He has time for running? I think I know what's wrong.
My Startup has 30 Days to Live
161–170 of 239 posts
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#162So, it sucks, but it happens, and it won't matter nearly as much in June 2014 as it seems to right now. Your co-founder will, hopefully, not find out about this through guessing "Is this my company?" on Twitter, but rather in hearing it from you. You may be heartbroken about it, you may cry a bit (totally OK). Then, you will put on your Responsible Adult pants, call your employee into the office, and tell them the si…
Great, level-headed outline of the key steps in this situation. Clear communication seems to be a common theme among people who handle these situations well.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#163"This week, I need to speak to the other founder and fire our first employee before he leaves on a planned vacation. He’s a good developer, but I won’t fucking make payroll next week if I don’t clear him and his severance out of the company." Is it wrong that I feel worse for this employee than for the author? He's looking forward to a (probably well-earned) vacation, and he's about to be forced into a job hunt inste…
Why not fire him after he comes back from vacation? Company is going under either way.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#164I'm going to say this knowing that I may get down voted to heck. And I don't mean it as a "told you so" to the OP, but rather hopefully some cautionary advice for would-be founders. I have come to the opinion that if you are bootstrapping, you have no business calling your company a startup. You are building a small business. And there is nothing shameful about this. You are among solid companions with your local plu…
Its kind of annoying that most of the comments in response to this post are basically debating vague jargon
The word means many things to different people. This is an indication that people should start using different words to describe things if they want their audience to interpret them as intended.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#165And in 90 days, you will be served with divorce papers.
People have had their accounts permabanned from HN for less.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#166Elon Musk put his last $3 million into Tesla to make payroll a few years ago.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#167Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#168If you let us know who you are and what company you're working on steering in the right direction, I'm very certain there are people, like me, that would love to help you in any way.
1. I work for a company that can alleviate any back-office pain you have, setting you up on the proper infrastructure, rather than startup blood-sucking solutions like BackOps, TriNet, and Algentis.
2. I have industry connections to help you find mentors, funding, or guidance of any kind.
3. I don't know you, but I am passionate about you. You're a founder and I believe you have great value to offer the world. With this startup or any other you create in your lifetime.
4. You've drummed up great awareness for you and your product with this post, so why not use it to get feedback on your product, with hopes to continue developing something customers want.
That's all I can say. I wish you the best, and hope you're not too discouraged if things don't work out with your current startup. You have the spark. Keep it alive, and build something of value.
Cheers :)
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
In this day and age, a million bucks is not even close to an economic freedom. @webwright has a good post on what he calls "Fuck you money", the amount you'd need to retire rich. Well worth the read. http://www.tonywright.com/2010/no-you-cant-retire-rich-at-30...
That article may be worth reading, but it is about retiring "rich", not simply retiring. It assumes a yearly lifestyle cost of $200k per year, which is redonkulously high. You don't need to be "rich" to be economically "free". Most people can live quite comfortably for far less than $200k/yr when they are debt free and (figuratively) sitting on a giant pile of cash, especially if they aren't tied to living in SV, NYC…
Yeah, that sort of depends on how expensive of a house you want, and whether "retired" really means "zero work and zero income" or just means you have the freedom to work on whatever you want and never need to take a full-time day job again.
If you're the "permanent vacation" type of retired then $200k / year fixed income might be low. Waterfront properties, luxury hotels and first-class plane tickets are expensive. You're at least 1-2 orders of magnitude from private jet money.
If you're the "I paid off my mortgage and cars, set aside my kids' tuition account, and now my only expenses are food, utilities and taxes, and now I have years of runway to build my next project, plus free time to do hobbies, raise my kids, and enjoy life" type, then a 2-4 million payout is probably plenty to qualify for "FU money." That's more than most people make in a lifetime, so if you get it in a lump sum, you're set.
It's all about what standard of living you want.
Re: My Startup has 30 Days to Live
#170So, it sucks, but it happens, and it won't matter nearly as much in June 2014 as it seems to right now. Your co-founder will, hopefully, not find out about this through guessing "Is this my company?" on Twitter, but rather in hearing it from you. You may be heartbroken about it, you may cry a bit (totally OK). Then, you will put on your Responsible Adult pants, call your employee into the office, and tell them the si…
Great advice. I don't have much to add except that I urge you to make it a priority to manage your stress level during this difficult time, and to not make important decisions in a fragile mental state. Try to be a rock for the other team members, and be professional. Lean on your wife for support, and be honest with others about your situation. Bottling all this up inside is counter-productive and makes it worse. There is no shame in your situation - you took a risk and tried to do something really hard.
Having said that, a month to live is still a month to live. Talk about the situation with your team members and advisors and try to figure out whether or not it's salvageable. Perhaps, after making some difficult choices, there's a way that you can still continue. There have been moments in my own startup experience where things seemed really bleak and hopeless, and it seemed time to give up, but in the end we actually got past it. Another friend of mine had a situation where he literally had no money left in the bank and took the company to Vegas on credit card (I don't advise this!), when someone threw him a $200k life preserver at the 11th hour.
I guess the question you really have to ask yourself is whether you still believe in what you're doing. If the answer is no, then I think your involvement with the company has to end, which may or may not be fatal for the startup overall. I feel for you OP - my own startup failed 18 months ago and it's no fun. However, you'll get through it and I hope you decide to try again.