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Entrepreneurship is so hot right now. It’s never been trendier to start a company. The idea of creating your own “startup” is incredibly sexy from the outside looking in. You’re the top dog and you possess the creative freedom to steer your own professional destiny. Also, you’ll be rich af when you IPO or get acquired.
Movies like The Social Network have young people convinced that the entrepreneur life is mostly glamorous. All you need is an idea and a little seed money from your friend’s rich parents. Next thing you know you’re poppin’ bottles in the club with Justin Timberlake talking big picture business strategy. Sounds a hell of a lot cooler than that cube grind, right?
Few people talk about the dark side of entrepreneurship. Building a company is an emotional rollercoaster and it isn’t the right professional path for everybody. This chart does a good job of articulating the emotional journey of creating a great company.
Via Brian Armstrong, Co-Founder & CEO of CoinBase
In his book The Hard Thing About Hard Things Ben Horowitz goes into excruciating detail about his experience as an entrepreneur building the enterprise software company Opsware, which Hewlett-Packard acquired for $1.6 billion in July 2007. The challenges that Ben faced to get to this acquisition were BRUTAL, but the various ways he navigated these monstrous obstacles are unbelievably impressive and inspirational. After the acquisition of Opsware, Ben went on to create one of the most notorious venture capital firms in the history of Silicon Valley, Andreessen-Horowitz. If you’re currently building a business or considering taking the entrepreneurial plunge, this book is a must read.
Here’s a taste:
“Every time I read a management or self-help book, I find myself saying, “That’s fine, but that wasn’t really the hard thing about the situation.” The hard thing isn’t setting a big, hairy, audacious goal. The hard thing is laying people off when you miss the big goal. The hard thing isn’t hiring great people. The hard thing is when those “great people” develop a sense of entitlement and start demanding unreasonable things. The hard thing isn’t setting up an organizational chart. The hard thing is getting people to communicate within the organization that you just designed. The hard thing isn’t dreaming big. The hard thing is waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat when the dream turns into a nightmare.”
― Ben Horowitz
“Great CEOs face the pain. They deal with the sleepless nights, the cold sweats, and what my friend the great Alfred Chuang (legendary cofounder and CEO of BEA Systems) calls “the torture.” Whenever I meet a successful CEO, I ask them how they did it. Mediocre CEOs point to their brilliant strategic moves or their intuitive business sense or a variety of other self-congratulatory explanations. The great CEOs tend to be remarkably consistent in their answers. They all say, “I didn’t quit.”
― Ben Horowitz
“Hard things are hard because there are no easy answers or recipes. They are hard because your emotions are at odds with your logic. They are hard because you don’t know the answer and you cannot ask for help without showing weakness.”
― Ben Horowitz
“There are no shortcuts to knowledge, especially knowledge gained from personal experience. Following conventional wisdom and relying on shortcuts can be worse than knowing nothing at all.”
― Ben Horowitz
“From an evolutionary standpoint, it is natural to do things that make people like you. It enhances your chances for survival. Yet to be a good CEO, in order to be liked in the long run, you must do many things that will upset people in the short run. Unnatural things.”
― Ben Horowitz
“People always ask me, “What’s the secret to being a successful CEO?” Sadly, there is no secret, but if there is one skill that stands out, it’s the ability to focus and make the best move when there are no good moves.”
― Ben Horowitz
“IF YOU ARE GOING TO EAT SHIT, DON’T NIBBLE”
― Ben Horowitz
“That’s the hard thing about hard things—there is no formula for dealing with them.”
― Ben Horowitz
Respond
Madison Wickham
#CoolDad / Husband | Founder / CEO of Grandex Inc
@madisonwickham
@madisonwickham
madisonwickham
I tend to do my best work in that Dark Swamp of Despair. I revel in it now. You can find me atop the meniscus line sitting on an inner-tube raft in my swim trunks just splashing myself with the gross ass shit water as I subtly laugh out loud to myself. You just gotta own it and when you crawl out of the swamp, you feel good knowing that it wasn’t all that bad
same
How did you deal with the anxiety or emotional turmoil of founding a company? What specifics stand out to you the most? And at what point did you realize that this simple idea Ryan had and you built on a wordpress would one day become the success it is?
The emotional turmoil never ends, but I’ve adopted strategies to help manage it. The biggest things that help me the most are 1) focusing on my health (eating well, exercising, and getting good sleep) and 2) learning from others via books, podcasts, and friends/mentors. If I had to recommend one book to help manage stress/anxiety it would be ‘The Obstacle Is The Way’ by Ryan Holiday. It isn’t specifically about business, just dealing with difficult situations in general.
From the very beginning we had ambitions to build a big business, but in the early days there was a ton of uncertainty around whether or not we could actually make it happen. I think I started gaining more confidence in our abilities and the opportunity in front of us at about the one year mark. Our ambitions for the company are still well beyond where we are right now, so the pressure is still on.
I’d be interested to hear your wife’s (or any officer’s wife / longtime gf) take on the founding and growth of Grandex and what it looked like from their perspective. I know that I couldn’t go more than a few days without Mrs Rico being there for me, and in light of the comments on PGP these last 10 days it would make for a VERY interesting podcast. Not asking to delve too deep into your personal life, but this might be something that intrigues all PGP users.
She has always been extremely supportive. I quit my corporate job 10 days after my first kid was born to focus full time on a 4-month-old frat comedy website…I still don’t know how I convinced her that it was a good idea. I doubt she’d do the podcast, she has no interest in the spotlight, but having that kind of support is definitely an extremely important variable for me.
Thanks for the response, Madison. I get her not wanting to do the podcast as I wouldn’t want to do it either. I’ve noticed some new commenters popping up the past few days and wish you guys all the best in growing your core user base. Here’s to continued great content.
Here’s to hoping the uptick is real.
“IF YOU ARE GOING TO EAT SHIT, DON’T NIBBLE”
That’s a great fucking quote.
People who know shit: Dexter from Dexter’s Lab
This guys fucks with the vision
Ron Paul for the next person who knows shit.
Hahahahahahaha
what
toss in a female for your next pwks