Your startup failed, now what?
Figuring out what to do next depends on your physical and mental energy
I recently had a conversation with a first-time founder whose tech startup was on its last breath. She could see the writing on the wall and was trying to decide what to do next.
She had a handful of concerns she wanted to discuss, among them feelings of inadequacy and worry about not having the attractive resume line she was anticipating she’d have.
A big part of informing the decision of where to go next has to do with unpacking an individual’s mental and physical state.
The mental state
The first thing I wanted to highlight was
Just because a business failed doesn’t mean you personally are a failure.
It’s a critical mental distinction to make. At BookClub, we have hired a handful of incredible people from Jeff Katzenberg’s super-public failure, Quibi.
Their insight about what worked and what didn’t has been invaluable, plus they’re incredibly talented individuals. Not for one second has the failure of that business impacted how we perceive their contributions to the team.
