When to fish, and when to cut bait...or wait, is there another option?

So, you're in a high-tech start-up, and the technology doesn't seem to be performing as you expected or the product development is hopelessly behind schedule.  What do you do?  If you're part of the founding team, or at least one of the decision-makers, when do you decide that it isn't going to work and close up shop?  When the money runs out?  Key to this thought process is to do an assessment of just exactly what intellectual property the company does have, even if it turns out that the technology has no legs.  I mention intellectual property not just in the patent sense, but also in a most general sense:  just what does the company have that is of value?  Does it have really sharp people that can recast the technology or its intellectual property into another market?  Has the company developed expertise in its original market such that even though the technology doesn't work, it knows the market and customers so well, that it can use other technology to build a product that will sell into this market?  Find out what your company has or does best, and build on that expertise to reinvent yourself.

Fancy titles, but no worker bees...a red flag to an investor

Let's see, you have five persons in your start-up, and three of them are VPs.  Yikes, I actually saw this once.  So, who's doing the real work here?  This looks really bad from the outside, especially to a prospective investor, and indicates naive management.  In a start-up, one should only have a fancy title if (a) s/he has earned it from previous experience at that level, or (b) s/he needs it to convey decision-making authority when talking to customers, suppliers, and partners.  Oh, and if someone will join your company only if he gets the title he wants, kindly show him the door.  His priorities likely are not in making the company successful.

Step back and look into your company from a fresh perspective

You grind along day after day, trying to make your start-up a success.  You already know you're doing everything you can, because you're "heads-down" 24/7.  But sometimes we get so caught up in the day-to-day tactical stuff, that we miss grand opportunities to step back and take a new perspective.  Some of my best insights in whatever start-up I happened to be involved in at the time, were when I was stuck on a plane or somewhere with no email and minimal distractions, and I was forced to be idle.  That's a golden opportunity to step back, and "re-view" how you've been approaching the challenges of the company, whether they are technical or business-related.  That's when new insights into how to approach a technical problem, or new ideas of how to attract that first customer, etc., come about.  (This, by the way, is effective in any job and any career, even flipping hamburgers.)  Another way to accomplish this is to find a consultant who has domain knowledge in your space, and bring him in for a design review, or a business review.  A well-respected person from the outside can bring new insights and ideas to your company.