Where founders find a problem worth a company

The Founders work group traces where Pinterest, Notion, Twitch, LinkedIn and Coda began.

Updated October 13, 2026

Start with a problem you will care about for years, find people whose behavior shows they have it too, and know why you can make progress where others see risk.

Start from a need you have. Ben Silbermann and his cofounder built Pinterest as a place they wanted to collect things, and users who wrote in when it went down gave them a reason to commit. Ivan Zhao started from making portfolio websites for artist friends.
Study people who do something intensely. Emmett Shear suggests asking about behavior and motives before pitching an idea. Calling 40 or 50 streamers showed that even $2 a month mattered to them, and Justin.tv built ways for streamers to earn.
Know why you can win. Reid Hoffman looks for a change he understands before it seems obvious, and took LinkedIn to smart critics to learn what would break. Emmett saw that game publishers had reason to welcome streams, which made gaming a better bet than general live video.
Keep the aim, change the first product. Notion's first two years on a developer tool did not resonate, so Ivan moved to productivity software and kept the aim of letting people make their own tools. Shishir Mehrotra had to build Coda to show what its thesis meant, because the pitch alone left people asking what was wrong with their current tools.

Group chat with Emmett, Ben, Ivan, Reid, Shishir — the Founders work group

Question:

How do founders find a problem worth building a company around?

Ben SilbermannFounder and Chairman of Pinterest. Founder of How We Feel

I think you start with a problem you care enough about to work on every day, then look for people whose behavior tells you they care too. Evan Sharp and I wanted a place to collect things we found online, return to them, and see what other people collected. We built Pinterest around something we wanted to use ourselves. When early users wrote because the site was down and they depended on it to plan a wedding or redecorate a home, their use gave us a reason to commit to it.

Apple Podcasts

The first audience can be small. After months of sharing Pinterest, we had around 3,000 registered accounts, yet a few people really loved it. We found more people like them and learned what they were trying to do. A founder can test an idea the same way: make one useful thing, watch who returns to it, and ask what would happen if it went away.

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Ivan ZhaoFounder of Notion

I found the starting point by making three or four websites for artist friends who needed portfolios. They could describe what they wanted, but making it in software required someone who could code. That gap stayed with me: people should be able to shape the tools they use for their own work.

Apple Podcasts

The harder test came after we started building. We spent roughly two years on an easy developer tool and showed it to friends and investors. It did not resonate. People had reports due and work to finish, so we moved toward productivity software they already used every day. For a founder, I think the problem has to hold your interest long enough to keep working on it, while the first product has to meet a task people already care about. Our original idea survived because we changed the way people encountered it.

Apple Podcasts

Emmett ShearCEO of Softmax. Founder of Justin.tv and former CEO of Twitch

Find people doing something intensely, then ask what they need to keep doing it. At Justin.tv, I had been reasoning from the viewer's perspective. But viewers followed streamers, and I didn't understand streamers. So I called roughly 40 or 50 of them and asked how they got started, why they kept streaming, and what they would change if they ran Justin.tv. One answer surprised me: even earning $2 a month mattered to them. Earning anything from streaming made the activity feel real. That led us to build ways for streamers to make money.

Spotify

I used to take an idea to customers and ask questions that would validate it. That can tell you whether your existing idea survives contact with users; it gives you little chance to discover a better one. Ask about their behavior and motives first. In our case, the important problem was what streamers needed in order to keep creating, and those interviews changed what we built.

Spotify

Ben SilbermannFounder and Chairman of Pinterest. Founder of How We Feel

Ivan's example points to a useful distinction between a lasting interest and the first product built around it. Our shopping app before Pinterest tried to do too many things, so people had little reason to choose it for any one task. With Pinterest, we focused on making a collection look good enough that someone would want to make one and show it to a friend. I would test a possible company problem with one experience that earns someone's time; feedback on a rushed, unfocused version can tell you very little about the underlying need.

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Reid HoffmanCo-founder of LinkedIn, Inflection AI and Manas AI. Partner at Greylock

I look for a change I understand deeply enough to see a useful service before it seems obvious to everyone else. With LinkedIn, I believed people would use their real identities online and would need a professional identity distinct from their social one. Job hunting and recruiting gave us a specific first use case; the larger opportunity was helping people find professional relationships and information. I took the idea to smart critics, asked what would break, and used their objections to identify what we had to solve.

Spotify

A founder should also ask why they can make progress where others see too much risk. Customer enthusiasm can show demand, but it also means competitors can see the same opening. A surprising idea needs a clear reason you know something others have missed, then an early use case that lets you learn whether you are right.

Spotify

Ben SilbermannFounder and Chairman of Pinterest. Founder of How We Feel

An early sign that the problem reached beyond our own taste was who used Pinterest. Some of our first committed users were people from the Midwest and York, Pennsylvania, who were planning meals, homes, and weddings. They came back because it helped them with something in everyday life, and friends learned about it when they asked where an idea came from. When you see someone outside your own circle use a product for a task they already have, you learn more about its reach than you do from a room of founders saying the idea sounds promising.

Apple Podcasts

Emmett ShearCEO of Softmax. Founder of Justin.tv and former CEO of Twitch

Ben's point about a small first audience is right, but the decision to commit still needs a bar. At Justin.tv we gave a small team three months to make the gaming category better and set a usage growth target of roughly 20% to 25% per month. That turned a disagreement about which direction felt promising into a test we could actually run.

