This is an interesting and short article from INC magazine on the traits of successful startup CEOs.  After running a business for about 3 years, a lot of these make good sense.

1. Good at hiring and firing – hiring people is easy and makes you feel good about yourself. But knowing when to cut loses is hard, and delaying can result in bigger problems. It’s not easy to do, I struggled with this for a long time.

2. Builds a culture, not a company – a company cannot grow if it has the wrong culture. Spend time finding employees with the right skill set AND the right culture. The first hires at a startup are crucial to building the right culture.

3. Listens to feedback

4. Resilient – someone said to me early on “sometimes the road is straight and easy, other days you can’t see 10 feet ahead of you.” Keep chugging along.

5. Has a vision – People need to believe that you have a plan and direction.

6. Stay focused – I interpret this as not getting distracted by other things that may pop up. Keep your head clear and focused to the important matter.

7. Speak clearly – When I first started I talked a lot to be friendly, thinking that I could get people to be more willing to do stuff for me.   But all that did was confuse people. Now I know to keep my instructions simple and concise. Explanations may or may not be necessary.

8. Customer advocate – I have to say “the customer is not always right.” Sometimes you have to fire customers. There’s certain customers that I don’t deal with, either because they are cheap, or because I know they will never be happy.

9. Good at convincing people – also related to being concise and clear. Don’t talk yourself into a trap, learn to stop