Celebrate those who survive the journey

Send a message or go hug someone who’s in the trenches.

I was with a portfolio founder today, someone we backed years ago, long before his company had any real right to exist. And as I left the meeting, I felt that familiar shock you get when a founder emerges from the fog, carrying the scars of a long battle that is neither finished nor won. A mix of being impressed, reassured, and almost viscerally moved by the difficulty they’ve pushed through and by the distance still ahead. Moments like this bring me back to the deepest humility of my work.

It’s also a reminder of an uncomfortable truth: sometimes the need is obvious, the founder is talented, the work ethic is impeccable, the ambition is real… and yet it still takes time to click, often far more time than any mortal would ever hope for. And when it finally does, when everything suddenly looks obvious in hindsight, one question becomes impossible to avoid: why?

The first unlock: Break the boundaries, move faster

For him, the turning point started when he left for the United States.

Same product. Same team. Same founder.
But suddenly a different rhythm, a different ambition, a different mindset.

America has that effect. It forces a founder to discard the small version of themselves. You arrive thinking you’re ambitious; you realize you were operating at 30% of what you could be. You meet people who go twice as fast, twice as hard, without apologizing for wanting something big. And sometimes, that shock, that brutal contrast, is exactly the oxygen a company or a founder needs.

But let me be clear: I’m not saying the U.S. is the answer. That would be far too simple. What I’m saying is that immersing yourself in a different referential, different rules, different ethos, different ways of thinking and building, stretches your mind in ways your existing environment simply can’t. It’s not a magic solution; it’s a way to break out, look around, and decide what you actually want next.

Maybe you discover you don’t want to run your company in such a brutal system. But at least you can say: I’ve seen it. I’ve understood it. And now I choose my way forward with open eyes.

The second unlock: Remove the wrong people

He also made a hard choice: he separated from a cofounder.

Not out of anger. Not from ego.
But because he eventually understood something most founders refuse to see:

A team member can love you and still block you.
A person can create a second center of gravity that drags the company sideways, diluting every decision, muddying every direction.

And when you try to please everyone, you end up choosing nothing.

Letting go is hard.
But not letting go is worse for both sides.
Ending a partnership is not a punishment. It’s a release.
And if you don’t cut the rope when needed, no one gets to move forward. not you, not them.

The real unlock: The test of time

Every great founder shows two qualities through time and struggle: Determination and Discernment.

Determination is the ability to keep going when everything in your head screams to stop.

Discernment is the ability to make the uncomfortable decision that needs to be made, clearly, quickly, and without flinching.

One without the other doesn’t work.

Determination without discernment becomes chaos.
Discernment without determination becomes theory.

Put them together, and a founder becomes dangerous in the best possible way.

Your secret weapon : The entourage

There is something I’ve seen again and again: founders rise or fall based on their environment.

Your entourage shapes your optimism or poisons it.
It gives you courage or steals it.
It creates a space where you can be vulnerable or traps you behind a mask.
It sharpens your decisions or erodes them.

The best founders are the ones who learn to trust their instinct about people. Not the loudest people. Not the most impressive on paper. The ones who amplify them. The ones who remove friction instead of adding it. The ones who make them more themselves.

A founder I’ll remember

Today’s founder reminded me why I love this job.
There is something powerful in him… Ambition, heart, clarity… but also realism. There is no delusion, no posturing, no fake crushing it. Just a person who is crossing the desert and will come back with a sharper mind and a steadier soul.

And he is not alone.

Our portfolio is full of founders like him. People who feel lost, inadequate, behind… when in reality, they are becoming exactly who they need to be.

Celebrate the people who survive the journey

Everyone wants the poneycorn-that-transformed-into-unicorn-that-became-a-decacorn. But that pony who drank the magic potion with all the right ingredients… It’s an exception, not a blueprint.

The real heroes are the founders who keep going when nothing works.
Who wake up every day and push the rock up the mountain again.
Who evolve, who learn, who cut what must be cut, who fight their own limitations and win slowly, painfully, relentlessly.

People look at entrepreneurs with that strange, involuntary contempt.

Give them one day in the life of the people I work with.
One day of pressure, sacrifice, risk, loneliness, responsibility.
They wouldn’t get up again.

To all the founders out there

You’re not crazy.
You’re not late.
You’re not behind.

You are becoming.

Through time, through difficulty, through the decisions you make when no one is watching. And by the way… no one is watching anyway, or just the fall, for like a minute.

If you stay determined…
If you stay discerning…
If you surround yourself with the right people…

You’ll get there. One way or another !