Inspire them!
The highest purpose of art is to inspire. What else can you do for anyone but inspire them? Bob Dylan.
I’m a very long-time Bob Dylan fan; I saw him at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 and have all his albums through Blood on the Tracks, after which he lost me for a number of years. When I think of creating corporate culture in a startup I think about this Dylan quote. Business is not art. Or is it? My first stint in the software industry was at a company entitled Software Arts. The founders considered themselves artists whose medium was software.
It is very hard to push anyone to do anything. But pulling them in the direction you want them to go is the job of the founder/CEO. If you can’t inspire the troops you better find a co-founder who can. Inspiration is the strongest pull, far stronger than free lunch or stock options! Your vision in founding the company is the strongest inspiration you can offer, but you should be thinking how you can inspire everyone on the team as a constant process, not a one-time event.
