Why does failure sting?

“This principle eludes most people, but it is critical: You are not your idea, and if you identify too closely with your ideas, you will take offense when they are challenged.”

Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar

Reading this line in Creativity Inc struck a chord with me. When I was running a company, I am sure I took critical feedback on the business as an attack on me. Perhaps it is human nature to think that you are your idea. Ed Catmull mentioned this in reference to the talented directors and animators he worked with at Pixar but the first thought I had when reading this was about founders.

A founder’s identity is, at least in part, tied to the company they are building. Beyond spending the lion-share of their time focused on building a company - the founder and company often become synonymous with each other. The company is born from the founder but at some stage of notoriety, the importance / brand awareness of the company overtakes the founder. In the beginning, the social identity of the founder is based on their past more than their current occupation as a struggling founder. However, once the company starts to gain traction, the founder becomes an extension of the company.

If the company doesn’t work out, one of the hardest things for a founder to do is to reconcile their role in the failed company with the fact that new ideas often don’t work out. This is incredibly hard because a founder might feel responsibility for the failure but making a bad decision (or many) does not necessarily mean that someone has poor judgement across the board.

Reading Catmull’s book reinforces the notion that failure is part of the entrepreneurial process, just as it is part of the creative process at Pixar. While it feels better to succeed than to fail, neither define someone.