Over the last few weeks, you will have noticed that I have started talking more about the emotional impact of entrepreneurship. I talked about impostor syndrome, people cloning businesses, the loss and grief of selling a business, all topics that most people keep quiet about. I remember keeping quiet about this myself a few years … Continue reading The Emotional Journey of a Bootstrapped Founder: Fear of Disappointing Your Customers

Motivation is a powerful initial force. It provides momentum. When we start projects, we need that momentum to push us through the initial collision with reality when we learn of all the complex choices we have to make to get things off the ground. It's the motivation to learn, to discover, and to create that … Continue reading Motivation Will Eventually Go Away: Build Accountability Systems Instead

Many founders choose to create a lifestyle business. They have read the 4-Hour-Workweek by Tim Ferriss and now want to build a company that can sustain a life of travel, enjoying the world, and spending time with their loved ones. Gone will be the days of overtime, the excruciating commutes, the pointless teambuilding weekends. Well, … Continue reading The Bootstrapper’s Plight: The Social Headaches of Building a Business

As a founder, you will encounter many expectations. Founders have to have a mission. They have to care about their customers genuinely. A great founder is a leader, a visionary, an expert. Sometimes you just want to be you — the entrepreneur who had a good idea for a business and then worked on it … Continue reading Real and Imaginary Responsibilities of a Bootstrapped Founder

I started getting anxious whenever I heard the sound of an email coming in. What began as a genuine curiosity when we founded FeedbackPanda was now a feeling of dread. Was it another error message? Is the database having trouble again? Was it another customer reaching out? Were they writing in because some parts of … Continue reading Scaling Your SaaS Without Scaling Your Anxiety