I’m working for a food startup in San Diego called uberfood. We launch very soon, and I’ll talk more about it then.

The team is made up of an investor/co-founder, general manager/cofounder, and me. The Investor is a successful entrepreneur and I’ve taken some notes on some the things that he’s said about business, negotiating, and entrepreneurship. Here’s the list so far.

1. Titles are toxic

When egos, salaries, and deliverables intermingle, titles make people act irrationally. A boring title is a good thing.

2. Entrepreneurs always act without all the information

There will always be more information to gather and evaluate. When we were deciding on which chefs to work with, I wanted to wait try all their food before we made a final decision on who we would move forward with. The Investor advised that we just pick some chefs that we liked and move ahead with the negotiating and testing. If it didn’t work or something broke down in the in meantime, we would move on to someone else. It make sense. We can find out information by waiting until the next meeting, or we can insert the information we do have into our business model and see if it’s compatible.

3. Everything will go wrong

The Investor is extremely cautious. When we were discussing initial operations of the business, he made it clear that we have to assume everything will go wrong, people will sue us, and workers won’t show up for work when we expect them to. I first thought this was extreme, then I realized I was delusional if I thought these things would never happen. You have to be prepared for when everything breaks. This lens has set us up with a thousand what ifs. We can’t damn every leak, but we can get most of them with forethought.

4. Be clear, explicit, and honest about expectations

There have been no serious misunderstandings about the expectations we all have for each other so far. The Investor has made it clear from the beginning that everything about uberfood will be done legally, by the book. All the contracts, negotiations, and discussions dealing the company have been ego-free, open, and honest.