Brave Tech World

    This week I had the worst meeting since I started Sampa.

    It is hard to be an entrepreneur. You have to have a vision, plan it, execute it, and hope that people will love what you do and buy your product. But that is not the hardest part. The hardest part is the impact on your personal life. Everybody around you is affected a little (or a lot). On my case my wife and kid are the ones, besides me, that have to go through restraints to help me.

   Back at the meeting, we've met this other entrepreneur to see if there was a possible synergy between Sampa and what he was doing. We do that all the time, with many entrepreneurs, investors, consultants, etc. No biggie.

   For some reason, this person starts the meeting completely inside the box (read Leadership and Self-Deception). He is not only arrogant, but he has that smirky look of somebody that knows everything (wait, that is the definition of arrogant, isn't it?). You know how to detect people like that, when they say things like "Every company is doing X wrong…".

   For a possible partnership meeting, it started bad. He begins by drilling into Sampa's architecture and question a lot of our decisions with "but you could have done this way", "but you could have used this tool". What the fudge? Most of my answers were "sure" with me thinking why am I wasting my time with this. He was clearly trying to pinpoint every single possible flaw in Sampa's architecture (according to him, of course). The fact is that he came with an agenda, close-minded and just wanted to confirm it.

    Now, to be honest, I love when people challenge me. I surrounded myself with honest advisors, not afraid of telling the truth. But for a first "date" at least you should be a bit more diplomatic and open-minded. This person is certainly not a mensch.

    I belive that meeting was worth something. Learning about him and be wary of anyone that considers him a great entrepreneur.

    At the heat of the moment, I said words that should never been said: "let's see we can partner in the future". For that I'm sorry, very sorry.

    And just to be clear, I don't wish him any harm or ill. I'm working hard to be somebody that is remembered by the many friendships I created and the great legacy left to humanity.

PS: Oliver, you were right. The craziest s**t happens when you're an enterpreneur.