Ask HN: I'm crushed, share with me your failure story
What's your biggest project failure and why did it fail? What did you learn from that?
25 comments
After years of reading hacker news, books on startups, tweets, essays, listening to podcasts I decided I had to start my own startup. From all the years of prior research I did a lot of things right. I also did just so many things wrong that they always warn you about.
The failure was mostly one of spending months building out a product that no one actually wanted (the classic move!) But it was also one of not working hard enough and having very wrong mental models about startups and the nature of the world.
I took almost a year off to do it and had basically nothing to show for it by the end. The psychological effects of that kind of failure are pretty rough in the wake of it. I felt pretty ashamed. All my friends and family were convinced it was impossible to lose and told me as much all the time. I think had kind of convinced myself of that too because of how easily the software field had come to me up to that point. I assumed I'd try to start a startup and do nothing but kick ass and cash checks because frankly, thats how my career had gone up to that point for the most part.
After the dust settled I got a new job, it paid well. Even failed startups seem to be a resume booster. I also got the chance to reevaluate how I approached life and thought about myself. I had my identity and self worth all wrapped up in material success. This might have been the crux of the failure. I was enamored with the idea of earning money and status rather than focused on the actual problem I was trying to solve. Particularly the status of being able to tell people that I did it - I started my own company. I also felt like I got something back from my childhood that I had lost, my curiosity. What did I really care about money or status? When I was a kid all I had cared about was poking around at interesting problems. Where had I gone off track?
I learned a lot. I feel like I emerged on the other side as an almost entirely different person. There was trauma but I grew from it and wouldn't trade it. And it didn't feel that way in the immediate aftermath by the way. At the very end I just felt terrible all the time.
I'm going to try again. I'm happy I tried it and know just how damn hard it is now.
I've found that most of the failures in my life tend to be that way, big growth experiences. It sucks that you have to experience something like that to grow but it tends to be the case for me at least.
So as for this failure you've experienced I understand how bad it feels. With time I hope you'll be able to look back and learn from parts, laugh about others.
Good Luck.
The failure was mostly one of spending months building out a product that no one actually wanted (the classic move!) But it was also one of not working hard enough and having very wrong mental models about startups and the nature of the world.
I took almost a year off to do it and had basically nothing to show for it by the end. The psychological effects of that kind of failure are pretty rough in the wake of it. I felt pretty ashamed. All my friends and family were convinced it was impossible to lose and told me as much all the time. I think had kind of convinced myself of that too because of how easily the software field had come to me up to that point. I assumed I'd try to start a startup and do nothing but kick ass and cash checks because frankly, thats how my career had gone up to that point for the most part.
After the dust settled I got a new job, it paid well. Even failed startups seem to be a resume booster. I also got the chance to reevaluate how I approached life and thought about myself. I had my identity and self worth all wrapped up in material success. This might have been the crux of the failure. I was enamored with the idea of earning money and status rather than focused on the actual problem I was trying to solve. Particularly the status of being able to tell people that I did it - I started my own company. I also felt like I got something back from my childhood that I had lost, my curiosity. What did I really care about money or status? When I was a kid all I had cared about was poking around at interesting problems. Where had I gone off track?
I learned a lot. I feel like I emerged on the other side as an almost entirely different person. There was trauma but I grew from it and wouldn't trade it. And it didn't feel that way in the immediate aftermath by the way. At the very end I just felt terrible all the time.
I'm going to try again. I'm happy I tried it and know just how damn hard it is now.
I've found that most of the failures in my life tend to be that way, big growth experiences. It sucks that you have to experience something like that to grow but it tends to be the case for me at least.
So as for this failure you've experienced I understand how bad it feels. With time I hope you'll be able to look back and learn from parts, laugh about others.
Good Luck.
I echo all of this post, especially the part about wrong mental model. Me too after reading listening to all success stories thought that it would be a fairly effortless, all I have to do is build a great product and users and investments will coming knocking to the door. And why not, that's what led to fairly great success in corporate world - focus on building great stuff, heads down do things that you are great at, and good things will follow.
I took couple of years off, built seemingly good product along with 3 others but it did not go anywhere.
Selling and hustling is hard.
I depleted and reset my savings and wealth by half a decade or so. Initially I found it tad difficult to get back to same or better position in corporate world; though eventually after couple of years it happened.
But inspite of all this I'm glad I did this as otherwise I would have always led a regretful life (what if).
As OP says next time I would be doing this with my eyes wide open and with a 'default dead' [1] mindset.
[1] Default Alive or Default Dead? http://www.paulgraham.com/aord.html#:~:text=If%20it's%20defa...
