Think about a time when you didn’t need money. You could go a long way with a very limited amount of money because you did not have to pay for rent, the use of your furniture, your food, utilities, sometimes clothing and most or all of your necessities. You still used these items; you just didn’t have to pay for them. Furthermore, think about those opportunities where family, friends, acquaintances, and sometimes even strangers provided you with necessities.
Right before independence, helps flows to make it work
You did not feel the need to have money because you did not have to pay to use valuable things, you were not fully independent and you did not owe anything in return for that which you were using or consuming. It was given to you, but it was not a hand out. Rather, somehow, you felt you deserved to use these assets but you also knew you could not dispose of these benefits for other ones. For example, you could not have someone else eat your dinner, sleep on your bed, or wear your pajamas. You had permission to consume some things without paying for them, but you did not have full ownership or full obligations.
Welcome to the Teenage Mindset. Chances are that you don’t even realize how easy you have it until you have to pay for your own stuff. Some businesses follow a similar path. There is plenty of support available: working overtime, a helping hand moving boxes, the advice of a friend, a supplier’s employee that connects with another supplier, and so forth. This help can go unnoticed or unrecognized. However, when entrepreneurs or founders reach out for help, they can find amazing responses: For instance, Uncle Bill gives you a fax machine and his secretary takes 10 minutes to save you tens of hours on letter formatting. Other examples: Mary finds a store that might carry your products and calls them up for you; Paul lends you his truck; your lawyer refers her accountant to you, who then refers you to his web designer, who connects you to her printing company, which offers to promote you as the client of the month. You just benefitted by hundreds of unpaid hours.
Others are prone to help you because they feel useful and want to support your future independence. They are not obliged to help you rather, they do it freely even as you don’t feel tempted to demand their help. Sometimes their help comes unannounced, sometimes you request it, sometimes your request is rejected, and sometimes help is offered. It is not the focus of your attention, it is complementary. Yet, in a larger scheme of things, the contributions you receive are very important during a company’s initial stages:
- A small help goes a long way.
- There is no need to fit such help into an existing process.
- Help does not imply an obligation.
- Help comes as is, and is an input to the process, not the other way around.
The teenage mindset is a very interesting concept as it opens many opportunities to explore innovative ways of funding. If we think back to the origins of funding and money, we realize that funding has always existed in the sense that people provided resources that were transformed into economic development — what we normally accept as prosperity.
Teenage funding include: gifting, supporting, and capital-less funding.