it once they understand how it is actually done, and nothing whatsoever about introversion prevents someone from becoming masterful or even best-in-class at it. What it requires is motivation, deliberate practice, and somebody willing to coach you, which is precisely what reaching any level of any skill requires. This is considerably more approachable than it sounds. Begin with the most basic relationship skill there is, which is communicating, and practice it somewhere the stakes are low and the feedback arrives immediately. Join a local improv group, or join a public speaking peer group such as Toastmasters. Learn to work with a team to make a room full of strangers laugh, or to hold that room with a story of your own. Either one will give just about any introvert the confidence to go and find the teammates and customers who will join them on their entrepreneurial journey. Notice that nothing in this asked you to change who you are. It asked you to stop treating a trait as a verdict. Next week we take up where your body chemistry sits on the stress spectrum, and what to do about it if the answer turns out to be “high.” With gratitude,
Derek and Ben P.S. If you like what we’re doing, please consider recommending this newsletter to another person you think would benefit from us. It really helps us build out our free content platform.
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