1 Year from Success, 1 Month from Bankruptcy, and a Lifeline

In the beginning of December, I presented the plan for 2014 to the team.  “Things are too easy, so we need to stir up the pot.”  Well here we are a month later, and the pot has high entropy.

The wildcards we thought would give us cash simply didn’t pan out.  AAF Member delayed their decision and are leaning towards no; and the $500k I wanted to borrow was rejected (big surprise).

Our gambles are in the infancy and are the source of my anxiety.  I just won’t know for months if these work out; and if they don’t we’re going to be in big trouble.

David – New sales guy has a positive attitude, perhaps too optimistic.  It worries me a bit.  Lot’s of appointments in his first 3 weeks.  I have faith though that he’ll come through.

Marketing Company – We’ll spend $42,000 before we see even a drop of results from this company; and realistically it will be June before we start seeing any return on this.  Here I have faith too.

Miriam – We hired Miriam to help with sales support.  Last week I learned that she is starting to get complacent, just doing the needful, but no more.  We could have given her work to Amy in the Philippines for $1,000 / month, but we are spending 4x more to build an office culture and get motivated people.

Tommy – New support guy.  I have little faith in him working out.  I asked him this week, what he sees himself doing in 6 months.  He answered “oh, I don’t really want to look at the support queue; I want to be a coder.”  I’m confused as to why he applied for a customer support job.  I’m foolishly looking past this big red flag.  April 15th is my cutoff date for him to learn the system.

All in all, we are bleeding cash fast.  Lot’s of new internal investment — lot’s of uncertainty.  I’m hopeful EagleBank will come through with a small loan to buy us an extra 2 months of time.

But more so I’m hopeful that all these 4 investments pay off.  They have to for us to make it to next year and beyond.