🚶‍♂️Climbing Kilimanjaro in 8 Days; 90 km; 46 hours of walking; ~ 177,188 steps

Usually, at the start of a new year, we write about the new year’s resolutions, but first, I need to wrap up the ones from last year. So here I am, reporting on my social contract made last year — “The 4 Peaks Challenge”.

For me, 2023 was focused on health and making my way to an active lifestyle. That’s how the idea of the “4 Peaks Challenge” came to be — To climb 4 major mountain peaks in 1 year including the tallest mountain in Africa and one of the 7 summits, Kilimanjaro (5,895 m).

Even if I missed some of the peaks along the way I’m happy to report that on the 23rd of Jan, I managed to conquer the highest point in Africa and the tallest free-standing mountain in the world — the mighty Kilimanjaro, Uhuru Peak (5,895 m). This was a culmination of not just my health efforts but the desire to reach this point, which is what kept me going through 2023’s ups and downs.

Getting Started

On our second day in Africa, anticipation was building in the hotel as we prepared ourselves for the journey ahead. After meeting our local guides, and gathering our gear, we embarked on the Lemosho Route, an 8-day trek starting at 2,700 meters altitude. Little did we know, that this adventure would be marked by unforgettable moments, challenges, and an unstoppable momentum leading us to the summit. Over the course of 8 days and 90 kilometers, we took 177,188 steps to reach Uhuru Peak.

Leaving the hotel, we drove for around 3 hours to reach the Lemosho Glades at 2,349 meters, where our adventure began. Meeting our experienced guides, including one who had climbed the route over 300 times, eased whatever concerns we might have had. As we ascended Mt. Kilimanjaro, the group started bonding over personal stories and eagerness to conquer the challenge ahead.

On the first day, the hike felt surprisingly manageable, thanks in part to our guides’ constant reminder of “Pole, Pole” meaning “slowly, slowly” in Swahili. This mantra really helped steady our course as the journey progressed.

What initially seemed like a moderate effort soon intensified amidst rainy days, cold nights, and diminished oxygen levels at high altitudes. Under the Pole Pole anthem, we were making our way through the rainforest and I could see my own journey as an entrepreneur unfolding side by side. Whether it’s climbing mighty Kilimanjaro or building up Salt & Pepper, one thing remains true, you need to build your efforts for a marathon, not a sprint. No matter the challenges building your efforts, with steady steps and a continuous momentum the group always makes it to the top. That’s why “Pole Pole” always rang strong in our ears, bringing us back into the present and helping us build up our climb one step at a time.

Life above the clouds

On the second day, we covered 11 km and ascended 1,000 meters from MTI Mkubwa Camp (2,650 meters) to Shira I Camp (3,610 meters) amidst rainy conditions. Leaving the rainforest behind, ascending beyond 3,000 meters we finally got a glimpse of Uhuru Peak between rainbows slicing rain clouds. It was a reminder of why we all chose this journey and the reward at the end of this adventure.

In the next few days, the hike unraveled into a unique and breathtaking experience as we ascended above the clouds and continued acclimatizing to the high altitude of over 4,000 meters. Noticing the clouds slowly drifting beside or beneath our feet, created a surreal and peaceful atmosphere, a truly unforgettable sight.

The days went on into a mix of awe-inspiring scenery, physical challenges, and an opportunity to adapt to the lack of oxygen in the air. The terrain also started becoming more challenging, with steep uphill sections, uneven paths, and all this under heavy rain and battling new levels of discomfort testing our minds and our bodies. An area that stood out was the Barranco Wall, a 257 meters steep ridge roughly halfway up Mount Kilimanjaro. The Barranco Wall looked formidable and was an exciting experience to climb it early in the morning as all the groups from the camp started making their way together towards their next destination.

The Summit: Nonstop to the Top!

