Catch 22

 I have been doing this startup gig fulltime for about 6 months now, and there have been a lot of ups, downs, and things that just don't make sense to me. The transition from an employee, to building a tech startup, is comparable to the process of going from a worm to a butterfly. If you stick it out, you end up becoming something greater than you were before, but it is a painful process. Your idea, your "baby", will get bullied before it even leaves the "womb". 

One of the many transitional processes that is extremely odd to me at this point, is the funding process. If you are new, you are viewed by the veterans cynically, as being "unproven", and more of a risk than they are willing to take. For example, one of my advisory board members has a few associates who invest in tech companies on a regular basis.

The caveat is they only invest in founders who have had a previous success, or with whom they have already invested. I get it, they have worked hard for their money and want to minimize their risk as much as possible, they want to make money and lots of it. They are not in the charity business, it makes sense.

What I don't get is, how blatantly obvious it is that this behavior stunts economic growth. It prevents, or at least delays, the creative process. How many "unicorns" have been turned down just because the founders were new, and inexperienced, even if the product made sense and the market was ripe? How many investors have missed a huge payday because of a false sense of "due diligence"? Lets be real, just because a seasoned entrepreneur has had one good idea/product, doesn't mean the rest they come up with will be golden, no matter how much money is thrown at them. Maybe they got lucky and their first idea was successful because of timing alone, something no one can predict infallibly. So there you go, the investor "safety net" dashed in a few sentences, but it won't stop them form holding to these behavior patters.

New entrepreneurs need to be guided, given tools that will help ensure they are able to develop their ideas, not trampled on by false fortune tellers. The pitching process is archaic, to say the least. A 99% rejection rate for an idea that eventually becomes a cash cow, is unnecessary. There has to be a better way, one that does not kill dreams because that sounds cool and business like, and deters the whack jobs who have no grit.

I get it, it's really is a catch 22. How to separate the ones who have the required work ethic, from the dreamers who fold the moment things get tough? There are no easy or blanket answers. I am a problem solver. I see a process and the first thing that comes to my mind is, how can we streamline this? How can we make it better, more rewarding for everyone involved? That's how my brain works at least.

This paradigm puts founders, who are not blessed with huge amounts of disposable income, in a position where they do not have the money to build their idea, and since investors need to see the thing they might invest in, so they can "predict" it's chance of being successful, the idea never comes to fruition. There is this what seems like an impenetrable barrier.

How then does a new founder become successful, without someone taking a chance on them? It's a stalemate more often than not. One that has killed thousands of ideas, and will continue to do so until a group of people take a stand. The problem is the system is lead by people who try to predict the future, instead of cultivating it.

Until there is a change of guard, the business of startups will continue to be unnecessarily hard, and claim thousands of more victims. All we can do as founders is grind, hope for the best, and be Okay with the fact that you will hear no 99 out of 100 times. If you have done your homework, and put in the hard work, this rejection will not devalue your product, it just makes the eventual victory lap sweeter.

See you in the battle field my friends!

Robert Morton

Co-founder