7 things I HATE about Indian entrepreneurs

Paul Singh, partner at 500 start-ups, a seed fund and start-up accelerator firm tells us what he dislikes about Indian entrepreneurs and their way of functioning.

I've spent a decent amount of time in India over the past few months.

Most recently, I spent a little over two weeks in August meeting with founders and investors in Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Goa.

A couple of observations in no particular order...

1. Indian founders don't have clear role models...

...at least not within the Indian start-up ecosystem.

That being said, that will likely change over the next three to five years as the founders of companies such as SnapDeal, FlipKart, Naukri, MakeMyTrip, Inmobi, Directi (along with many other fantastic companies) continue to grow.

Illustration: Dominic Xavier

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The communication style of Indian founders is quite different than other places.

It seems like a cultural thing: founders (and perhaps most people) seem to think that they are establishing authority by giving longer answers to specific questions.

I'd like to see founders improve their communication styles: be direct, be crisp and be passionate.

By doing that, they'll be able to better communicate with co-founders, potential team hires, press and investors (both foreign and domestic).

On a side note: There's huge opportunity for a speaking coach to make huge money in India.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh

Pound for pound, the Indian technical founder has far more raw horsepower than I've seen anywhere else.

I suppose that's why nearly every pitch I've heard from Indian founders has been heavy on the technology powering the solution.

Unless you're building a start-up that is technology, your pitch shouldn't contain any mention of the technology you're using.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh

I'd like to see more Indian founders try to solve problems for the Indian market.

Until now, it seems that most entrepreneurs focused on building online products that could be sold to the West and that made sense: the Western internet user was way more likely to buy online.

Internet penetration is rapidly increasing in India, that's no surprise -- Indian founders should start to focus on the Indian internet user because more of them are coming online daily, their comfort with purchasing on the web is growing and, frankly, because outsiders are less likely to understand the cultural nuances of the Indian customer.

Illustration: Dominic Xavier

No surprise! Most of the Indian investor community isn't founder-friendly.

They can be very slow, deal terms can be onerous and the overall experience for founders is rough.

For investors, there's a lot of opportunity in this -- just be more founder friendly and I suspect your deal flow will rise considerably.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh

Investors seem to inherently distrust founders.

Investors should only take referrals from trusted sources and initial check sizes should be smaller while the relationship is still new.

Founders should take it upon themselves to present themselves in the most truthful way.

Regardless, I think you'll begin to see investors prosecuting founders publicly in an effort to make a statement to the market.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh

As a first generation Indian-American, I find it interesting that many founders and investors born and raised in India seem to be more pessimistic about India's prospects than I (and, by extension, other outsiders) am.

As Sasha Mirchandani has said in the past, my hope for India is that it changes from a pessimistic society to an optimistic one.

I'm certainly not the first one to say this but, even with all the challenges that exist, India has nowhere to go but up -- the question isn't if but when it will happen.

We've made a handful of investments in Indian start-ups over the past year and we're planning to aggressively ramp that up immediately.

Illustration: Uttam Ghosh