When deciding that I wanted to hike Kilimanjaro, I heard multiple times that I was not signing up only for a physical challenge, but I was also taking on a mental challenge that would test my determination and resilience to conquer the top. And I truly felt this massive challenge on the summit climb — by far the hardest and most exhausting thing I have ever done in my life!

We got into the summit camp, Barafu at 4,673m altitude, around noon after a 3 and a half hour's walk from Karanga camp. We got some lunch and tried to rest up for a couple of hours. Sleeping during the camp’s day noise and at that altitude is not an easy task but we needed to recharge and build up energy. Had dinner around 7 pm and then again battling distractions to get some sleep.

Overnight Ascension — Yes, you read that right, the summit ascension is done overnight. You wake up at midnight and start the journey. The darkness certainly heightens the experience with a pinch of mystery and a dash of anticipation to reach the peak. For my Eastern European Orthodox friends, this experience reminded me of the Easter holiday from my childhood when like in Kilimanjaro we had to wake up at midnight and climb out of bed to go to church and walk around the church with the rest of the congregation holding lighted candles. Unlike my childhood, the Ester bunny would not make a magical appearance this time. At 11 pm the night of the final ascent some of us were feeling the toll of the climb while others were preparing for what lay ahead.

Under the beat of “Pole, Pole” we started climbing in the middle of the night. We were looking at an 8-hour climb to the top with only 5-minute breaks every 1.5–2 hours to avoid getting too cold. I had 2 layers on my legs, 5 layers on my upper body, 2 layers on my head, and hand and foot warmers, yet I was still freezing, especially around my feet and hands.

The climb was something like nothing I had ever done before, a 1,135-meter elevation gain going straight up…and when I say straight up, I mean really straight up, like climbing a double black diamond ski slope for 8 hours straight. At times it was completely silent and I was drifting between exhaustion and meditation.

We were fortunate to have an incredibly active team of guides while going up, as they constantly kept us focused and energized by singing and shouting chants. Pole Pole was now sometimes being replaced with: “One Team, One Goal, Nonstop to the Top!”. They somehow made it clear that even if the body or the mind might give up the spirit can still push on, and so we did.

After 4 hours into the climb, the effects of the altitude began to affect all of us. Each step became more difficult, each breath shorter, and fatigue started to set in. I had to take smaller steps and more frequent breaks to catch my breath. The little voice in my head grew stronger and stronger, wondering “Why did I decide to do this? Why?”. I even looked back a couple of times and considered turning back.

We trusted Mandela, our lead “singer” guide who kept encouraging us with shouts of “Keep going, we’re almost there,” and despite my constant thoughts of “Are we there yet?”, the dark sky began to fade while the sun was coming up. Finally, we reached Stella Point at 5,756 meters, marking a significant milestone on our journey to the summit. The grueling ascent was behind us, and we now had only about 100 meters of elevation left on a steady path to reach the Uhuru peak.

Feeling extremely exhausted, we finally got the chance to take a much-needed, longer break. We took off some layers, savored a cup of ginger tea, and watched the stunning sunrise over the vast African landscape. It was an unforgettable sight that provided me with a much-needed energy boost. Not only did it motivate me to continue to the top, but it also allowed me to fully enjoy this experience as my fatigue gradually disappeared.

At 7:29 am against all my fears, frustrations, and fatigue we reached Uhuru Peak! Hugh and singing were the norm while congratulating each other and slowly realizing what we all managed to achieve, the end result of all that effort: “We actually made it! We were at the top! Unbelievable!!!”

Some (of the many) takeaways

• Have your own walk — Besides the physical challenge of the experience, climbing Kili was also an opportunity for me to disconnect from my digitally powered life and connect to nature, to people but above all to re-connect with myself. Reminding myself once again that as in climbing Kili, in our personal lives, and in business, each of us has their own walk — and is a marathon, not a sprint. Independent of how fast or ”Pole, Pole” we go, the important thing is where we decide to go, the people we take with us, and making sure we enjoy the ride!
• Anything is possible! — We can do whatever we set our mind to if we’re focused, we have the right people by our side and we put in the necessary work — “If you want to go fast, go alone, if you want to go far, go together!”.

