Do you have any horror stories or any really glorious stories?

Tim DraperFounder and Managing Partne, Draper Associate · I back the ideas that look crazy first

Moments of horror and success in a career of entrepreneurship | Michael Abbott

12 Aug 2016 · 2 min

Watch on YouTube

1:48

In this interview segment, Michael Abbott reflects on the extremes of his entrepreneurial journey. He recounts a horror story from his early twenties when he had to lay off 180 of 220 employees, describing the emotional toll and how the experience exposed poorly behaved investors, ultimately steering him toward venture capital. He contrasts that with glorious moments: the satisfaction of shipping a paid product at Composite Software, the excitement of the webOS demo at CES, and the profound impact of his company's services during crises such as the Japanese earthquake and tsunami and in the Middle East, where Twitter and his product helped deliver medicine and aid. Abbott emphasizes the lasting bonds formed with former colleagues and expresses gratitude for the varied, meaningful experiences throughout his career.

Questions this video answers

Abbott recounts a horror story of laying off 180 of 220 employees in his early twenties, describing the emotional toll and investor misbehavior, and contrasts it with glorious moments such as shipping a paid product at Composite Software, the webOS demo at CES, and the humanitarian impact of his product during the Japanese earthquake and Middle East crises.

Chapters

Now I want to get into some more fun questions. So my first question is, do you have any horror stories or any really glorious stories?
I mean, a horror story was like laying off 180 people out of 220, and I was like 20-something. I had, you know, telling someone like at the time my dad's age, we're like, you know, that person had a family and kids and the crying in my office, like that's pretty awful. It was very humbling, and it made me also I realized how much— I mean, this contributed to me also going into venture because I saw how badly behaved the investors were in that company, some of the guidance they gave us, the guidance they gave me. I felt like I was the guy left to go clean it all up. Yeah. Which I did, which was not fun. Ironically though, I built such strong bonds at that company. Actually, we're having an event this Monday. Out of the 120 people in engineering, half are going. 20 years ago, 15 years ago. So I think that's awful. You know, I think I could easily say like, oh, the demo of webOS at CES, like that was amazing. But actually what was more amazing for me wasn't that. It was at Composite Software getting a product and having someone pay for it. It's like, wow, like I built something that someone paid for. That's amazing. And I think on the enterprise side, I think certainly the experiences were like Twitter and the events in the Middle East or how the service was used in the Japanese earthquake and tsunami to get medicine. I mean, that was awesome to think that a product that we were making sure worked helped humanity. So I've been very lucky in my career, without a doubt, to see some of those things. Yeah.