Spotify Gaming grew roughly 25% to 30% a month for almost nine months before we launched Twitch as its own site. We had repeated use and growth in a specific group before we committed to the separate brand.

Apple Podcasts

Ivan ZhaoFounder of Notion

Ben's point about a focused first experience fits a second test: can the product carry your own taste while earning repeat use and revenue? In our early years, we leaned so hard toward the tool we wanted to see in the world that friends and investors could not see why they would use it. I think founders have to watch both sides. Too much of your own vision can become an art project; following demand alone can leave you building a commodity.

Apple Podcasts

I would keep asking what part of the idea you would still care about after the first version fails, then use people's actual work to decide what to build next. For us, the aim of helping people make their own tools persisted through several versions; productivity work gave us a concrete place to begin.

Ben SilbermannFounder and Chairman of Pinterest. Founder of How We Feel

Emmett's growth target gave his team a clear decision point. With Pinterest, I also wanted a way to hear the reason behind the numbers, so I put my phone number in outbound emails and early users called when something failed. A founder deciding whether to keep building should stay close enough to users to hear the exact task they were trying to finish, then choose a measure that captures whether the product helps them finish it.

Apple Podcasts

Emmett ShearCEO of Softmax. Founder of Justin.tv and former CEO of Twitch

Reid's question about why you can make progress mattered in gaming. Live video usually creates hard rights problems: content owners have reasons to restrict distribution. With game streams, I saw a different incentive. Watching skilled players could lead viewers to buy a game or play it more, so game publishers had reason to welcome exposure. That made gaming a much better category for us to build around than a generic live-video service.

Apple Podcasts

Shishir MehrotraCEO of Superhuman (formerly Grammarly). Co-founder of Coda and former Chief Product Officer of YouTube

At YouTube, I became interested in how teams built their own ways of working with documents and spreadsheets, even when those tools made the process clumsy. I kept asking whether a simple, ambitious idea could solve that recurring problem. That observation led Alex and me to Coda's thesis: anyone should be able to make a doc as powerful as an app. We had to build the product to show what that meant, because the pitch alone left many people wondering what was wrong with the tools they already used.

Apple Podcasts+1

For the decision to start a company, I use two questions: Can you imagine working on this idea for years, and is there a teammate you deeply want to build it with? I had both with Coda. If you can articulate the problem but cannot convince even one person to work on it with you, keep testing the idea before making the company commitment.

alejandrocremades

Reid HoffmanCo-founder of LinkedIn, Inflection AI and Manas AI. Partner at Greylock

Ben's point about committed users outside your circle also raises a distribution question: how will the first users make the product useful for the next ones? LinkedIn began with a professional profile that others could search and use to reach you. A member could add value to the service simply by creating a profile, even before they became a frequent visitor. That helped us address the early network problem while we built toward stronger network effects.

Spotify

For a founder choosing a problem that depends on a network, I would ask who gets useful results with the first hundred people and what brings the next hundred in. That answer changes which product you build first.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What are the signs of product-market fit?
A small group who would be upset to lose the product, then growth you can explain, from users who look like the market you want to win. Fit rarely arrives as one moment.
How is early traction different from product-market fit?
Traction responds to a launch, press or founder effort and fades when that stops. Fit keeps compounding through the product's own loop, and the love repeats with strangers who match the first fans.
What should you do when product-market fit isn't coming?
Make the next attempt a bounded test with a target and a deadline the cash can cover, check that the test was fair, and change course on a miss. With no promising group or runway left, return the capital.
How do you pressure-test a startup idea?
Set a behavior bar before the team gets attached, put an early version into someone's real work, and write down the ways the company could fail even if early users love it.
When should a founder drop an idea?
When people who have the problem can find the product, try the full version and still don't come back. Low signups and investor doubt alone are weak reasons to quit.
What should a first-time founder do first?
Start, choose a cofounder with care and get something in front of strangers early. The group splits on whether research or a rough product comes first.
How do you size a market before building?
Start from a behavior people already have, ask what has kept anyone from winning the market, and let growth or repeat use tell you its size.
How does a startup stand out in a crowded market?
Pick one experience people return to, start with the people whose choice brings everyone else, and check whether users come back for a second job.
Where can an AI startup win against the model companies?
Around what takes sustained work to copy: a group's accumulated taste, a team's workflow, trust between people or a creator's audience.
How do you validate an idea with customers?
Go out to learn, ship one thing worth a stranger's time, watch who comes back on their own and then ask them why.
How do you choose a consumer products category?
Look for a need people already recognize, evidence that they act on it, and unit economics that work across the whole purchase cycle.

All starting a startup questions →

Frequently Asked Questions

Where founders find a problem worth a company

Founders

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the signs of product-market fit?

How is early traction different from product-market fit?

What should you do when product-market fit isn't coming?

How do you pressure-test a startup idea?

When should a founder drop an idea?

What should a first-time founder do first?

How do you size a market before building?

How does a startup stand out in a crowded market?

Where can an AI startup win against the model companies?

How do you validate an idea with customers?

How do you choose a consumer products category?

Your ideas, super powered.

Where founders find a problem worth a company

Founders

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the signs of product-market fit?

How is early traction different from product-market fit?

What should you do when product-market fit isn't coming?

How do you pressure-test a startup idea?

When should a founder drop an idea?

What should a first-time founder do first?

How do you size a market before building?

How does a startup stand out in a crowded market?

Where can an AI startup win against the model companies?

How do you validate an idea with customers?

How do you choose a consumer products category?

Your ideas, super powered.