• Seeing the people who helped us get to the top carrying 30–40 kgs on their backs and heads each day, helping us with whatever was needed along the way, and smiling the entire time determined me to be more grateful and appreciative of the opportunities and challenges I have in my life.
• All of us need support and I would not have been able to do this without the support of my family & girlfriend throughout 2023’s ups and downs; without Alexandru Ilovan and the Salt&Pepper team that helped us prepare for this; I would not have been able to do this without the 9 people from our group who looked out after one another to make sure everyone is feeling well and can make it all the way to the top. And definitely, I would not have been able to do it without the help of Mr. Johns, the guide who has been by my side and made sure I made it to the top, and the rest of the Almighty Kilimanjaro crew.

Hakuna matata!

– PS: For the ones of you who told me you are looking to climb Kilimanjaro as well, another article with more practical insights and tips & tricks should follow soon.

Maybe you’ve heard the famous quote “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”, right?

As an aspiring entrepreneur, constantly navigating the ever-changing landscapes of business, I’ve come to appreciate the immense value of understanding and shaping organizational culture. One book that stands out in this regard is “No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention” by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer.

💡 Why I Wish I’d Read It Sooner

• I would have better understood the quote “Culture eats strategy for breakfast” — the true power a good culture has for the team & company’s performance, and how you can actually build it;
• In the early years of my journey, building a company culture that fosters innovation, adaptability, and growth was one of my most significant challenges. This book provides a unique look into how Netflix crafted and maintained its distinct culture. Exploring these principles earlier could have transformed my approach to culture-building in my own company.

🚀 Key Takeaways and Lessons

• The Essence of a Great Workplace: Beyond superficial perks, a good workplace is defined by great minds collaborating to elevate each other. It’s the joy of being among talents, pushing boundaries, and collectively becoming better versions of ourselves.
• Radical Honesty & Feedback Culture: Netflix encourages open and candid feedback among employees, creating an environment where issues are identified early, and solutions are collaboratively devised. “At Netflix, it is tantamount to being disloyal to the company if you fail to speak up when you disagree with a colleague or have feedback that could be helpful. After all, you could help the business — but you are choosing not to.”
• Open the Books: Ignorance about how a business works is its biggest challenge. Just like players need to understand the game, employees must grasp how the company operates and makes money. Transparency about the business’s core helps every decision-maker align their actions with the company’s success.
• Leading by Context: Netflix replaces control with context. Granting employees freedom while expecting responsible decisions not only fuels innovation but also cultivates a culture of accountability and ownership, where individuals are empowered to make impactful choices.

📋 Recommendation to First-Time Founders

• Gift it to Your Team: Share this book with your leadership team. Engage in debates about the principles presented in the book and explore how these ideas can apply to your company’s culture.
• Promote Feedback Culture: Integrate regular feedback sessions into your routines. Initiate open discussions during your 1-on-1 meetings with a simple yet powerful question: “Do you have any feedback for me this week?”. Encourage colleagues to adhere to the 4A feedback guidelines: Aim to help, Make it Actionable, Appreciate it, Accept or discard.
• Be Patience with Yourself: Remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither is a thriving company culture. I’m sure that after reading this book you would feel a bit bad about not being able to implement all or many of the principles presented here as quickly as possible. However, be aware that Netflix’s journey was paved with years of hard work and the expertise of seasoned individuals. Take it one step at a time, allowing yourself and your company the necessary time and space to grow and embody these principles organically.

I really like the quote used to highlight “Leading by context”:

If you want to build a ship,
don’t drum up the people
to gather wood, divide the
work, and give orders.
Instead, teach them to yearn
for the vast and endless sea.

— The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

📚 Thanks for following me on this journey

This book concludes my series of “5 Books I Wish I’d read in my first years as a founder”. Thank you for following me on this journey and I hope they will help you in yours.