I took couple of years off, built seemingly good product along with 3 others but it did not go anywhere.
Selling and hustling is hard.
I depleted and reset my savings and wealth by half a decade or so. Initially I found it tad difficult to get back to same or better position in corporate world; though eventually after couple of years it happened.
But inspite of all this I'm glad I did this as otherwise I would have always led a regretful life (what if).
As OP says next time I would be doing this with my eyes wide open and with a 'default dead' [1] mindset.
[1] Default Alive or Default Dead? http://www.paulgraham.com/aord.html#:~:text=If%20it's%20defa...
[deleted]
I wanted to make a video game. Over the course of a few years I built my own 3d engine and SDK, using only Java and the OpenGL API. By the time I got to a state where an actual game could be made (sort of a point and click adventure) I fell out of love with games altogether.
If you want to actually make a game, use something like Godot, Unreal or Unity. If you want to do all the ”fun parts” of designing a rendering pipeline, implementing shaders, inventing a scripting language but not actually make anything, roll your own engine..
If you want to actually make a game, use something like Godot, Unreal or Unity. If you want to do all the ”fun parts” of designing a rendering pipeline, implementing shaders, inventing a scripting language but not actually make anything, roll your own engine..
Just because you had a bad experience with something, doesn't mean that this experience of yours is applicable to others.
Are you familiar with Jonathan Whiting? If not, have a look, please:
https://jonathanwhiting.com/writing/blog/games_in_c/
https://jonathanwhiting.com/
As far as I am concerned, he made everything on his own and had his success with it.
Are you familiar with Jonathan Whiting? If not, have a look, please:
https://jonathanwhiting.com/writing/blog/games_in_c/
https://jonathanwhiting.com/
As far as I am concerned, he made everything on his own and had his success with it.
That sounds interesting to me. Did you ever end up posting the code of your engine anywhere? I think others would find the fruits of your labour useful.
Thanks, but I doubt anyone would find it useful apart from the curiosity and novelty of it. It's neither optimized from a performance or development perspective and it lacks visual fidelity (my friends kept reminding me that it looked like Minecraft). I have some videos from way back demonstrating how making a scene could look like (everything was done in-engine):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUxVISIwAa4&feature=emb_titl... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEQ1_MIRMMc&feature=emb_titl...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUxVISIwAa4&feature=emb_titl... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEQ1_MIRMMc&feature=emb_titl...
That's cool. Thanks for sharing :) I think anything created from scratch like this has value from an artistic standpoint.
Good luck with your future endevours!
Good luck with your future endevours!
And just to clarify, this was a hobby project alongside studies, not a full-time endeavor..
Failure is part of learning. The failure of my project Graphite Docs (https://graphitedocs.com) crushed me too. I had built something new and exciting for a niche community, but I had failed to leverage the community that already loved it. Instead, I tried going after the “bigger” fish. The ever-elusive enterprise clients. That, in my opinion, is ultimately what did me in.
I did an interview on Failory that goes into a lot more detail: https://www.failory.com/interview/graphite-docs
But the biggest lesson I learned is how and when to validate things. Validation doesn’t stop once you’ve launched. And validation should also not be so intense that you never launch. It’s a delicate balance that I feel much more equipped to manage now.
I did an interview on Failory that goes into a lot more detail: https://www.failory.com/interview/graphite-docs
But the biggest lesson I learned is how and when to validate things. Validation doesn’t stop once you’ve launched. And validation should also not be so intense that you never launch. It’s a delicate balance that I feel much more equipped to manage now.
I got an MBA admit at a prestigious school and left my family and my home country to pursue my dream. I finished my degree and landed a job at an amazing tech company. It was all awesome - and then I started running into issues focussing at work. My boss was horrendous (my point of view) and the place was insane to work for. I was eventually fired.
Introspecting on these events, I realised I had ADHD and I was just never diagnosed as a child. If I'd only known this before, I'd make the most of my job opportunity with the knowledge that I had ADHD. The cost of not knowing was close to 2 years of mental trauma for myself, and my family. It was being forced to let go of approx 1/3 of the value of my mortgage in stocks. And it is living with the PTSD of having been fired from a prestigious position for performance issues. Well, onwards.
Introspecting on these events, I realised I had ADHD and I was just never diagnosed as a child. If I'd only known this before, I'd make the most of my job opportunity with the knowledge that I had ADHD. The cost of not knowing was close to 2 years of mental trauma for myself, and my family. It was being forced to let go of approx 1/3 of the value of my mortgage in stocks. And it is living with the PTSD of having been fired from a prestigious position for performance issues. Well, onwards.
