What I'd do differently if I started today

People love asking what you'd do differently.

They're usually hoping for something dramatic. "I'd have raised money." "I'd have moved to Berlin."

My answer is much more boring. I'd start the same way, with less nonsense.

What I'd keep

I'd still start with almost nothing. Foxnice began in 2014 with Yeray and 300 euros, and nobody else's money. Not because we were wise. Because there was nobody to ask. I didn't have contacts. Nobody in my family had run a business.

At the time that felt like a handicap. Today I think it was the best thing that happened to us.

When nobody lends you anything, every euro has to come from a client. And a client who pays is the most honest market research there is. You learn very fast what people actually want, as opposed to what they say they want at a networking event.

I'd still start with services. Building websites and looking after them paid for everything else. Every product we have today, PagoCRM, Foxnice Booking, Foxnice Restaurant, came from a problem we'd already solved for clients more than once. I wouldn't trade that for a clever idea on a napkin.

And I'd still start with Yeray. That one's not up for discussion.

What I'd throw away sooner

This is the longer list. I'll keep it short anyway.

I'd say no sooner. For years I treated every request as an opportunity. A bit of custom development here, a special case there. Each one looked small. Together they were a second company nobody had decided to build. We eventually wrote it down: support doesn't include development. I'd write that on day one.

I'd chase fewer side roads that look like free money. We've spent time on things that seemed like a shortcut and turned out to be a detour. Some paid a little. All of them cost focus. Focus is the one thing a small company can't buy more of.

I'd stop being the person everything passes through much earlier. I was the bottleneck of my own company for longer than I like to admit. Not out of ego. Out of habit. "It's quicker if I do it" is true every single time, and false over a year.

And I'd treat Yeray's doubts as a feature sooner. Not because he's always right. Because he's usually right about different things than I am, and a company needs both kinds of right.

Starting over, I wouldn't change the road. I'd just stop taking so many scenic detours.

What I wouldn't change, even though it hurt

The mistakes with money I could explain.

I've put money into things I understood and still got burned. The difference is that I knew why it went wrong. That's a lesson. Losing money on something you never understood isn't a lesson. It's a lottery ticket.

And the slowness. Patient money is slower. Products funded by client work take longer to build, because they have to fit in the gaps between projects.

But slow came with something I wouldn't give back: the right to be wrong without explaining it to anyone. No board, no round, no clock.

So if I started today, would I do it differently?

Yes. About fifteen per cent.

The other eighty-five I'd do exactly the same, only with more sleep.

P.S. The fifteen per cent is a guess. I didn't do a spreadsheet. That would be one of the things I'd do differently.