Where are the unhappy founders? | Hacker News Reader

Where are the unhappy founders?

23 pointsnpk7 comments

[excuse a belated post about startup school]

I've been mulling over the differences between YC startup school and academic conferences. Startup school left me with a feeling I have not experience before.... It's hard to fully articulate, but perhaps "thrilling" is the best adjective. Founders I met dream big, they're excited, and those feelings are contagious.

Am I crazy? Are startup founders really as excited as perceived? My primary fear is a selection effect. Those interested and excited in startups, attend things like startup school, those who feel bitter, tired, or bored with startups, don't.

Still, the same could be said of academic conferences, yet, I have never felt the same air of excitement at one. Why? Am I missing something? Did anyone else experience the same sensation? Anyone interested in sharing their thoughts?

I'm utterly confused. It's easy to drone on with my own hyperbole here. I guess I'd rather hear yours. :)

I think optimism and near-limitless excitement for your project are generally pre-reqs for doing a startup. Without them, it's pretty hard to justify bootstrapping//low pay//14+ hour days//no weekends//no benefits//the likelihood of failure//etc.

On the academic side, it depends on which academic conferences you go to. When I started going to quantum computing conferences (mid-1990s) there was a huge buzz in the air. It was thrilling, better even than the best startup events I've been to. The same cannot be said of quantum computing now - it's become oversubscribed, which is why I've left the field, and am working on a startup.

Yes, you're seeing the selection effect at work.

I've started two startups now. While I'm very nearly the most even-keeled person I know from an emotional standpoint (I've been described as "a robot", "mellow", "a cold fish", and worse), a couple of years of running a startup is like being bipolar. Perhaps for folks who are already bipolar without outside influence, it's even worse, I dunno.

Here's how I think it goes for most startups:

Stage 1

Great idea(s). I have a blinding flash of insight--first time my insight was "the Internet is too damned slow!" (in 1999, this was a pretty good insight). This time, with Virtualmin, it came as the gradual dawning of a Many Faceted Great Truth rather than a flash. These feelings are akin to messianic visions of the past. If they weren't we wouldn't be willing to quit our real jobs and spend three to seven years tilting at windmills to make them happen. This is exciting and very uplifting. I bet Jesus felt pretty good, too, when he woke up with the flash of insight that he was the most important human on the planet (and a god to boot!).

Stage 2 (where most folks start showing up to events)

Talking about the idea with friends and peers. Taking this leap of committing to the idea enough to share it with others and defend it feels like an accomplishment, which is emotionally rewarding. You get some validation, and you maybe spot a few problems and you work through them, which also feels good.

Still feeling great at this point. But you haven't actually done anything.

Stage 3

Now you've got to build something. A demo, if you just want to get to that next stage of big validation that is raising money. This one is harder. If you don't actually have the level of skill you thought you did (and we all hit this sometimes, no matter how great we might be at some areas) you run into roadblocks to completing this stage. This is where folks begin to drop out of the event scene and start to think maybe this whole startup idea wasn't so great after all. I've occasionally run into roadblocks that took me weeks or months to resolve, either by learning enough to scale the wall or by hiring or befriending someone who happened to have just the right knowledge (this is harder than it seems). And these are the worst parts of the ride.

Stage 4 (wherein validation reaches new highs)

Money. Some folks get addicted to raising money, and never actually get around to building their product (these are the same people who never actually succeed, by the way). When you raise money, not only is someone saying, "Yeah, that's a pretty cool idea", they are saying, "I'm putting my money where my mouth is, and I'm placing a huge bet on you being a big success."

However, before you get to that validation you will get numerous "no" responses, and that's usually a big downer: people are saying your baby is ugly, and kinda stupid. And you can't punch them in the mouth for saying so.

And at this point, you cycle between Stage 3 and Stage 4 until you fail or build a real company that makes money. This cycle is somewhat arbitrary as to how you'll be feeling at any given time...but the first two stages are action packed excitement all the way. Nothing can go wrong until you actually start doing something. Of course, nothing can really go right either...but you'll feel like everything is going right and clicking into place, because humans are funny that way.

Great post. Two questions:

1) So, presuming you were at startupschool, did you notice the people who were there tended to be more enthusiastic than is typical? If you did not attend, was it because you are just too busy and/or tired/grumpy?

2) Isn't "no" common for almost all successful ventures? I guess I don't understand why being constantly rejected for funding is any different between any two different fields.

1.

Yes, I was at Startup School. More enthusiastic than is "typical" of whom? Startup people in general, or of the whole population?

Events for people starting startups are full of optimistic and enthusiastic people. I try to go to about one per month. Last month it was Startup Camp, this month it was Stirr Deal Hacks, and I pretty much always attend YC events because they're among the best of the lot--though I got overwhelmed and exhausted this year with the StartupSchool events (I'm an introvert and crowds make me tired) and ended up skipping the after-party.

Anyway, I go just to keep perspective: we're not alone, we're not astonishingly brilliant and unique, and we're not crazy. By this, I mean it keeps things in perspective from both sides of the coin, by being both a reminder that we aren't the only people who could do what we are doing so we have to move fast and effectively, and also being a generally fun and validating atmosphere.

2.

Of course. You asked about startups, so I told you about startups. Rejection happens in every aspect of life. From cliques in school, to college applications, to getting your first job, to raising money for a startup, to getting a date with the pretty girl that works at the book store, etc. The difference might be that when you're the messiah and you're going to change the world, and someone tells you you're not and you can't, it's harder to take. I'm not sure why some people take rejection by investors so hard (maybe harder than other forms of rejection), but they do. As I mentioned I'm a "robot/cold fish", and so I don't take it personally, but many startup founders do.

And, of course, some of the best businesses have been rejected dozens of times by investors. One rejection per idea is bad enough...dozens probably starts to wear you down. I imagine authors have the same problem before they reach a certain level of success, since one story may be rejected by dozens of people. At least in the rest of life, each rejection is independent: The girl at the book store says "no", but that's the only "no" you'll ever hear for that one idea (the idea being "get a date with the cute girl at the book store", and honestly, it's not a very big idea, anyway...she's cute, so many others have probably had the same idea). Likewise for a job. You want to work at Google, they say "no", OK, you move on. With a startup, you have a lot more invested in the idea--often months or years of your life. Again, like a writer with a story that she can't get published.

Rejection by potential customers or investors is not the hard part. Folks who can't face that don't typically try and start something new. Here are some things that are much more difficult to face: laying off employees (not firing poor performers, letting good ones go because you can't pay them), shutting the business down and negotiating with creditors, and getting fired by your investors (or co-founders). These are not uncommon outcomes that get much less press, conference time, and blog posts. I don't say these to discourage anyone from an entrepreneurial career, I mention them because many founders seem less mindful of the real possibilities of failure: most of the really painful mistakes are made after initial success.

Agreed--from experience. It hurt when our startup failed(after initial success), and really hurt for a few months. Laying people off (mainly ourselves), shutting down the business....it's very deflating. You hear statistics like "90%" of startups fail--but you don't hear much else about failure. Rarely are the gory details revealed. On the other hand, every success is well documented and the intricate detailed are talked about ad nauseam. It's very rare to talk about failure with anyone at these Startup Events, IME.

One thing I can say about failure: being young definitely helps. We had a lot less to lose than older people and plenty of opportunities to do different things when that didn't work out. It wasn't easy to fail but I've bounced back and am happy working in the non-startup world(though I've still been working on side projects still, mostly for fun).

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