If you missed the first 4, here is a quick list:

1. “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni on building teams
2. “Never Split the Difference” by Chris Voss on negotiation
3. “The Hard Thing About Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz on the struggles you face as an entrepreneur
4. “The 4 Disciplines of Execution” by Chris McChesney, Jim Huling, and Sean Covey on executing your strategy

Have you encountered any unconventional workplace practices that you found beneficial? Share your thoughts and experiences!

Let’s learn & grow together!

The 4th book in this series — “The 4 Disciplines of Execution” is a lifeline in this storm. It unveils a straightforward approach to managing chaos and chasing objectives. It’s all about focusing on wildly important goals, pinpointing lead measures, keeping a motivational scoreboard, and embracing a rhythm of accountability. Let’s dive in!

💡 Why I Wish I’d Read It Sooner

• Practical Wisdom through Examples: Rich with practical examples, the book served as a practical guide rather than a theoretical one. Is a roadmap filled with relatable instances, making it easier to envision the application of the framework within your organization. The real-world examples provided valuable insights, enabling you to navigate the complexities of implementation with more confidence.
• A Simple Yet Powerful Framework: The book presented a straightforward yet intricate framework for driving goal execution (The 4DX) within teams and organizations. While simple in concept, the challenge lies in its implementation, requiring thoughtful adaptation to the unique dynamics of any company.

🚀 Key Takeaways and Lessons

Similar to Chris Voss’s book from this series, I’m using this one as a field guide, always keeping it in my backup and opening it when I find myself in need of a bit of guidance in approaching situations related to planning or executing our goals.

• Morale Through Victory: “Nothing drives the morale and engagement of a team more than winning” — in a time when all of us are searching for new ways to keep our team’s morale up, this book offers a great takeaway: the unparalleled impact of winning together on team morale and engagement. Celebrating achievements, irrespective of size, generates a sense of accomplishment and propels progress.
• Navigating the Whirlwind: Balancing new strategies within the whirlwind of daily operations is a challenge every leader faces. This book stresses the importance of addressing urgent tasks while not neglecting strategic goals — “If you ignore the urgent, it can kill you today. If you ignore the important, it can kill you tomorrow”
• Lead vs. Lag Measures: Grasping the difference between proactive Lead Measures and outcome-oriented Lag Measures was a great takeaway for me. Reading this book I’ve realized most of the time we used and are using Lag Measures, an outcome which most of the time is hard to control. Understanding and using proactive measures to ensure desired outcomes, under the form of Lead Measures, is a game-changing strategy..
• The Leader’s Dilemma: The art of saying no to good ideas is a counterintuitive yet vital skill. Focusing on wildly important goals sometimes means rejecting promising initiatives — “The will always be more good ideas than there is capacity to execute”

📋 Recommendation to First-Time Founders

• Ideal Timing for Implementation: October to November marks the perfect period to dive into this book. As you gear up for the upcoming year’s planning, this reading material can be incredibly insightful, providing essential strategies for your team.
• Gradual Implementation is Key: Like many valuable strategies, applying the principles from this book to your team’s planning should begin with small, manageable steps. Start modestly and refine your approach as you progress.
• Simplicity and Discipline: Most of the time we look for clever ways and apps to track our progress and to automate the work. This is great if you have the possibility of doing it, but don’t let this stop you. Even a basic Excel file, coupled with discipline, can suffice. Ensure the file is accessible to everyone via a shared link, and prioritize the “Scoreboard” review as the first item in your weekly planning meeting so everyone can answer the question “What are the one or two most important things I can do in the next week (outside the whirlwind) that will have the biggest impact on the scoreboard?

You don’t hear leaders saying, “I wish I were better at driving strategies that require people to do things differently.” What you are more likely to hear is a leader saying, “I wish I didn’t have Tom, Paul, and Sue to deal with!”

