Everything Is On Fire 

What Resilience Really Means for a First-Time Founder

Startups have a strange relationship with resilience.

We celebrate persistence.

Never give up.

Keep pushing.

Work harder.

But after listening to founders describe the reality of building companies, I think resilience is more sophisticated than simply tolerating pain.

Founder resilience is the ability to keep making useful decisions when things aren't going to plan.

And things will not go to plan.

The idea eventually meets reality

Customers don't behave as predicted.

Products take longer to build.

People leave.

Investment doesn't arrive.

Costs increase.

Competitors emerge.

Sometimes the idea itself turns out to be wrong.

Andy Bird and Steve Baker describe repeatedly going back, revisiting assumptions, realigning themselves and rethinking strategy while building Toggle.  

That's not failure.

That's the work.

A founder's job isn't to predict reality perfectly.

It's to remain responsive when reality supplies new information.

Resilience isn't stubbornness

This is where "never give up" becomes dangerous advice.

Andy recommends remaining open-minded and being prepared to adapt your original concept.

That's difficult because founders become emotionally attached to their ideas.

You've thought about it for months.

You've told everyone.

You've built something.

Then someone says:

"What if you're wrong?"

The resilient response isn't:

I'll prove you wrong.

It is:

Let's find out.

Persistence should attach itself to the problem, not necessarily the first solution.

Your wellbeing is part of the company

This came through especially strongly in several interviews.

Gianluca Memoli describes moments when everything seems to be crashing and cash flow becomes existential.

His lesson is to return to the basics of looking after yourself.

Because, as he puts it:

The founder has to grow before the company.  

Julia Marshall Wessendorf takes that further.

Her advice is to remember that "the compass was invented before the clock."

Direction before speed.

Julia explicitly puts her children and health ahead of Wave Six. Her journey may therefore take longer, but that's a trade-off she accepts.

"Your wellbeing and your health are your biggest assets," she says.  

That's almost radical in a startup culture obsessed with acceleration.

The company needs you tomorrow

Katie Grayson and Zillah Watson make a related point.

Their company only works if they create something they actually want to work within.

Zillah recalls advice from a friend: turn the startup into the company you want it to be, because otherwise you won't survive the mountains that have to be climbed.  

That's a useful test for first-time founders.

If success requires destroying yourself, what exactly have you succeeded at?

Resilience means being capable of continuing.

Sleep matters.

Relationships matter.

Recovery matters.

Boundaries matter.

Asking for help matters.

Celebrating wins matters.

And yes, sometimes pushing extraordinarily hard matters.

But pushing and recovering are a pair.

Own the chaos

Rob Kramer has a phrase for entrepreneurship:

"Own the chaos."

I like it because it doesn't pretend the chaos disappears.

The experienced founder isn't necessarily experiencing fewer problems.

They've become better at functioning while problems exist.

That may be the real development.

You stop interpreting every setback as evidence that you're failing.

Some days, everything really is on fire.

Your job isn't always to extinguish every flame immediately.

It's to work out which fire matters most.

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