141–150 of 171 posts
That sounds harsh, but it's the truth and you've recognised it yourself. Forget your investment; it's gone and it isn't coming back no matter how hard you try.
Raising VC capital seems to me like a bad thing to rely on.
This situation is actually very simple, don't let it feel overcomplicated: Tell them you need an actual salary and actual health insurance in the next 30 days. If the venture can pay you to keep at it, that's great. Otherwise you'll have to start looking around for a real job in a couple of weeks. Even the most brick-and-mortar type of businessperson will completely understand this. Stick to your schedule. It will ei…
To not comment on the rest, since it's highly dependent on your personal situation: "I feel as though I've invested too much time and energy to bail now." This is a very dangerous way to think about it. This is your life you're investing here. Perhaps to break it down to oversimplified but still valuable math: (probability of success)*(personal outcome) = expected outcome If you think they have a 10% chance of succee…
I'm currently reading through "What I wish I knew when I was 20" by Tina Seelig (more entrepreneur-y than expected, but pretty good) and this exact topic is discussed in Chapter 5.
> […] “even great ideas require a tremendous amount of work to reach a successful outcome, it’s incredibly hard to know when to keep pushing on a problem, hoping for a breakthrough, and when to walk away. We all know that persistence is to be admired, but when does it become foolish to continue working on something that’s never going to fly? Gil Penchina, CEO of Wikia, describes the dilemma wonderfully: “If you throw gasoline on a log, all you get is a wet log. But if you throw gasoline on a small flame, you get an inferno.” That is, it’s important to know whether you’re putting energy into something that has the potential to pay off. This is one of life’s biggest challenges. We often stay in dead-end situations way too long. This occurs when companies commit to a doomed product or project, or when individuals stay with jobs or in relationships that make them miserable, hoping the situation will improve. So how do you know when to quit? This is a huge philosophical question. It’s always a mammoth challenge to separate your desire to make something work from the reality of the probability that it will work. Of course, the more you put into a project, the more likely it is to succeed. But some efforts will never pan out, no matter how much time, money, or sweat is injected. The most scientific answer I’ve found is, listen to your gut and look at your alternatives. Essentially, you have to negotiate honestly with yourself. Do you have the fortitude to push through the problems in front of you to reach a successful outcome, or are you better off taking another path?
> So quitting is hard—but it’s even harder to do it well. I’ve seen people quit gracefully and others quit so clumsily that they leave a huge crater in their wake. As discussed in detail in chapter 8, you are likely to bump into the same people again and again in life, often in unexpected ways. This alone is reason enough to make sure that when you quit, you do so with careful thought about the consequences for those around you. Besides the impact that quitting gracefully might have on you later, it is just the right thing to do. You can never rationalize quitting in such a way that you hurt your colleagues, friends, or former business.
> A colleague told me about his assistant, who was doing a terrific job. He gave her great reviews and spent a lot of time talking with her about her career path within his group. She made it clear that ultimately she hoped to move into a different field, and my colleague was supportive of this. In fact, he told her he would be delighted to serve as a reference for her anytime. With this as a backdrop, my colleague couldn’t have been more surprised when his assistant came in one day and gave two weeks’ notice. The team was in the midst of a huge project, the deadline three weeks away. She was going to leave one week before the project was completed, putting the entire team in a very difficult position. My colleague asked her several times if she would consider staying one more week to help him get to the end of the project, which involved dozens of people directly and several thousands indirectly. She refused, saying, “I know you’re going to be unhappy that I’m leaving no matter when I go, so I decided to do what I want.”
> My colleague felt as though he’d been kicked in the stomach. It was nearly impossible to fill in the holes she left during the last week of the project, and everyone worked around the clock to try to fill the void. All those who worked with her will remember that decision. Despite the fact that she did a terrific job while she was with them, the damage she did to her reputation during the last weeks of her employment dwarfed all the positive things she had done in prior years. In sharp contrast, I’ve seen others quit jobs with remarkable style. Even if they were leaving because the job wasn’t a good match, the grace with which they left made such a positive impression that everyone involved would be pleased to give them a glowing recommendation at any time in the future. They provided enough notice to fill any gaps, they took the time to put their work in order so that someone else could pick up where they left off, and they even offered to help with the transition. These folks are heroes. They mastered the art of quitting well, and used their skill to turn a bad situation into something positive.
