The Startup Journey: 4 Steps to Navigating The Valleys of Despair
I’ve asked hundreds of people to leave their safe and stable positions to join crazy start-ups. I do my best to articulate a nuanced vision of what’s working, what’s not, the upside, and what could go wrong — the problem with this is that a new hire will almost inevitably focus on the upside. It’s just human nature. Sometime during their first year, there will likely be some event (missed numbers, the departure of a key employee, some market shifting news) that causes that new employee to reevaluate the downsides. At this time, engaging and motivating that person is the difference between exiting a hard period on a solid trajectory or bursting into flames. The margin for error is small and the risk is significant.
When presented with this situation I default to a 4 part mental model: 1) Create Safety; 2) Create Trust; 3) Create Clarity; 4) Create Purpose.
Create Safety
The person knew that joining a startup will be risky. but they had internalized that risk as relatively minor. But, when presented with a crisis that little tiny risk suddenly becomes a giant risk in their mind. The new situation is anything but normal.
At this time you must create psychological safety for them. Work to normalize the situation. I’ve found that parables and anecdotes go a long way — people want to know that you as a leader have both been there and know how to get out. If you’ve been around Silicon Valley long enough you’ll either experience directory or through osmosis a series of near-death company events. This might the time where the funding came down to the wire and you needed an emergency bridge before securing a massive up-round. It might be a pivot in GTM strategy that necessitated laying off a big chunk of year team -- only to see the new GTM work flawlessly in the coming months. Having a few stories in your back pocket makes the normalization so much easier.
Create Trust
First, know that owning problems and issues is the right thing to do. Under no circumstances should you as a leader pass the buck. Even if the error was wasn’t yours you’ll need to do the following:
State the facts clearly
Own the responsibility
Address the facts clearly and concisely. Don’t sugar coat and don’t explain away. Here’s is what’s going on, here’s how it happened. Then after you’ve identified the issue it’s important to own it. Here’s a hypothetical example: “The engineering and product teams are upset about the commitments that we’ve made to our largest customer in order to onboarding their users. There was a breakdown in communication and the new specs didn’t go through the approval process. This is my fault and something that I should have been tracking.”
Create Clarity
Create a clean and concise action plan. Depending on the complexity of the situation this could happen in a single 30-minute session or over the course of multiple days. Either way, it’s important to reach alignment through intelligent debate and collaboration.
Once aligned, outline the changes that need to happen. Be more explicit than you might otherwise and drive those changes into a clear and concise action plan. I’ve seen senior leaders freeze in the context of hard realities. You must give them clarity into what they need to do to be successful in this context.
Create Purpose
Reframe the clarity in the context of the greater “why” by associating it with the long term vision. Drive further down to personal motivations by confirming how their actions contribute towards those results and how their actions contribute towards their own goals. Here’s an example: “Make this change now accelerates our mission to 500,000,000 users and sets your team up to contribute more directly to this goal. I know you’ve always wanted to manage a team contributing towards massive growth, this is that chance.”
Closing
Done well, these 4 steps can help advert disaster and set you on a solid trajectory.