It’s natural for a leader to assume the people are the problem. After all, they are the ones not doing what we need to have done. But you would be wrong. The people are not the problem!

The problem is inherent in the system. As a leader, you own responsibility for the system.

📚 Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for more books that I found very helpful in recent years as a first-time founder.

If you’ve read this book, I’m curious, have you implemented the framework? How was the experience, any tips & tricks to share?

Let’s learn & grow together!

This book stands out as a collection of practical insights, offering real-life scenarios and solutions encountered by the author in his role as a CEO. Each turn of the page seemed to reflect situations I’ve personally encountered on my journey, accompanied by insights on how they could have been navigated more effectively.

💡 Why I Wish I’d Read It Sooner

• When starting a business, every challenge is unique and solutions don’t come pre-packaged. This book brings a raw and unfiltered perspective, something totally different from the polished success stories we often encounter in business books. I spent my initial years thinking that setbacks were unique to my journey, feeling isolated in the face of difficulties. Horowitz’s book might have provided me relief in knowing that others faced similar, if not worse, trials.
• ‎The book doesn’t offer you easy solutions, but rather, it prepares you for the harsh realities of being a CEO and offers you a way to navigate through them. It’s like a mentor sharing war stories and battle tactics. From hiring to firing, hiring executives when you’ve never done the job, evaluating your own CEO game, delivering bad news to your people, or making hard calls for the team — this book gets straight to the point. It even helped me figure out how much weight I should carry on my shoulders and when to cut myself some slack. This book’s like a collection of insights from a friend who’s been there, done that, and wants to make sure you survive and thrive.

🚀 Key Takeaways and Lessons

This book was the most highlighted one that I’ve read. It stands out as a gold mine of insights.

Let’s dive into some of the gems that resonated most with me, often in the author’s own words:

• “Don’t put it all on your shoulders”: Dispelling the myth that sharing worries will demoralize your team, Horowitz highlights that nobody feels the weight more than the one steering the ship. Encourage problem-sharing, and tackle existential threats collectively.
• “‎My single biggest personal improvement as CEO occurred on the day when I stopped being too positive. As a young CEO, I felt the pressure — the pressure of employees depending on me, the pressure of not really knowing what I was doing […] I thought I should project a positive, sunny demeanour and really the unburdened troops to victory. I was completely wrong. […] In my mind, I was keeping everyone in high spirits by accentuating the positive and ignoring the negative. But my team knew that reality was more nuanced that I was described it. And not only did they see for themselves the world wasn’t as rosy as I was describing it; they still had to listen to me blowing sunshine up their butts at every company meeting.”
• “Build a culture that rewards — not punishes — people for getting problems into the open where they can be solved.” — Create an environment where problems are openly discussed. Covering up issues only leads to frustration and delays solving them.
• “Given this stress, CEOs often make one of the following 2 mistakes:
  – They take thinks too personally.
  – They do not take things personally enough.”
• “‎Perhaps the most important thing that I learned as an entrepreneur was to focus on what I needed to get right and stop worrying about all the things that I wrong or might do wrong.”
• ‎Management Debt — occurs when short-term management choices create long-term expensive repercussions. It can come in many different forms. I’ve chosen to highlight 1 out of the 3 types presented in the book: “No Performance Management or Employee Feedback process”.
  – ”Your company now employs 25 pool and you know that you should formalize the performance management process, but you don’t want to pay the price. You worry that doing so will make it feel like a “big company”. More so, you do not want your employees to be offended by the feedback, because you can’t afford to lose anyone right now. And people are happy, so why rock the boat? Why not take on a little management debt?
  – ‎The first noticeable payments will be due when somebody performs below expectations:
  – — — ‎CEO: “He was good when we hired him, what happened?”
  – — — ‎ Manager: “He’s not doing the things that we need him to do.”
  – — — ‎ CEO: “Did we clearly tell him that?”
  – — — ‎ Manager: “Maybe not clearly . . .”
  – ‎ However, the larger payment will be a silent tax. Companies execute well when everybody is on the same page and everybody is constantly improving. In a vacuum of feedback, there is almost no chance that your company will perform optimally across either dimension. Directions with no corrections will seem fuzzy and obtuse. People rarely improve weakness that they are unaware of. The ultimate price you will pay for not giving feedback: systematically crappy company performance.”

