I’ve never had a real job. Here’s how I’m running a company anyway

I first heard about Silicon Valley when I was 15. I have shipped something every single day since then. Twelve years later, I’m the cofounder and CEO of Shapes, the most popular platform where you can talk to AI with your friends. I started Shapes six years ago, when I was 21, even though I’ve never had a real job, reported to a manager, or had a performance review. To date, I’ve never gotten a W-2 from anyone but myself. So, how do you actually run a company without ever having worked at one? Here’s my story. I grew up right next to Delhi, India. I started making websites when I was ten: first for friends and family, then for clubs at my school, then for random strangers online. I remember thinking it was a cheat code that I could make money doing something that didn’t feel like work. At age 11, I was on Upwork accepting gigs for making websites around the world. After making hundreds of websites, at 14, I got my own iPhone and became obsessed with apps. I taught myself iOS native coding and started publishing apps on the App Store. Turns out you could just make an app, charge for it, and people would buy it. I experimented with pricing from 99 cents to $100 per download and made tens of thousands of dollars over time. It was pure fun! At 17, I built a sleep-tracking app called Sleepisle. It was one of the first apps for the Apple Watch. This was the first time I qualified for Apple’s prestigious WWDC scholarship. It was also the first time I met any of my closest friends in person. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was learning the job by doing the job. Here’s what I’d tell other founders skipping the traditional path: 1. The job is already there, just find your customers Working with clients on Upwork taught me negotiating, professional communication, project management, prioritization, and how to advertise something nobody asked for—which is roughly the entire job of being a founder. Working on apps taught me marketing. I tried every