Introducing founder resilience

It’s June ’23, when I caught up with Sander Peltenburg, the founder of ‘de Krekerij’ and former YES!Delft students at the TU Delft, where we initially met.

During my coaching education at Nonons, I coached several entrepreneurs who sought guidance on dealing with stress, uncertainties, and finding energy and motivation in their entrepreneurial journeys. Two of them had recently experienced bankruptcy (it’s different times in 2023), making the topic of mental health for founders particularly top of mind for me.

Sander had just shared he had to close down his company ‘the Krekerij’ on Linkedin, and I was curious how he was doing and how he dealt with this personally.  Our first conversation evolved into three in-depth sessions, each lasting at least two hours. We where always running out of time, but never ran out of relevant topics to discuss. Through these discussions, we uncovered Sander’s journey so far and realised how difficult it is for founders to prepare themselves for what is coming. Our mutual interest in the mental health of founders was sparked.

We decided to dive deeper in the subject, conducting research and interviewing other entrepreneurs, specifically those who had faced similar challenges in fast growing (tech) companies. To understand how these founders coped with mental health, maintained the right spirit, energy, and motivation, and fostered personal growth, especially in times when you experience setbacks. Why some founders grapple with stress while others do not, and how to sustain energy and motivation during setbacks, we gathered numerous insights and lessons from honest stories shared by many entrepreneurs.

The topic of Founder Resilience started to get unveiled for us: “Founder Resilience” refers to the capacity ofentrepreneurs or founders to bounce back from setbacks, overcome challenges. Maintaining a sense of purpose and determination, to grow even stronger.” We embarked on a journey to understand the nuances of founder resilience, addressing aspects such as:

• Keeping yourself and your team motivated in challenging times)\
• Your role and responsibilities in growing organisations
• Setting priorities and  letting go of what holds you back
• Identifying stress triggers in your entrepreneurship journey
• Assuring you remain purpose driven
• Taking control of your day to day planning and work/life balance

In the coming weeks we’ll be sharing some initial insights and common traits derived from our conversations and research. We’re excited to share this and to invite you to join the conversation. Share your experiences, and contribute to what we’ve gathered so far.