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Young as fresh as a kiln's hot bricks collected tens of millions of dollars in silver. I was still sucking my thumb after ten years of others are armed for greatness.
Go big or go home, they said. I co-founded Webchutney in 1999. And I saw two waves of companies that had me overtaken until the finish line. In 2008, a generation of gold entrepreneurs had already built gigantic companies such as MakeMyTrip, Naukri, BharatMatrimony, Shaadi, Bookmyshow, and so on.
Standing on the sidelines, I was now attending a new wave of digital businesses in the form of Flipkart, Zomato, Freecharge and Paytm. Once again, I had not managed to ride the wave. I was at best a curious spectator.
It was already seen, and it was not beautiful. Believe me, according to my own estimates, was the baggage of a decade of experience and nothing else "comparable" to show. Nothing so bold or zealous. It seemed to me that my vision was good, but I almost felt like I lacked the carnal appetite that drove my peers toward growth, bold goals, ambitious and futuristic plans and a mature professional.
Do not get me wrong, my business was profitable and growing, but it was also predictable. In my head, I was convinced that consumer-oriented Internet businesses are more likely to succeed than most service companies. If I had a second chance, I would build something more scalable than a digital advertising company.
Consumer Internet companies are bady. If you are in the right place and people are willing to fund it, you announce ambitious, bold and bold goals, and say that you are going to "break the universe". You build a brand that your girlfriend or boyfriend knows. Parents and relatives see the advertisements of your brand. You strut, your landlord pays obedience. The press – well, they love it. If you can not be the next Elon Musk, you can sound like one.
These things will almost never happen in a service startup. Apart from a few hundred potential customers and a few thousand potential candidates you could recruit, nobody cares. Nobody knows of your existence.
In comparison, life is boring – you are not a prime contractor. But recently, a friend closed his business after 10 years. He was building a consumer products company and had raised more than 100 crores of rupees. One of the smartest and most persevering people I know and the darling of his VC, he had to pack his bags and go home.
Sweat of blood and tears – it all boils down to nothing. The VCs that feed the Blitzkrieg find founders willing to sacrifice years to prove a hypothesis in which they do not have a huge stake given the weakness of their success.
As a troubled founder, you are all alone. For every successful Flipkart, there are a few hundred left in the graveyard. The chances of becoming a unicorn for the thousands of startups launched each year are very small. The fact is that today, after years of wonderful lust, I have developed a pride for what I continue to build and what my peers in my circle of skills have built.
If you gather good talent, you must be extremely unhappy or completely ridiculous not to milk the cow for money. I know some deserving friends and competitors in the digital advertising industry who have a fortune of more than 100 crores of rupees in their individual bank accounts. The pessimist might say that it's less than in the last round evoked by "the new bady consumer start-up". But it is also a hell of a lot of money for someone who is about 35 years old. This is certainly not the foolishness change.
In my opinion, this mission is accomplished. This certainly does not mean that every one of my "digital advertising" colleagues who have started alone, including myself, has not had near-death experiences in our businesses. We still remember each time we meet – by exchanging stories about our moments of constant doubt, our mistakes, the horror of dealing with layoffs when an important customer is gone and the cash flow problems almost endless.
Under no circumstances was the journey easy. I have personally survived the psychosomatic disorder during my worst phase, but I hope to have it over. That said, most of us have come out alive, quite affluent at the moment and yeah – a lot more humble.
I am now beginning to believe that Go Big or Go Home's current narrative, which vaguely translates to Get Big or GTFO (Get the F *** Out), has a very patronizing and intimidating impact that potentially discourages a very a large number of promising entrepreneurs from the construction of significant companies that, in reality, have a better chance of achieving personal financial stability.
Apart from the founders of much-respected (and rightly so) torch-carrying unicorns, other founders who seek guaranteed victories are also equal champions. You have to be smart to do it – do not accept the odds that almost guarantee failure. And these potential entrepreneurs are exactly what the doctor has ordered in a country like ours.
Conclusion: If you really examine your motivations and the type of life you want to live, restricting your ambition may not be so bad.
The author is the co-founder of the digital marketing company Webchutney
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