Do Things That Don’t Scale

Startups don’t succeed on autopilot. They succeed because founders roll up their sleeves, do the hard work, and push them forward.

In Do Things That Don’t Scale, Paul Graham lays out why unscalable, labor-intensive efforts are often the secret to building a thriving business.

Here are a few key learnings from the essay that every aspiring entrepreneur should know.

Startups Don’t Grow by Themselves

Great products don’t magically attract users. Founders need to make things happen. Think of it like cranking an old car engine—it’s tough at first, but once it starts, it keeps running.

“Startups take off because the founders make them take off,” Graham writes. This is the mindset every founder needs to adopt. The real question is: how do you get that engine going?

Manually Recruit Users

The answer starts with recruiting users, and not just passively. Founders need to go out and bring them in.

Take Stripe. Instead of waiting for people to sign up, the Collison brothers would grab a laptop and set up Stripe accounts for users on the spot. Airbnb’s founders? They went door-to-door in New York, helping hosts improve their listings.

These hands-on efforts may seem small or inefficient, but as Graham says, “The most common unscalable thing founders have to do at the start is to recruit users manually.” It’s this direct interaction that builds the foundation for growth.

Focus on Growth, Not Scale

Once you’ve started recruiting users, the next step is to focus on steady growth. It doesn’t have to be massive right away—what matters is consistency.

“If you keep growing at 10% a week, you’ll be surprised how big the numbers get,” Graham explains. It’s easy to dismiss small, weekly gains, but those numbers add up. Stripe and Airbnb didn’t explode overnight—they grew steadily, one week at a time.

Delight Your First Users

Recruiting users is just the beginning. Once they’re on board, your goal is to delight them. Why? Because happy users don’t just stick around—they give feedback that shapes your product.

Wufoo, for instance, sent handwritten thank-you notes to its users. It was a simple gesture that left a lasting impression.

When you go the extra mile, your early users become your biggest advocates.

Fragility Is Normal

Even with a growing user base, early-stage startups often feel fragile. Success isn’t guaranteed, and the work can feel overwhelming.

Graham points to Airbnb as an example. What’s now a global powerhouse once teetered on the edge of failure. The founders’ relentless door-to-door efforts in New York made the difference.

“The question to ask about an early stage startup is not ‘is this company taking over the world?’ but ‘how big could this company get if the founders did the right things?’” It’s a reminder that early fragility is part of the process, not a sign of failure.

Start Narrow, Then Expand

Find a small, focused market where you can build momentum before scaling up.

Facebook is a classic example. Starting exclusively at Harvard gave it the foundation to expand strategically, first to other colleges and eventually to the entire world.

“It’s like keeping a fire contained at first to get it really hot before adding more logs,” Graham writes.

Manual Work Teaches You What to Build

When you start by doing things manually, you learn exactly what your users need. That insight is invaluable when it’s time to automate.

Stripe’s founders, for instance, manually created merchant accounts behind the scenes, providing instant setup for their users. This hands-on approach helped them refine their process and build a seamless product.

It’s About Effort, Not Big Launches

Forget the idea of a big, flashy launch. It’s not about how many people hear about you at first; it’s about how happy your first users are. “All you need from a launch is some initial core of users,” Graham explains. “How happy you make those users will matter more than how many there were.”

The whole concept is about laying the groundwork for something great.

As Graham puts it: “It’s not enough just to do something extraordinary initially. You have to make an extraordinary effort initially.” That effort is what separates startups that succeed from those that fade away.

Sometimes, the first step to scaling is doing the things that don’t.