How we decided whether or not to startup — searching the soul
A lot of soul searching followed our meeting with the legendary Silicon Valley venture capitalist (VC) who told us we should carry out our idea (previous article). We were searching the soul for whether or not we had the courage to disrupt perfectly comfortable lives to launch a startup.
The dilemma was simple. If we tried and failed, we could lose everything and we were no longer young enough to simply start again. If we didn’t try, well, that was simple too — we’d die wondering. Which was worse? More on that shortly.
We decided the best way forward was to test the idea further before betting the house. Could we get other tough nosed business people to also agree that we were onto something big enough? Was there a fatal flaw we were missing because we were blinded by ‘our idea’? The best way to find out was to approach a few more VCs.
It’s not easy getting meetings with good VCs. This is understandable. They are like judges of talent shows who have to painfully endure a sea of no talent in the hope of being first to find the rare gem. So we called people we knew that were well connected. PJ was able to tee up a meeting with the perfect person to critique our idea. She was the digital queen of Indonesia. She had been in digital media and advertising for over 20 years and personally knows the likes of Mark Zuckerberg, heads of Google and heads of the biggest advertising agencies in the world.
She agreed to meet. On the flight to Jakarta, I stood up to access my hand luggage and had to immediately sit down because I had no balance. It wasn’t the plane, it was me. Vertigo. Walking to immigration was a challenge because the floor kept swaying. Oh dear. Getting out of bed in the morning to go to the meeting was a bigger challenge. The wall was my only friend as I waited for the room to stop spinning. It didn’t look like I would make the meeting. Flashbacks of the panic sessions on the road to our first VC meeting crossed my mind.
But we made the meeting. Deep breaths and slow movements allowed me to get through the pitch. Our digital media expert and VC was very sceptical from the start. This was good because we wanted someone who could point to a fatal flaw. And if we couldn’t fix it, no damage done, we would have solved our dilemma of ‘whether to or not to’ dive in. She was brutally honest, but at the end of it all, there was no fatal blow. Every objection we believed could be overcome. In fact, she even told us to come back when we had 10,000 users. Nothing like a challenge to motivate.
We then met a VC in Sydney who told us to come back to their offices a week later with the entire team. We did, but they forgot to show up. That’s how important we were. Apologies followed that night and an alternate date was locked in. Third time around only one of them showed up and gave us just 20 mins because he had to be somewhere else. He didn’t seem very interested and rushed us through the pitch. But at the end, a distinct shift had occurred. He was excited and insisted on meeting again as soon as possible.
A few more meetings like this and our courage started to get tested. The variables that need to be managed were endless — product development, plans, roadmaps, people, systems, legal, structure, finance, infrastructure, processes, collateral, etc, etc. Did we really want to go through that again, at a completely new level?
We had a choice. Do nothing and no one will ever know or care. Do something and, well, we’ll need to figure out all those variables and deal with so many tough and unforeseen events. We’d have to go back to living on little and working a lot.
We were currently on an easy road with an exit sign that said ‘HARD’. The easy road was smooth, well lit, with a clear path to known destinations that we were confident of reaching by simply staying on the road. The exit, on the other hand, enticed you with scenery and adventure, but would be unpaved, unlit, headed to unknown destinations with untold dangers. There was no guarantee the road would not lead you off a cliff, without warning.
Who in their right mind would take that road?
We did. In the end, the decision came down to a realisation of the following. We all wake up in the morning and spend the day converting our energy into something. For most of us, we wake up to go to work. We now wanted to wake up to live a dream. To have a go at doing something truly special. Great even. So we decided to give it a go. Oh dear.
In our next piece, we share learning on how to manage the huge risks.
If you, like us, have always been intrigued by high potential startups, follow our adventure here. Our startup is turning into an amazing journey, that continues to unfold daily. The adventure is resulting in deep lessons of business and life. Lessons we are happy to share. Lessons not available in MBA school, the corporate world, or even from running your own business. Please let us know if you want more by giving us a ‘clap’ or two or three and follow us here.