📋 Recommendation to First-Time Founders

• Make sure to read it, no, seriously, read it — you will thank me later! → if you don’t believe me, email me at my personal email addrss and I will personally buy it for you!
• ‎Action over Theory — Dive into the book and keep it close even after you’ve turned the last page. Horowitz’s insights are practical and applicable, providing a toolkit that comes in handy when you’re actually handling a real-world scenario.
• Create your Playbook — Absorb Horowitz’s leadership lessons, but don’t mimic them blindly. Tailor his experiences to your unique leadership style and use this book as a guid to start building your own playbook for managing challenges and making decisions.

“If you are a founder CEO and you feel awkward or incompetent when doing some of these things and believe there is no way that you’ll be able to do it when your company is one hundred or one thousand people, welcome to the club. That’s exactly how I felt. So did every CEO I’ve ever met. This is the process. This is how you get made.”

📚 Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for more books that I found very helpful in recent years as a first-time founder. Check the intro article, 📚 5 Books I Wish I’d Read in My First Years as a Founder, for links to the other books.

If you’ve read this book, I’m curios, how did you find it?

What are some similar books you found most useful?

Let’s learn & grow together!

As an entrepreneur navigating uncharted territories, negotiation is a skill that can truly make or break your journey. Reflecting on my experiences, one book that I wish had come into my possession earlier is “Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It” by Chris Voss.

💡 Why I Wish I’d Read It Sooner

• In my initial years as an entrepreneur, I approached negotiations as a battlefield — a combat where I can win only by having the best arguments. This perspective created immense pressure and stress, especially when negotiations didn’t go as planned. The book’s emphasis on empathy and emotional intelligence has been transformative. It shifted my perception of negotiation from confrontation to collaboration.
• Based on real-world experiences, the book offers you practical approaches to various negotiation scenarios encountered as a founder — whether with investors, clients, your team, or even in personal interactions. Implementing the strategies from this book would have saved me significant time during my early days, providing a structured approach and potentially preventing numerous mistakes.

🚀 Key Takeaways and Lessons

• Negotiation as an Exploration: Voss’s approach encourages viewing negotiation as collaborative exploration rather than a combative process. Is not a battle of arguments for you to show that you’re right, but a process where you listen and learn as much information as possible about what’s important for the person in front of you.
• Validate Your Assumptions: The negotiation process is a chance to validate assumptions made while preparing for it, ensuring your arguments and proposals align with the actual needs of the other party.
• “No” as the Starting Point: Contrary to convention, Voss shows that getting a “no” can lay the foundation for productive negotiations. It was useful for me to understand that there could be more meaning behind a “No”, like: “I don’t understand your proposal”, “I’m not ready now to accept”, “I don’t think I can afford”, “I just need more info”.
• Embrace Tactical Empathy: Understanding your counterpart’s emotions and perspectives builds a connection and uncovers crucial information. Is not about agreeing with the values and bellies of the other party, is just about understanding and being aware of what’s important for them.
• Mirroring, Labelling & Calibrated Questions: These practical techniques help you establish a better connection and offer insights into the other party’s mindset. With the right questions you don’t necessarily need to be the one coming up with the solution.
• Smile: when people are in a positive state they are more open to collaborating and solving issues together, than fighting back and being defensive. A positive impression helps everyone in a negotiation.

