The -1 to 100 Framework: Rethinking the Zero to One Journey

Everyone talks about going from 0 to 1. But the real startup journey starts at -1.

After building products as both a founder and an employee across different industries and stages, and meeting hundreds of founders, I've noticed something crucial: understanding these distinct stages isn't just academic – it's the difference between founders who can adapt and those who get stuck.

The most successful founders I meet instinctively know which stage they're in. The ones who struggle often don't – they're applying late-stage thinking to early-stage problems, or worse, early-stage tactics to late-stage challenges.

Here's how I think about each stage of the journey:

1. From -1 to 0: The Foundation 

   This is the messy part no one talks about. You're still at your day job, coding on weekends, sketching ideas during lunch breaks. You're testing assumptions, building prototypes that embarrass you, having coffee chats with potential users who probably think you're crazy. You're not even at zero yet – you're gathering the courage and conviction to start.

   Getting to zero requires answering one question honestly: "Am I ready to go all in?" Every other question – market size, tech stack, funding – is just procrastination in disguise.

2. From 0 to 1: Creating Something Real

   Zero starts the day you commit fully. The 0 to 1 phase is about turning ideas into reality. All those nights and weekends at -1 become your fuel.

   The 0 to 1 phase is about one thing: finding sustainable value creation. Not scale, not growth, not efficiency. Just answering: can we create something valuable enough that people would miss it if it disappeared?

3. From 1 to 10: The First Real Scale

   This is where theory meets reality. Your product works for 10 customers. Can it work for 100? Your founding team is aligned. Can you align a real organization? Your early adopters love you. Can you serve customers who don't?

4. From 10 to 100: Building the Machine

   Now you're not building a product – you're building a machine that builds and delivers products. The skills that got you to 10 become liabilities. Success requires letting go of the very things that created your early success.

5. From 100 onward: Playing a New Game

   Each order of magnitude brings its own reality. Each feels like starting over. The only constant is change – in your role, your challenges, your definition of success.

The secret? Every stage has its own rhythm and its own level of path clarity. The messy experimentation of -1 to 0 has wild swings between clarity and confusion, but it's the focused building of 0 to 1 that starts to smooth out your journey. The founders who win aren't the ones who perfectly prepare – they're the ones who learn through action.

Your compass helps you navigate, but it's taking action that creates the path.