Everyone here can only judge your situation through your description of the situation and all the bias that comes from it. From what I read, the rejection of a single VC meeting seems to have put you down. This is normal. Meeting 10-20 VCs before getting an investment is not unusual. People here have nothing to loose so just take your time before shutting everything down.
All the same, a lot of us have experience falling prey to a sunk cost fallacy/gambler's fallacy situation, and I think anyone advising the OP to leave based on that has their heart in the right place.
TL;DR: advice from people on the internet is best ingested with a keg or two of salt.
I spent 6 years co-founding a startup (though because of my age I was never recognised as a founder). I put so many hours into the software, evenings and even some weekends. The codebase was almost a work of art, built for the long term. And the business would have scaled up with the system I had built.
The directors however were clueless. For 2 years they didn't have a clue how to sell the product I have built. Even though it was clear as day to me how to take it to the market we were targeting. Eventually they cracked it and we started selling lots and, at the time I left, the firm was doing £1mil in revenue. It's probably a third higher by now.
It was my first job out of Uni. and in hindsight I was a bit naive. Though not entirely naive as I remember having many thoughts through the years thinking that things "didn't feel quite right". Something was off. I was putting in all this work to build an awesome product. And the directors/sales guys were putting in only a fraction of the effort, and always far away from hitting any high notes.
I learnt that one of the directors was siphoning out money of the firm into one of his other companies, through dodgy service contracts between the two. It seemed every month or two he'd start saying we're struggling to pay the bills even though we'd just made £60k that month on new customer sales alone. This was a 4 employee company making 60g's most months and it was just so obvious all was not as it seemed on the books. I once calculated the firm was making a clear £300k profit and yet I never saw a single penny of that through a dividend. Not even as a bonus.
Eventually I realised I could not stay there any more, despite having a small shareholding. I told them a year before I left that unless something big changes in the way things are run then I shall be leaving. Possibly a stupid move in hindsight as this pretty much put the nail in the coffin of my relationship with them and of course I didn't see any salary rise that year, not even inflationary.
I left on good'ish terms, even if one of the directors started an e-mail argument (a "see you in court" type affair) with me a few weeks later accusing me (falsely) of secretly starting up a rival company. Ludicrous.
I'm still recovering mentally from the whole experience. Obviously what I've shared here is barely a 5% of what went on. Some day I'll write an epic blog post about it I'm sure. I certainly went through some dark periods but I'm on the mend now and have learnt to channel it in such a way that I learn from it and to make me better equiped for the next time I do a startup.
The way I see it now is, those 6 years at this startup weren't a complete loss. Sure I didn't get to cash out my shareholding (though maybe some day I will, as the firm is still successful thanks to the product I built). But I was living at home and taking home £40k which is a lot for someone the age that I was. I saved pretty much 85% of my money and ended up with a huge deposit to put down on a London apartment. I moved to London early last year and have moved on with my life.
I would encourage the OP to break free. Don't take a month off or anything as that will only make you feel worse. The best thing you can do is get back on the horse, get a new job, maybe even move town/city if you have to. You need to press the gas pedal on your life for at least 6 months, that's what I did, to help you move on and forget. The worst thing you can do is quit the job and let off the gas pedal. That could have dire consequences for your mental health.
Hope this helps.
This situation is actually very simple, don't let it feel overcomplicated: Tell them you need an actual salary and actual health insurance in the next 30 days. If the venture can pay you to keep at it, that's great. Otherwise you'll have to start looking around for a real job in a couple of weeks. Even the most brick-and-mortar type of businessperson will completely understand this. Stick to your schedule. It will ei…
Disagree. If you've truly lost faith in the founders and business -- which you have -- you should leave now & cut your losses. It's not going to work out, regardless of salary. As for how to make money after you leave -- get a job or find consulting work. Then jump back into starting a business when you're ready again.
You had bad luck and I surely do not know all the info but if you do not trust the monetization model it might be because it was never clear from the beginning, and do not forget, startups are companies and companies make money.
If you feel so frustrated just jump form the ship before it sinks, i have shut down startups because i didn't feel we would be able to make money (luckily we were always very early stage).
Saving yourself is always better than collective suicide.
Just cut your losses. The blue collar business people are lying to you. Just get out!