📋 Recommendation to First-Time Founders

• Prioritize reading “Never Split the Difference” early in your journey, but keep it afterwards around you for at least 3 to 6 months
• Take a gradual approach, applying these techniques in real-life scenarios to become skilled.
• Opt for a physical copy — I found highlighting and bookmarking valuable sections highly effective. Keeping it accessible in my backpack for quick reference was very helpful in my preparation for negotiations and adopting the different techniques.

“The language of negotiation is primarily a language of conversation and rapport: a way of quickly establishing relationships and getting people to talk and think together.”

📚 Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for more books that I found very helpful in recent years as a first-time founder. Check the intro article, 📚 5 Books I Wish I’d Read in My First Years as a Founder, for links to the other books.

What are some books on negotiation tactics that you found useful in your journey? Share it in the comments sections. Let’s learn & grow together!

As a first-time founder building your team, you navigated a path filled with challenges and lessons, often learned through trial and error. Looking back, one book that truly stands out when it comes to building teams — “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable” by Patrick Lencioni.

💡 Why I Wish I’d Read It Sooner

• Presents a comprehensive framework for building an efficient team that you can easily apply early on — exploring five critical areas to work on: absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, and inattention to results.
• Offers extraordinary value compared to the time invested in reading it — I started reading it on a Sunday evening and in a couple of hours I managed to get through 60% of it. Being a fable, it’s easy to read, and the narrative kept me engaged. I was amazed at how much value I was getting out of it — I found myself identifying with many situations mentioned, realizing how I could have managed them better with my team.

🚀 Key Takeaways and Lessons

• Trust emerges as the single most important characteristic of building successful teams, built on vulnerability and openness — being open, even exposed, to one another in the team around failures, weaknesses, and even fears.
• Embracing truth prevents wasteful time & energy behavior and helps drive results.
• Waiting for everyone on a team to agree on a decision is a good recipe for mediocrity, delay & frustration. When it comes to decision-making and commitment inside a team, the key is to “disagree and commit”. Understanding the importance of conflict inside a team and the risks of having artificial harmony helped me get comfortable with the idea of having conflicts, healthy ones, inside the team.
• The true measure of a team’s success is that it accomplishes the results it sets out to achieve. But what should you measure? Market share? Client satisfaction? Team Happiness? Revenue? Profit? Growth over last year? Key milestones? There are only 2 consistently wrong answers: none of the above and all of them. Pick one. Or maybe two. But by all means, pick something so that you have something you can collectively focus on.

📋 Recommendation to First-Time Founders

• Read it early on while building your team and provide a copy to all your team members.
• Consider working with an external trainer for successful implementation of the framework, as it can take a couple of months, and is helpful to have someone that can guide you through the process
• If you decide to implement it yourself, use the “Overcoming The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” field guide or “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: Facilitator’s Guide”. Both of these offer step-by-step instructions, structured workshops, exercises, tips & tricks, and all the materials you need to implement the framework yourself. Trust me, is a gold mine!

“Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage, both because it is so powerful and so rare.”

📚 Stay Tuned

Stay tuned for more books that I found very helpful in recent years as a first-time founder.

What are some of the books about building teams that you found most useful? Share it in the comments sections. Let’s learn & grow together!

As a first-time founder, your highs are the highest and your lows can break you if you fail to see the valuable lesson they can unlock.

Looking back, I realize there are a handful of books that I wish I had discovered much earlier — books that could have saved me from the headaches, sleepless nights, and moments of doubt that were a recurring theme during those first years.

To summarise my Aha! moments and hopefully help someone’s journey I’ve decided to start a series of posts about the “5 Books I Wish I’d Read in My First Years as a Founder”, and share some insights and personal lessons that shaped my path.

Whether you’re just starting your entrepreneurial journey or have been in the game for a while, here’s an invitation to join me and add your nuggets of wisdom. The first post should be coming soon and I’m also looking forward to learning about some books that guided your journey as well.

🤔 Looking back, what are the books you wish you had read much earlier in your career? And why?

🚀 Let’s learn & grow together!

