In Pursuit of Funding — The Plunge continues (Part 4)
Welcome to Part 4 of The Plunge — a project created to capture and share one man’s account of the realities of transitioning from working in the Corporate world to becoming a full-time Entrepreneur. We have been traveling alongside Anders Røpke over the last two months to document how his courageous leap of faith has unfolded.
Anders is finding peace with his first month not earning an income and takes steps to break his compulsive relationship with his smartphone. Can you relate? While the unpredictable nature of entrepreneurship continues to rock the boat, Anders is living true to his values and placing team over all else. WindPowerLab celebrates a pivotal new customer relationship but the most significant development over the past fortnight ticks the all-important funding box.
Editors’ note: for new readers, it’s worth jumping back to Part 1 and zooming through to this point.
What Not to Buy
I just experienced my first month without pay. That is frustrating, crazy, intimidating and scary. I have noticed that I have almost stopped spending money. It is like we are out of money, even though we are not. Strange feeling. It is just the idea of spending money from a savings account that will not be replaced with newly-earned money for an unknown amount of time. I really try to calm myself down on the private financial side of things. I’ve got a plan, I have runway: I need to stick to my plan. What I will take with me from this is that I just need to accept my new status of not earning money and the accompanying feelings.
It is OK not to buy whatever I want, and it is OK to feels this as a loss. As it is really not a loss, it is just being normal with a normal relationship towards spending money.
My new fear
Today I met my new fear. The fear of losing team members. I really fear that. Of course you can replace anybody on a team, but we really have a good chemistry thing going on here. The only way to come around this is to handle any bumps on the road, one by one. I think I also must think of my team´s resources, collectively, as a resource pool. As long as I have access to the resources; we are all good. I cannot execute full speed while focusing on somebody who might potentially have to leave the team one day. We will sort things out. What I will take from this is to limit the amount of energy that I put into scenario-plays of potential team losses in the future, and focus on the resource pool we have right now, in the moment.
It is not a problem until it is a problem.
First customer
We’ve got data! And we’ve gotten a customer to be very interested in our services. That means real work, together with a real customer. We will be working together in a proof of concept, testing our algorithms against the customer’s internal team performance. So this is the real deal and it is also the moment where our go-to-market strategy proves itself. During our work with the “Disciplined Entrepreneurship — 24 steps” we discovered and discussed how to sell our services. The anticipation was to sell by proving ourselves. And this is exactly what we are doing. What I will take with me from this is the confidence level we have while approaching this customer. We have done our homework and get less surprises as we have already considered a lot of the issues we are facing while engaged with a customer.
Digital detox
I hammered my phone to the ground in a shopping mall while helping my daughter get her snowsuit on. That gave me a bonus: a weekend of digital detox. No phone calls, texts, checking news, Facebook, Messenger, Linkedin, Netbanking, Slack, Trello, emails, or checking more news… I spend too much time with my smartphone. I actually got to read a book on emotional intelligence instead and — I can recommend reading it! The Little Book of Emotional Intelligence: How to Flourish in a Crazy World by Andy Cope and Amy Bradley.
What I will take from this is to limit my smartphone usage significantly. I really need to just shut it off, or show some self-discipline on this. Going forward I will leave my phone at a certain spot in my house while at home. Then it is not that easy to keep myself entertained by surface covering news and cat pictures on Instagram(!)
In pursuit of, and pitching for, funding!
We got selected to pitch for an innovations fund, which we applied for first thing after starting our company. 10 minutes and an application will create the foundation of a yes or no to us, and a grant of 500.000 USD. This will be my sole focus for the next couple of weeks, finding my extra anti-fragile gear and start to benefit from the balanced performance strategy I have managed to pull off for the last 1.5 months. This is it, it is really happening! So exciting times, thinking of my MIT elevator pitch and how we created our final investment pitch. I will do the same here, I have done all the same preparations. Just more details, information and considerations to communicate. But it is the same calibre of 5–7 slides that I will have to present in the first week of December. Which is also why Rachel and Sally have offered me to do a fifth story on my plunge here.
Support during my roller coaster ride
Mentally it is much harder for me to be in this new venture than anticipated. It is not the private finances that is the problem, or the team considerations. It is the ups and downs I experience on a daily basis. That is tough and it just keeps on rocking the boat. I have a pretty good relationship with the drama-concept. I really like to feel that things are going well, and the fight in getting them to do so. But in this new chapter of my life I am really in for a treat on this. The only thing to do about it is to talk about it. And I disturb Rebecca Baigent, Sally and Rachel [“Editors’ Note: WE don’t see it as a disturbance!], without respect of their time zones, a lot with small updates on this and I always get a positive advice or cheering words in return. That is way more helpful than you ever can imagine. Going forward I will remember to return this favour, anytime. Thank you guys for your support!
Do you relate to Anders’ plight? Or you have dreams of ‘taking the plunge’ or know someone who does? We have something just for you. Jump across to www.infinityfoundry.com/curiousentrepreneur
Missed previous articles? you can read them here:
The Plunge Project — A Social Experiment in the Making (Part 1)
The Plunge Project — A Social Experiment in the Making Continues (Part 2) The Plunge Project — Is The Honeymoon Period Over? (Part 3)
