Free Feedback on “Founder Fit”
Hi Quinn,
Thank you for submitting your essay for feedback. I'm excited to offer this to friends of David and Write of Passage. You can expect:
- Written feedback on structure and flow
- Notes on clarity and concision (at the sentence/paragraph level)
- "The One Thing" to focus on if you were to revise this piece
- And a video overview of my feedback.
My goal is not just to give you feedback that would improve this single essay but to give you feedback that, if you apply it to future projects, would make you a better writer (by helping you become a better self-editor).
I'm going to work through the drafts in the order they were submitted (you're ninth), and I'll get back to everyone within the next two weeks.
All the best,
Garrett Kincaid
The One Thing
Don’t coin two terms; cut “QuinnOS,” and double-down on “Founder Fit.”
The ideas in here are valuable and insightful and clear. The only point that confused me was your QuinnOS metaphor. I suggest either relying less on that metaphor or cutting it altogether. Instead, keep your insights in terms of fit or misfit.
Notes
- I think it’d help to be more specific and concrete about the work you were doing at your agency, so that you can draw a clearer contrast to your startup. Reading your intro, I was wondering what kind of agency you had. Was it operations consulting, or maybe marketing? I have to guess from this line:
- Even something as simple as saying “design agency” here would help me imagine what your experience was, and the kind of work you do.
- Paragraphing: This is a stylistic choice, but I advice you against using so many paragraph-breaks. Rather than using paragraph-breaks for emphasis or for formatting, use them to serve a logical purpose in the flow of information. Use a paragraph-break to transition from one idea to the next.
- Here is a great insight that’s relatable, with nice imagery, but this entire excerpt is one idea. I recommend making these three paragraphs into one, as below:
- This made me laugh — really clever: “Everybody and their mentor loves to preach about product-market fit.”
- This is a great question and is essentially your thesis, but the first mention of it is buried in your second section I suggest moving this up to the end of your intro.
- There are some great, punchy, insightful sentences in here. I can tell that you’ve given a lot of thought to this puzzle, and you speak on it well, in a memorable way. Here are a couple such lines:
- I personally find the screenshot of your text about your Mastermind a little distracting. Maybe keep the fact that they kicked you out but remove the screenshot.
- Choose one of these examples, and expand on it so that it says all that you need to say with an example: Roam Research, Gumroad, Beehiv. Usually, it’s important to have multiple examples to show a trend, but you’re diagnosing a problem from your own experience. To list these examples back to back is to distance me, your reader, from your experience, which is what I am invested in.
- I suggest sticking to the Roam example and expanding on it, since you seem to be familiar with the founder and his story.
- Also, consider expanding on your example of Brian Chesky, since he seems to be a role model for you (mentioned alongside Jobs and Musk at the start of this piece). Make sure to mention that he is the co-founder AirBnB for those who might not know. AirBnB could be an example of Founder Fit, and Roam could be an example of founder misfit.
- This is another one of those punchy, clever lines, and a satisfying kicker — well done!
“I’d made a name for myself as the person who could take a company with product-market fit, find the key levers, and rebuild the whole foundation to scale.”
“I was bouncing between spreadsheets, meetings, and fires that popped up the second I got into anything. It was chaos. My unfair advantage was wasted on a dozen things I didn’t even care about. Bootstrapping felt like I had to MacGyver my way through every problem with nothing but duct tape and a paperclip. I scattered my best energy across hundreds of pointless tasks. And somewhere in the middle of that mess, I realized the irony. I wasn’t designing a dream. I was designing a cell. Every task, every late night, was just another brick in a wall I didn’t realize I was building around myself.”
“We design products for customers, why not businesses for founders?”
“Real design is about solving messy, real-world problems and making sure everything works together to get the outcome you want. It’s a puzzle, not a paint job.”
“Business Fit is the foundation that maximizes the return on your time and energy. Without this foundation, you’re trading your best energy for busywork.”
“I’m after that state of effortless flow—the place where building feels like breathing.When you’re designing from a place of flow, the numbers fall into place. And if it ends up worth billions, all the better.”