📚 And, here are the books:

1. “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni on building teams
2. “Never Split the Difference” by Chris Voss on negotiation
3. “The Hard Thing About Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz on the struggles you face as an entrepreneur
4. “The 4 Disciplines of Execution” by Chris McChesney, Jim Huling, and Sean Covey on executing your strategy
5. “No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention” by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer

But first, a reflection exercise

Somewhere at the end of 2019, when I turned 30 I started doing a short reflection on my 20s. I’ve realized that since starting the university in my early 20s and until turning 30, I was almost 95% of the time in high gear, always busy with either studying or volunteering work, freelancing work, and in the last 4 years with starting and growing Salt & Pepper.

Doing this reflection exercise and looking back, one of the things I totally ignored, and took for granted, during that busy 10 years period was my health. Except for one dental emergency and a few fractured ankles, I didn’t have any major health issues, especially taking into consideration I didn’t pay much attention to having a healthy lifestyle or even at least doing annual medical checkups.

For that entire period, I took my good health for granted, something which I realized couldn’t go on forever. That’s how health became one of my top priorities as I turned 30s — “Start taking care of my health NOW, NOT LATER”. I started looking at ways that could help me have a healthier lifestyle. Over the past 3 years, I managed to stop drinking regularly Coca-Cola (and any other sparkling drinks), remove the use of extra sugar from my diet (from coffee, tea, etc), pay more attention to the food I eat every day and also managed for 3 months to do intermediate fasting which helped me lose some weight.

The only thing I didn’t manage to constantly do or include in my routine was doing regular physical activity of any sort. I tried jogging, tried the occasional hiking, and even tried a couple of times going to the gym. Although I felt the benefits I was gaining from this, the extra energy I had while doing sports, I didn’t manage to sustain this habit for a period longer than 3 months.

2023 & my way of adopting an active lifestyle

While thinking about 2023, the health priority came once again into focus, and finding a way to start moving my ass on a regular basis. Starting from a chat with Alex Ilovan, which mentioned that one of his goals is to climb Mountain Kilimanjaro when he turns 30, I started thinking of a similar objective that could keep me engaged for a longer period of time, just enough to adopt regular physical activity as part of my routine.

Now, Mount Kilimanjaro is not the most difficult peak to climb, but you still need some training to get into good enough shape (especially if you are like me and 4 flights of stairs humble you really quickly) and also climb a few other mountains to get used to hiking.

Aaand, that’s how the idea for the “4 Peaks Challenge” came to be — To climb 4 major mountain peaks in 1 year.

Kilimanjaro — the tallest mountain in Africa (5,895 m) and one of the 7 summits, is the main goal and in preparation for it to ascend 3 other mountain peaks. For now, I’ve settled on 2 out of 3: Moldoveanu (2,544 m) the highest peak in Romania, and the highest peak in Greece, Mount Olympus (2,917 m). Still looking for the 3rd one and I’m open to suggestions.

Now that we covered the reason for coming up with this challenge, let’s cover the reason behind writing about this.

First of all is a social contract I’m making here and now, to complete this challenge in 2023. Second of all, I decided to document the process behind training and completing this challenge, for anyone who would be interested in either joining me or doing something similar in the future.

Currently, I’m still pretty early in the process and I don’t know all the details of how I’m going to make this happen. Here is what I know for now and the next steps I’m going to take:

• I need to plan the period for the Kilimanjaro climb, probably in October (the best option) or December (this is a long shot). If you want to get a quick understanding of all the details behind climbing Kilimanjaro, this is one of the best videos I found
• Based on the above, decide on the 3rd peak and plan the dates for climbing them
• Decide on a training program and start in February

Interested in joining or just curious?

If you’re interested in joining this challenge or just curious about the process (or if I will manage to complete it), I will be posting about the next steps here on Medium, on my Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook accounts. Also, any recommendations for the 3rd mountain peak are welcomed.

Thanks, and let’s make 2023 the best one yet!