If life is a book, then I’m on the fourth chapter of adulthood.
The first is about an angry young man from a broken home who hustled the streets before finding peace amidst the dangers of raging whitewater rivers and snow-capped mountains.
The second is one of discovery and growth. While much is about university and grad school, equal parts are of creating friendships, going on adventures, and searching for meaning. It covers two degrees, 30 countries, and interning for six nonprofits. It also includes building a legitimate (albeit short-lived) business.
The third chapter is about a 30-year-old recent grad hell-bent on not getting a job. Ten years, dozens of employees, millions of dollars, and way-too-many 100-hour work weeks later, he burned out, badly. It was then that he made a promise to himself to do everything he could to help other founders avoid the traps that he wasn’t able to.
Chapter four covers ten years, a thousand founders, and almost 10,000 hours of coaching, examining more business models, refining more strategies, navigating more challenges, and discovering more blindspots than would otherwise be possible in ten lifetimes as a founder. And although he builds two more companies; serves as founder-for-hire of five; and takes on a PhD in entrepreneurship, he learns more about building companies from being a coach than his 20+ years as an entrepreneur. That’s because, although every journey is unique, every decision isn’t. And he had a front row seat to more decisions, good and bad, than you can imagine.
A wise man once said that all decisions happen at the intersection of facts and values. Turns out he was on to something. The hard part is that entrepreneurs make so many decisions, often with limited information, and often under conditions that cloud judgment and create blindspots. That’s where our story’s protagonist steps in, armed with both a lived understanding of the founder’s struggle and the lessons of many lifetimes of entrepreneurial experiences.
Soon a new chapter will begin, one where he shares his learnings more broadly. But before that story begins, there are still many more founders to learn from.
