One of the important qualities that every entrepreneur should have is to stay calm during extremely tough times. The good thing about the tough times is that they don't last forever.
Here are a few tough situations I faced in my Business where I didn't give up:
1. Cofounder exit:
Back in August 2018, my cofounder abruptly decided to quit and pursue something else. I was left with 1 intern and 1 full-time employee. We had less than Rs. 5 lakhs ($6k) in the Bank. I didn't quit. I convinced Harshita to leave her job at Citibank and join me as a co-founder.
We started rebuilding the entire product. I focused on the customer side and she worked on Product development. Things worked out. Fast forward to March 2021, we did a revenue of over $1M and in November 2021, we got acquired by Exotel in a multi-million dollar transaction.
2. Large customer not paying:
We had a large government institution as our customer. Due to their internal transfers and restructuring, our significant payment got stuck. I chased every person I could for more than 6 months but still nothing happened. 1 person told me to go to the other person. Another person pointed me to a 3rd person to 4th... Typical Government office scenario.
COVID fear was already rising. I had given up all hope because there was ZERO possibility of getting the money if a lockdown happens. To my surprise, 2 days before Junta Curfew on 22nd March 2020, the money hit the Bank. I immediately called Harshita and we both got a huge sigh of relief. That money was extremely important for us to survive during the uncertain situation of the COVID lockdown back in 2020.
Both the above situations were extremely negative. But I kept myself calm and focused on doing whatever was the right thing to do at that time. I focused on the effort and left the result to God and God didn't disappoint me.
There is a saying I read - "If you're going through hell, don't stop. Why would you stop in hell?"
My father himself did a software startup at Delhi in 2000s.
ReplyDeleteWhat dreaded him the most was money getting stuck/delayed at these Govt "departments".
Once in the some ministry, they "delayed" the payment for ~7 months.
Consequently, he filed a complaint. They alleged that "service/support" on his part was not fulfilled.
Eventually, they cleared it, but he never did business with them again.
I personally feel startup journey is more for the thrill and profit.
What do you say?