The startup scene.
Ideas. We all have them. Some people get their best ideas when on the toilet or in the shower. Others spend years working in a corporate environment and suddenly see that there is a “pain point” they can solve for the business they are in. Some people just stumble on a situation and look at it in such a different way that they have an epiphany that they can make the “world a better place” by building a new “thing” that will “disrupt” the status quo and hopefully be acquired by a huge company leading the “founder” richer than bill gates.
But in the startup scene there is an enormous elephant in the room. A heard of elephants in fact. The elephant is not seen or heard, it’s never spoken about. It’s rarely acknowledged.
Mental health. Depression in founders.
Shrabonti Bagchi, Senior Editor with Mint Lounge, reported in her Article :
Michael A. Freeman, clinical professor of psychiatry, UC San Francisco School of Medicine, provides insight into the psychological dimensions of entrepreneurship and the mental health scenarios associated with it. A 2018 study led by Freeman found that entrepreneurs were more likely than comparison participants and the general population to experience depression (30% more likely than comparison participants or the control group), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD (29% more likely), substance abuse (12% more likely) and bipolarity (11% more likely than the control group).
Is mental health the actual “unicorn” so often referred to in the startup scene?
The unicorn is the term used when a company is a startup that goes on to achieve mass market success and profitability. Think AirBnB, Canva, ByteDance etc…
It’s called a unicorn because it’s so rare and almost never seen. Except when it is.
Its revered as the absolute pinnacle of success. The zenith, the highest of highs.
90% of starts ups will fail. They say.
But all founders still hold on to the dream of being the unicorn.
I wonder, how many VC’s meet founders, and can see through the overinflated ego? How many VC’s can identify a struggling founder upon meeting?
They say investors invest in you, the founder.
That they make their decisions about who and what startups to fund based upon if they think the founder and the team are the right people to “solve the problem”.
What they mean is, “can we get along with this guy?” “Are they mentally tough enough to handle the set backs?” “Can they answer to our bogus and demanding requests on a daily basis?” If so, give em a million.
In the world of startups there are a million set backs before a founder even gets to the stage of having a meeting with a VC.
Chances are they have hit rock bottom and bounced back more times than you can count just from the process of putting together a pitch deck.
Many founders, particularly first time founders, begin working on their startup on the side of maintaining a full time job. Many have families, many have no income to support the startup but they “hustle” anyway, because they believe so wholeheartedly in what they are building.
During the early years of Facebook, did anyone ask Mark Zuckerberg how he was doing? How he was coping? What of his mental health? Or did it remain the elephant in the room because, “unicorn”?
I have a startup of my own.
Nothing has gone to plan.
We keep going.
We have lost team members.
We kept going.
We have met with potential investors who told us they love the idea but won’t invest.
We kept going.
How is my mental health you ask?
I consider myself a strong woman. I don’t care or think much of the opinions of others. I’m not deflated when I’m told someone doesn’t believe in my idea. I’m ok.
But some days I’m not. Some days I want to just walk away. Sometimes I want to wake up, take my kids to school and not sit at my laptop all day. Some days I want to just sit in silence and ignore every email until day turns into night. Sometimes I want to just shout from the hilltops that building this business is futile and too frustrating and the world has enough people to solve the problems so I don’t need to pitch in with my solution.
But could I ever actually say these words? Out loud? Absolutely not.
To even give off a scent of disbelief is startup suicide.
No investor would even consider even taking a zoom meeting with any founder who may not be tough enough to handle the road to unicorn.
Recently, I attended a dinner with the most amazing and supportive women’s founders circle.
The night started with the free flowing drinks to destress from the day.
When we all sat down we went around the room and each took our turns in talking about where our business is at.
I listened as each incredible woman spoke so passionately about what they were doing, how they poured their heart and souls into their work and how rewarding it was.
When it was my turn, I just couldn’t maintain my charade any longer. I word-vomited all my pent up feelings of not being happy right now, of not knowing if this work I’m pouring my sweat into was worth all the time, tears and frustration.
You would imagine I would have been met with silent stares, gobsmacked faces, shock and horror. But no, I was met with looks of kindness, of empathy, of understanding.
These special woman, strong women, smart women, who were building incredible businesses looked at me with care. They each expressed that they all felt like this too at times. They offered up their strategies to work through the tough times and shared their own experiences.
It was the “unicorn” of startup scenes. The place that comes along once in a lifetime, the dream.
I left that dinner feeling stronger. I felt like I had the motivation to get up the next day and turn on my laptop and answer those emails.
For the first time in a long while I found the excitement again to dive into what I’ve been working on.
I have the Female Founders Circle to thank for that.
So I wonder, if every other startup founder out there had the support network to be surrounded by empathy and compassion, if every founder had a circle of people that offered them a safe space to discuss the hard times and really be honest, wouldn’t they be more successful in the long run?
