What startups can learn from small nations: work harder, resist pressure, solve problems, and never surrender to larger competitors.

Switzerland, my home country, is a small nation. We have been dealing with big and mighty neighbors for centuries. We have always been the small fish but managed to keep our independence. At least some sort of independence.

Call us weird, that’s maybe not a bad way to characterize us.

Call us successful, that’s what we became over the centuries.

Call us lucky, that was definitely what we were in the last few wars that ravaged the continent.

Now, how does all this relate to entrepreneurship? Well, entrepreneurs always start as underdogs and new kids on the block. There are always larger forces around that make your life difficult. And you need that little bit of luck to become successful.

Let’s look into some specific examples.

1. Work Extra Hard

As a small nation or company, you’re always fighting an uphill battle. Larger players have more resources, which is why they can do more in less time. Larger players have larger markets, which will be denied to you, the smaller player. As a consolation, you can work extra hard to serve the small, segmented markets.

I’m afraid there is no way around working a little harder if you are the smaller player. But there’s no reason to despair: Working extra hard is a strategy that works because people get lazy when they become larger players.

2. Don’t Succumb to Pressure

When larger players (i.e. competitors) finally observe that there are smaller players out there who could become dangerous, they start to apply pressure. Just like in good old geopolitics. They will sue you over bogus claims, intimidate you with new features they intend to build, and use their power to break havoc on your pricing model.

When larger players (i.e. customers) buy from smaller players, they also apply pressure. You need to agree on their contract frameworks and undergo an ISO 27001 or SOC 2 certification to do business with them. If something goes wrong during the project, they threaten to terminate the contract for convenience or send you formal notes of complaint. And last but not least, most of the larger players don’t respect the payment deadlines of your invoices, because they know that you won’t sue them or send a debt collection agency their way.

You know what? Don’t succumb to the pressure applied by larger players. They might try to intimidate you, but they will not be able to kill you.

3. Don’t Succumb to Problems

If you’re used to working extra hard, and if you’re used to the pressure applied by larger players, use these superpowers to solve problems better than everybody else: Don’t give in to nasty technical problems, work extra hard to solve them for your customers.

Sometimes customers scream “urgent bug” and then it isn’t a bug but a config problem, but sometimes nasty bugs keep you busy for long periods of time: We recently had a login bug when using Microsoft 365 Single Sign-On, and in the end, it turned out that this bug was due to the iOS 18 update. It took us many many hours to analyze and fix this bug, but in the end, our persistence paid off and the problem was fixed.

Of course, that single bug fix didn’t make us successful. But a long series of efforts to fix nasty problems whilst not succumbing to pressure from larger players will eventually make you successful.

Never forget that Switzerland was a poor country for centuries before it became what it is now. It took hard work, persistence, and yes, a bit of luck.

Just keep that in mind when you build your company.