Has anyone reading this quit a startup because of a similar experience? Or do you want to quit your current startup??!
I think he simply couldn't accept the failure, even while it obviously wasn't anything wrong from ourselves. He started resenting any minor annoyance as an act of sabotage. If I came late to the office (I've always, always came late for the past 20 years; I hardly pass the door before 11AM if not for a serious reason), if the sales guy failed to close a sale (well, good luck with that...), he lived that as a personal offence and a deliberate attempt to annihilate his own efforts.
What the article didn't mention is that this emotional burden can alter relationships and literally make the atmosphere poisonous. It's quite incredible, but an 8 persons group can be filled with petty politics, resent and conspirational talks. As a result we had a near complete reset (the team went from 8 to 2, then back to 8 in 6 to 9 months).
Don't take this as belittling your efforts or your results, because I'm not trying to, I'm simply stating what is probably a fact of life. When you have 0 sales for 9 months straight, eventually somebody has to take responsibility. Preferably, that should be everyone pitching in to make one last charge up the hill, but it doesn't change the fact that someone needs to and eventually will take responsibility and blame for what happened (or did not happen, rather). This is the founder's blessing and curse, huh?
I believe good communication is the key to any relationship. Where there is no communication or a lot of miscommunication (where the parties involved do not really understanding what it is being said) problems will arise.
What I learned is from now on to talk through everything and never let things pass by. Is there something that bothers you? Talk. Is there something that seems a bit odd? Talk. Do you think your partner is bothered by something? Talk.