When you begin with your own startup, you nurture it like your own baby. The dream become a priority before anything else. The personal life is engulfed in the vision. But often, especially in cases which involve venture capital, the startup takes a life of its own. The founder may find himself in disconsonance with the dream, and left by the side as others surge ahead with his vision.
Here are few instances of successes, who were asked to quit their own companies.
Steve Jobs
His is the classic case of the phenomenon of coming back with a vengeance. Apple was founded in the year 1976, but unfortunately, Steve Jobs got fired in 1985. Then he founded NeXT computers along with The Graphics Group, which went onto become the legendary group Pixar, partnering with Disney. However, Jobs got back to Apple in 1997, and vindicated his position in the company.
Mike Lazaridis
He founded BlackBerry Limited in 1984. The company grew exponentially with the BlackBerrysmartphone, extremely popular with executives and celebrities in the mid- 2000s. However, the company has taken a backseat in the cellular market since then and Lazaridis relinquished leadership in 2012.
Jerry Yang
Yang and co-founder David Filo founded Yahoo in 1994. Through the 2000s, the company grew to great heights, but hit a hurdle with the emergence of Google. Yang was criticized for turning down an offer from Microsoft to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion. That, along with several changes in leadership, forced Yang to step down from his position 2009.
Martin Eberhard
Everybody knows Elon Musk, but few have heard of the other name behind Tesla success. Eberhard was passionate about sports cars, and helped to start Tesla Motors in 2003. In 2007, he was asked to transition from CEO to Advisory position. In 2008 he left the company for good. Following his departure, he filed a lawsuit against Tesla and Elon Musk for breach of contract. The suit was later settled out of court.
Jack Dorsey
The founder of Twitter was ousted in2008 for the whimsical reasons of his love for fashion designing and yoga. Dorsey bounced back, however, returning to Twitter as Executive Chairman in 2011.
Travis Kalanick
The most recent of founder oustings is the case of Uber. He was removed in 2017 on charges of sexual harassment. The scandal began when an ex-Uber employee posted a blog post exposing gender discrimination in the company. Under the pressure of the shareholders, Kalanick resigned, but maintained his position on the board.
Brian Acton
The co-founder of WhatsApp is said to have left the organisation to commence another startup venture. Acton spent eight years with WhatsApp, which Facebook bought in 2014 for $19 billion.
Though some be fair, and some unfair, these instances show that the path of fate leads the deserving to success.
Read Also: Vishal Sikka Shows Why You Should Not Ruffle The Founders’ Feathers
