How to Stay Sane as a First-Time Founder When Things Go Wrong
Sunglasses
So, we had just closed our first round of funding when my key employee quits. I had sold the investors on that employee's skills, and everything was horrible. I felt like a faker, and our company would never work despite the funding! That night I slowly walked to the bus with my head down and spirit even lower. I felt numb and hurt. But we found a replacement within weeks, and nobody really cared.
Three years later, I am at this conference in Manila, and we go to a bar. Those Philipinos can drink, I tell you! I had just bought new sunglasses, put them in a bag and leave it in a corner. The next hangover morning, I wake up smelling like gin and tonic receive two bad news. My COO tells me the replacement employee (who was now even more key!) had just quit. …
One of them is overlooked by most founders.
Your role as an entrepreneur is one of an architect. You plan and design. You balance physics with art. You strive to create a beautiful building, but also one that’s sturdy and built to last. You ponder over function as much as over aesthetics. Your best tool is a sharp mind with good taste.
Your role as an entrepreneur is one of a builder. You carry weight. You put in the muscle. You hustle with brute force. You follow the plan and execute it. No building without the sweat. Work has to be done and someone’s got to do it. At night you feel the day’s effort in your body. …
Problems create entrepreneurial opportunities, and 2020 is not lacking in problems
I started my digital marketing company in 2009 against the backdrop of a global financial crisis. Most people thought a young university graduate — like I was at that time — should play it safe and wait for the business climate to get better before starting a company. I’ll never forget the middle-aged business owner who approached me at a trade show and suggested I was “very courageous” to start a company in “the crisis,” and wished me well as if I were taking a trip to some dangerous place from which I would never return.
My youthful ignorance turned out to be a blessing, although the first two years of bootstrapping were painfully humbling. My business card read “CEO,” but in reality, I was sleeping on an airbed under my desk. Two years later, armed with the proof of concept for our business model and bolstered by the tailwind of the improving economy, I raised my first round of financing. Eventually, I assembled a fantastic team of hundreds of people and later sold the majority of the company to a media conglomerate. It was a great ride, and I now believe that starting my company during a recession was the best move I could have made. …
Your job isn’t about finding the best option anymore — it’s about finding the option that is least bad
Dear startup CEOs: It’s time to shift your mindset.
Last week might have been about growth and funky new initiatives. It could have been about hiring employees and closing that new financing round and launching that new product. Last week was about shiny things. Growth was your religion, and your North Star was closing deals and booking revenues. Amen.
But we woke up in a different world, a world where part of the population is shielded from normal social life (or will be soon) due to the spread of coronavirus. This new world calls for new rules. …
There’s a much better term you can use
In the early years of my company, we did not extend an employee’s one-year-long contract because their performance was okay, but not outstanding. Also, we were in the middle of a financing round and had to save on cash. It was a perfectly rational decision. However, since it was the first instance that we had let go of somebody under such circumstances, the rest of the team was confused. I had been calling our companies’ culture “family-like” many times before. That didn’t help at all in the situation.
“How could those monsters in management cold-heartedly fire a family member?” was the question written over the faces of the staff. The mood of the team was down for weeks, and we probably lost more cash on unproductive time than we saved on the employee’s salary. …
There might be ways to keep them happy without breaking the bank.
Welcome to the beginning of the year. It’s a beautiful time when the snow is falling, new year’s resolutions are not yet broken dreams, and employees suddenly demand a steep salary increase in your chronically underfinanced start-up. You check your bank account with the usual anxiety and realize that this whole salary-increasing-thing would be a wonderful activity…in the very distant future. But you need that dear employee, and they surely know that. Neither messing with your staff’s motivation nor breaking the bank sound like the confetti party you hoped to start the new sun rotation with. …
Here’s what serial entrepreneurs change about their next business
The sun was setting and starting to melt into a creamy orange color over the beautiful fields of Mallorca’s nature. Our group of 15 entrepreneurs had gathered on the island to learn from each other. One of my core beliefs is that if you surround yourself with extraordinary people, good things happen, and you’ll learn a lot. That’s why I host Digital Founders Camps to share my own entrepreneurial experiences with the next generation as well as to learn from them.
How a little nudge from a book made one employee do the unthinkable
When Tilman walked into my office, he was smiling from ear to ear. He was the head of web design at my digital marketing company, and by his smile, I could tell that something had happened.
Tilman is a designer through and through. He sports a big bushy beard around his boyish smile and his uniform is bright, colorful hoodies. He likes colors, playing games, and stimulating the development of his employees. In his team’s office, you would spot a pink stuffed unicorn next to a popcorn machine. Tilman is the easygoing, supportive, and understanding boss that his young employees adored. He’s not the usual numbers guy and would much rather “manage by emotions” than cold hard data. …
Creative genius needs structure to “get things done”
Orchestras and jazz bands
If IBM was an imposing symphony orchestra, your start-up would be a jamming jazz band. A handful of talented, yet probably inexperienced musicians meet in a dimly lit, underfurnished backyard rehearsal room to create beautiful melodies on the fly. Most of the music is improvised. Maybe the instruments aren’t even tuned to each other. Dave the drummer doesn’t show up — which he’s prone to do — but you start your session anyway.
While the IBM behemoth of an orchestra is perfectly structured and organized to the bones, your jazz band is refreshingly chaotic and the music excitingly unpredictable. With the orchestra, you’ll get what you expect. …
The one list you should be aware of as a first-time founder
When the weather outside is beautiful, I like to take walks while coaching entrepreneurs. On this particular, cool summer evening, I found myself strolling through an industrial area with a talented first-time founder of an enterprise software company. It was almost nightfall and the streetlamps switched on as we were starting another stroll around the block. Our topic of conversation was the ‘basics of management’ since his young start-up had recently grown from a handful of people to a staff of 18.
The leap from under ten to over ten employees and growing from there can be a challenge. Your job as a founder shifts from only building a product to building a product and an organisation at the same time. On top of that, first-time founders have to learn how to do both of these things concurrently, since they usually haven’t ever done them before. …
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