Us start-up types probably need to have at least some hyperbole in our veins to be in this world, but “re-birth” may not be a stretch in describing my journey.
About 20 years ago, I was a very young and impatient business (marketing/sales) guy who understood software technology–at least on paper. I had worked at a few technology companies, and I was really itching to do a start-up. On business trips (we did lots of those back then), I would lug a few programming books to study at night and on airplanes. I also made it a point to hang around with the smartest programmers at work to understand their perspective about software and how their talents were being used and appreciated (or not).
Before I jumped into the start-up world, I pitched my idea to senior management at my employer (a pretty great company); they declined, but–despite the fact I was becoming a competitor in the lower end of their market–they wished me all the best.
Armed with boundless energy, my plan for using software to bring dramatic innovation to a willing market, and my nest egg of zero dollars, I willingly became unemployed and devoted 80-hour weeks to finishing my business plan. (Yes, most people really serious about start-ups back then did 20+ page business plans, and those plans included tedious maket analysis and countless hours invested in financial forecasting out to five years or more. And yes, this exercise was of zero value compared to actually launching the business and living the resulting lessons.)
To be fair to my history, I need to remind myself that despite the software-driven “secret sauce” of my business idea, the actual business was capital-intensive, requiring hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment. As a result, my initial focus had to be on finding seed funding. At about this time, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, and the availability of funding immediately dried up.
Having no money for a cash-devouring start-up just as Gulf War 1.0 was rocking the capital markets was not about to get in my way, and I did manage to scrape up enough cash to buy some used equipment, sweet-talk a former colleague into writing some key software libraries for the price of a new laser printer and build out a production facility for next to nothing–all because I secured a signed letter-of-intent (“if you build it, I will pay”) from my first customer. (FYI to younger readers: Back then, all customers were paying customers).
This customer–a leader in his market niche who later picked up the phone to get us into several more customers in that market–committed to risk the timing of his cash flow on the concept I was pitching. (I went to the sales call with the letter-of-intent language on a floppy disk, and I printed it out on his letterhead for him to sign.) As proud as I still am of that moment, this product launch experience was not all soft puppy-dogs and roses for either of us. Before we were solidly live, I put his cash flow in serious peril, and I silently listened to him threatening (as he pounded on my locked office doors on a Saturday afternoon) to break my legs if I didn’t resolve the problems yesterday.
That I became arguably proficient in C programming over that weekend-long “do-or-die” marathon is what preserved this guy’s cash flow, allowed me to make payroll and positioned us to get our next customer.
And I was hooked on the adrenaline-fueled exhilaration of the start-up experience.
