Stepping Down

Last September, I stepped down from iomando, the company I co-founded almost four years ago. Arguably, the most difficult and also painful decision I’ve ever faced in my professional life.

When Victor and I founded iomando in our dorm rooms, and setting aside the fact neither of us knew what we were doing, we did it with just one thing in mind: building an amazing product and putting it in the hands of people — that was all we cared about.

We were thrilled watching our customers fascination with the fact that they were able to access their garages, factories, or whatever they were accessing, right from their mobile phones. Back then it was a bold insight, and definitely way ahead of its time.

That feeling of creating something people perceived as valuable was the fuel that kept us going despite the rough beginnings. To me, personally, the most tangible expression of fulfillment and self-actualization.

Crafting this experience, building something that people were actually in love with, has always been my guide. And what later I have come to consider my little contribution to the world, as little as it might be.

And while it is true that building iomando has come at a cost — mostly missing out on friends, vacations… as a matter of fact, I’ve enjoyed the journey so much, that now that I look back at what we’ve done, I have no regrets and I acknowledge the cost as the price I have paid for pursuing what I loved the most.

I believe in pursuing what you love, and if this happens to be work, so be it.

I don’t mind pouring my soul (and time) into something I deeply care about. I don’t believe in work-life balance. Instead, I believe in pursuing what you love, and if this happens to be work, so be it. I don’t see the point on stop doing what you love just because there’s some kind of social convention that labels it as “work”.

Fortunately, in the times we live in, there are jobs as exciting as what could be considered the most refined leisure from just a few decades ago. I just happened to be fortunate enough to create one of those jobs.

Nonetheless, after four years, some things changed.

My job became less and less about crafting our customers’ experience, and more and more about arguing with investors and partners. Endless discussions that I didn’t want to take part in, and were far from building amazing products.

We reached a point where our investors and the team running the show had completely different visions for where iomando should go. The kind of problem that, as I come to realize, has no straightforward solution.

It is difficult to relate to such a complex problem without falling into a misleading “good and bad” narrative. The closest I can describe it is that it felt as we decided to stop in the middle of the road and start a pointless argument that led nowhere, while the world around us kept moving. But we were not paying attention anymore. We were just stuck in meaningless fights with one another, that lead nowhere.

For the first time, I felt what burnout means. It was not because I was working longer hours than usual, on the contrary, I was “working” less than ever. But I found myself working on something that was not moving the company forward anymore.

Since this very moment, I felt I was burning time in the wrong direction. I wasn’t passionate about what I was doing anymore. My daily activities started revolving around politics and were far from “building something that people were actually in love with”.

Coming in every day became an exhausting experience, one I was not willing to pour my soul into. I felt powerless for not being able to course correct the situations. Fake politics won me over. Work started to feel like war, not something I actually enjoyed — it felt wrong.

Because of this, I have decided to quit.

This is the saddest words I’ve ever written in this blog. They are not intended to sound insightful or smart. Plain and simple, this is how they came out.

I’m just sad and I can’t hide it.

Stepping down from the company you’ve created is arguably one of the most painful experiences I’ve gone through. Yet something in my gut tells me this is the right thing to do. At least this way iomando will continue, who knows in which direction, but at least, forward.