Ask HN: What about the founders in their 30s who fail?

As someone who turned 30 recently and would classify my 20's as 50/50 win-lose, I feel I can add to this.

I am single, however family is becoming increasingly important, but to each his own. As much as I dreamed of being a playboy entrepreneur in my 20's, I started tuning in to what I really want, and it's scary.

How will I still achieve my dreams and embark on something as demanding as a family? Feast or Famine is not an option amongst other things, but this is not about relationships, it's about career.

My recent job search was eye opening, I decided to get back into the working world after 8+ years and here is what I have boiled it down to:

1. My biggest mistake while I was an entrepreneur was failing to develop a role for myself. Although you may have to wear many hats in your day to day, you should always try to become an expert at what you're good at. For example, I did marketing and development, pretty good at both, but when looking for work I did not have much of a portfolio and to be very honest, I felt like a hack. Stay prepared and be able to demonstrate and prove your ability at any given time.

2. Failure happens. The delicate part is not looking desperate. Lifestyle change, sparked interest in a new industry or just simply making the next step in your career are all good reasons for transitioning from founder to employee. However, I felt there was some judgement passed on a few occasions. Forget them, it's not worth it.

3. Going out and taking a swing at your dreams deserves a lot of respect. There is so much mediocre in this world that an attempt to do something substantial in your life is not crazy.

4. Being a founder is a thankless job. There is no love until you become successful, or at least look like it. Forget what society thinks, you will almost never get the response you want when you make this decision.

5. Optimize, automate or delegate. After years of overworking, deferring life, missed encounters..... It's not worth it. Having a family may make you a better founder because it gives you boundaries. Respect your time, set your hours and give it your all when you are working at it. Nothing is perfect, but it's amazing what you can achieve when you have 8 hours to GTD.

I think I'm a perfect fit here ! In my very early 30s, with a family and one kid, and yes, unfortunately my startup kind of failed. Or even worse, never really started.

I used to work in IT for trading, on the support / analysis part and last year decided to launch a startup to build a product with a friend of mine (same background). We did quit our jobs, worked hard on the product and yet... we never finished it. Too much distracted (we started developping several products at once), too much basic errors (leaving jobs too soon), not enough dev experience etc, long story.

To answer your question - you get back to normal job. I had 0 problems to find a job thanks to the reputation / experience I have acquired before. Also people do care, but in a positive way - yes you failed, but at least you have tried ! I frankly don't know any smart, hard working guy in the corporate jobs that isn't dreaming about launching his own stuff. It's just that most are too affraid to fail and / or give up the easy life for some months or years.

I was a bit surprised too by this positive attitude, especially that I'm living in France where the culture of failure is not exactly the same as it seems to be in the US. So overall, my only regret is to not trying earlier. And I will certainly try again, no matter if I'm in the 30s or 40s or whatever !

Hi,

(throw away account)

I've been working in my startup for a while now, it was successful and made money for some time, but due to a big mistake we ended up losing a large amount of money, we bankrupt while being profitable. I'm the technical co-founder. Answering your questions:

> So what happens when such startup with founders in 30s fail ?

You look for a job. I'm not sure this is age/maturity related, but as soon as I was sure we wouldn't make it I moved on fast. Not to another startup, but to something solid where I could have time to think about my next move.

> Does society viewed them as ineptitude ?

Seriously? Society couldn't care less about you. If you are a technical worker, your open source activity, certificates, etc are the only thing that's worth anything.

> Since job prospects are changing way too fast , how difficult it becomes to get job in 30s after failed start-up especially if you have family ?

I got 6 solid job offers the same day I started to look for a job. The market is looking for a certain type of worker, you need to realized that and be ready to supply that demand. I know extremely talented programmers who are unemployed because they are ASM/C/Fortran developers. If your startup was working in something not very marketable, make sure you use your free time to learn, contribute to something the market wants.

> What do you think ?

Go for it, but don't gamble with your life.