Out of curiosity what made you realise you had ADHD? I've previously suspected I have inattentive type ADHD but was never sure if it was just an excuse I told myself or not. Due to that I've never pursued a diagnosis.
I made a confidential salary survey app that is for employers and their candidates to check if salary expectations are within ballpark before interviewing. The idea is that it would save everyone time upfront without affecting negotiation leverage.
Many people have had experiences where interviewing was a waste of time due to the pay range, and this kind of app was mentioned before on HN as something nice to have.
Well, I made one and posted it, and have gotten zero response.
https://payscope.io/
https://payscope.io/blog/employers
I'm not sure what I've learned yet, except maybe PG was right about building for a small number of users who really want your product, rather for many who take some convincing.
Many people have had experiences where interviewing was a waste of time due to the pay range, and this kind of app was mentioned before on HN as something nice to have.
Well, I made one and posted it, and have gotten zero response.
https://payscope.io/
https://payscope.io/blog/employers
I'm not sure what I've learned yet, except maybe PG was right about building for a small number of users who really want your product, rather for many who take some convincing.
I wish, as someone who has been job searching, that I could use something like this...Have you reached out directly to employers or did you just post about it to hackernews?
Also note that the costs of flying someone in right now is mitigated by the fact that all on-sites are virtual right now. And unemployed people in 2020/2021 may not have the luxury of being picky about a higher salary. You tried launching this in a weird year.
The survey was designed to help employers too - it's a large expense for them to interview, especially including indirect expenses.
A weird market should actually call for more screening like this, because expectations can be all over the place right now.
A weird market should actually call for more screening like this, because expectations can be all over the place right now.
I certainly can do more "things that don't scale" but so far the response has been limited, so that I'm not even sure if it's a matter of reaching more people or it's just not something employers want.
A startup which I joined years ago, I bootstrapped it from technology point of view and then hired people to help me push it further. After two years founder decided he needs to hire a project manager. The person he hired had very bad habit of badmouthing people behind their back and collecting everyone's failures so he could use that later as ammo. After another two years founder was kicked off by that manager. I was loyal to the founder so I was next on the list of people to go. This startup still operates on simple premise of finding yet another investment wave to slide on, almost if finding next investor was sole purpose of this startup.
But outside of this drama story that startup was a failure from day one simply because we was following the founder dream, not the market (I learned this over years, I was way too inexperienced when I was joining). Founder was deciding what features we need based on his "expert" knowledge. The problem was that at first glance all potential customers was saying how good the product was, but when it came to actually make use of it they could not really see the benefit.
But outside of this drama story that startup was a failure from day one simply because we was following the founder dream, not the market (I learned this over years, I was way too inexperienced when I was joining). Founder was deciding what features we need based on his "expert" knowledge. The problem was that at first glance all potential customers was saying how good the product was, but when it came to actually make use of it they could not really see the benefit.
The project of finding a person to start a serious relationship with once I'd entered the work force. Apparently salaried me is far less of a catch than broke-and-unemployed me was
Related: Ask HN: What's a side project you built to make money that hasn't? [0]
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25580637
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25580637
Made an offer on a house. This was going to be my dream home. It required stretching the budget but was doable.
I had panic attacks for a week and ultimately backed out of the deal. I didn’t lose any money other than realize that I got into something without thinking it through, was paralyzed by fear and anxiety, and then had to back out. It was a GREAT deal. There’s literally nothing in the same market that even close.
This was supposed to be my first home purchase. And I got lucky at the deal I was getting, but I just couldn’t go through with it.
My spouse isn’t saying anything, but I know I’ve disappointed them. I really did want that house but I think the right decision was to hold off for another year... but then I think about it and I feel we really need the larger space and now is the right time.
I realized how indecisive and immature was on something so important. Complete lack of backbone on my part.
I had panic attacks for a week and ultimately backed out of the deal. I didn’t lose any money other than realize that I got into something without thinking it through, was paralyzed by fear and anxiety, and then had to back out. It was a GREAT deal. There’s literally nothing in the same market that even close.
This was supposed to be my first home purchase. And I got lucky at the deal I was getting, but I just couldn’t go through with it.
My spouse isn’t saying anything, but I know I’ve disappointed them. I really did want that house but I think the right decision was to hold off for another year... but then I think about it and I feel we really need the larger space and now is the right time.
I realized how indecisive and immature was on something so important. Complete lack of backbone on my part.
Not buying a house now to keep looking is way less risky than buying one and maybe making the wrong decision. From my experience it's not always possible to fully rationally explain how I feel about a decision, but for most decisions where I said yes despite having a bad feeling my subconcious was right in retrospect. So maybe you also made the right call.