Why stopping isn't quitting

I recently read The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz. Despite it being highly rated, I found it a bit ho-hum. It is probably more interesting if you are in the world of venture capital backed technology start-ups – most of us aren’t. And I didn’t really like Horowitz, who seems to me to have far too big an ego for this exercise. This became clear when I finished the book; as I went back to review any parts which I had highlighted, they were few and far between at the beginning of the book (Horowitz’ story) and more prevalent at the end (general business advice).

One excerpt in particular stood out for me:

As a CEO, there will be many times when you feel like quitting (…) Great CEOs face the pain. They deal with the sleepless nights, the cold sweats, and what my friend the great Alfred Chuang calls “the torture”. Whenever I meet a successful CEO, I ask them how they did it. Mediocre CEOs point to their brilliant strategic moves or their intuitive business sense or a variety of other self-congratulatory explanations. The great CEOs tend to be remarkable consistent in their answers. They all say, “I didn’t quit.”

If you are or have been a business owner, I am sure this resonates. Everyone has had some crunch times. In my four-decade business career, I have had a few crises which might have tipped me over the edge. In the 80’s, when we moved our home and, six months later, the business from southwest London to Oxfordshire, an upheaval we almost didn’t survive. In the early 2000’s, when all our largest customers decided to build their high-volume electronics assemblies in China rather than the UK, causing our revenues to half before we were able to pivot into new markets. And on March 23 2020, when we were all told to go home and stay home. I dealt with this by resolutely staying open and operational, and keeping our team together by not implementing any redundancies or furloughs. To me the lockdown was a profound existential threat to my business, and massive psychological challenge, one from which I have not yet completely recovered. Lucy Easthope, Britain’s leading disaster planner, says that, post-pandemic, “we are all disaster survivors now”.

I didn’t quit.

I don't purport to be a great CEO of the Horowitz ilk. And this is not to advocate a stubborn, incessant resistance to change if needed. If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging. If you a Warren Buffett acolyte (Rule Number One: Never Lose Money. Rule Number Two: Never Forget Rule Number One), then a fundamental principle is to stop doing whatever it is that breaks Rule One.

If your business has been around for more than a few years, there are likely many activities that have been around forever, that happen automatically, or in the background, that no-one pays attention to. There are also activities that are pet projects, to which you have some emotional attachment or a sense of loyalty. Are you sure that these are all profitable? Are they pulling capital or resources from other, more important or strategic projects? Have you ever said, “you know, we should stop doing that?”

Stopping is actually quite difficult. Kodak couldn’t find a way to stop making film until digital cameras put it into bankruptcy. The Pareto principle suggests that 20% of your customers are contributing negative profits to your business – can you be the one who says to customers that we don't want your purchase orders anymore? Stopping stuff is also quite difficult because we have more fun starting stuff; launching new products or services, implementing new software or processes, trialling a new market or territory.

A good question to review is “What should we stop doing?” Pose the question to your managers, ask them to take a good look around their areas of responsibility, and bring suggestions to the next management meeting.

Stopping is a hard thing. But easier than, ultimately, having to quit.