I don't think age has anything to do with finding a demand within a given market. You can be any age, at any phase in your life to realize there is a need in a certain market, and to find the motivation and will each day to meet those needs. Younger founders have the edge generally because they're freshly trained with newer and innovative technology, but a person who graduated from college 10 years ago, doesn't necessarily need to rely on those innovations - they have something different, experience within an industry, as well as time to make connections and build relationships within those industries. Business always boils down to one thing. People. If you know people, and you know how to add value to their life and meet their needs, you'll be fine. Age doesn't play a role at all. Only the will of the individual. As far as job opportunities go, and if working on a start up is "okay" in your 30s and 40s... I have yet to find/research a time in human history when all was stable in any given economy. You simply can't predict the future, so it's best to minimize risk given your experiences, assess you current situation, but have the balls to try something new. No matter your age/stage in life, you are responsible for creating your own opportunities.

Going to Startup School this weekend and getting ready for a YC submission, a similar question is very much on my mind, the only difference is that rather than early 30s I'm in my 40s! I think that the age related difficulty factors you cite increase exponentially with age.

The real problem is not a failed startup but finding out in 1-2 years that you're really not cut out for this type of life, due to many factors, some of which you listed.

Starting startups in your 20s and even in 30s is a no brainer: even if you want to go back to the corporate world in 3-5 years you still have many years assuming a cut off competitive employment age of around, say 55 (not the same thing as retirement); yet, if you're in your 40s you're getting dangerously close to the age where it becomes difficult to apply to large companies. The remaining options become starting another startup and freelancing. This means that an important lifeline that's available to young founders is not there for such older founders.

if you're in your 40s you're getting dangerously close to the age where it becomes difficult to apply to large companies. The remaining options become starting another startup and freelancing

I guess it depends on how you define "large company" but that sounds suspiciously like a "fallacy of the excluded middle" scenario to me. I'd say there are a lot of other options... there are plenty of established - but not large - companies out there to work for, where being 40+ isn't going to be a negative. And there's always consulting where you're getting paid exactly for your accumulated experience and wisdom. Or one could opt for a "lifestyle business" of some sort.

I don't mean to say that age discrimination doesn't exist, or that it doesn't get somewhat harder to find work as one ages, under at least some circumstances. But if one keeps current on the skills and talents that are in-demand and desirable, I have found it quite possible to remain highly sought after at 40+. To use my own example, even though I'm not looking for a job... I get calls from recruiters pretty much every freaking day. And while they don't necessarily know my exact age, you can tell about how long I've been working from my LinkedIn profile and could come up with a fairly accurate approximation of my age without much trouble. But yet they keep calling.

I think you're over-thinking this. I mean, yeah, the point about how (some) people in their 30's (or later) have dramatically different life circumstances (family, mortgage, etc.) is true. Other than that, I don't think it matters much.

Is a failed 30 year old founder viewed differently than a 20 year old one? I don't know, but I doubt it, and - more to the point - I don't think it's relevant. Speaking as a 41 year old founder, I know that I don't give two flying fucks what anybody else will think about me if we ultimately fail. I mean, why would I? Why would you? Why would anybody? "Do what thou wilt shall be the sum of the law" and all that. Don't worry about seeking approval from strangers, life is too short for that shit.

Since job prospects are changing way too fast , how difficult it becomes to get job in 30s after failed start-up especially if you have family?

This is debatable, but my experience has been that if you have "in demand" skills and are good at what you do, finding a job isn't difficult even into your 40's - at least for a developer or other tech role. Maybe it's different for other fields, I really can't say. What I can say is that at least here on the East Coast, I've observed plenty of older developers (even more than a few who are quite older than me) who had no issues with age discrimination or whatever, so long as they had current skills.

My overall take? I look at working on a startup as a chance to learn new skills, broaden my horizons and learn a ton of valuable lessons. IF Fogbeam fails someday, I believe the experience will have made me far more employable, not less so. YMMV. shrug