When Is It Time to Move On?

Software Social

Michele Hansen 0:00
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Michele Hansen
Hey, Colleen.

Colleen Schnettler 0:15
Hey, Michele. Good morning.

Michele Hansen 0:18
It's been a while.

Colleen Schnettler 0:19
Oh, I know. I've missed your face.

Michele Hansen 0:22
I've missed your face and your voice too.

Colleen Schnettler 0:26
Yeah, I think we haven't recorded in almost a month now.

Michele Hansen 0:29
Yeah.

Colleen Schnettler 0:31
Crazy.

Michele Hansen 0:32
It's been it's an every year in California now.

Colleen Schnettler 0:35
Yes.

Michele Hansen 0:37
And I guess we should catch people up. So the other day we were emailing about what time we should be recording since there is now a nine hour time difference between us. And it occurred to me as we were sort of trying to figure out scheduling and whatnot. I had this sort of thought for a moment of You know what, we've done this for almost a year. That's a really solid run. Like apparently, like, I think most 90% of podcasts only make it to like, what, three episodes or something like that. Maybe, maybe we've maybe we're done. Maybe we did what we did what we set out to do, and maybe we should walk out on a high note.

Colleen Schnettler 1:21
Yeah.

Michele Hansen 1:23
And then I said that to Mateus. And he was like, No, you can't stop the podcast, it's your thing.

Colleen Schnettler 1:29
By the way, thank you. saving the day. It's funny, you should mention that, Michelle, because a lot has changed in my life in the past month. And I had a similar thought, but not because of the time zones more because I'm like, sick of hearing my voice. I feel like I've been, I feel like I get on this podcast every week. And I just complain about how hard it is to start a business. And I'm not actually doing anything. Like, I feel like I've lost my bias to action. Like you aren't doing things, I guess I don't know, I just like colleagues, just do the thing. Stop talking about doing the thing and just do the thing.

Michele Hansen 2:08
It's so interesting that you listen back to it and you hear that you're not doing anything. When I feel like if you were to you know, I like I imagine you listen to some audio books on your long road trip from Virginia to I did California rather than listening through our entire catalogue.

Colleen Schnettler 2:30
That would have been funny, though.

Michele Hansen 2:32
Yeah, I imagine you celebrate our entire catalog. But I feel like I hear you did not have a side project going last summer. Like you spent the late summer in fall. And I guess it wasn't really until the fall you like decided to go all in on this. And then by December, right, you had something launchable. And you got it out there. You got into the training wheels phase of the Heroku marketplace. And then you were finally led out into the world in February. And last we spoke you were at like right, right around 1000. Mr. That sounds like a lot to me.

Colleen Schnettler 3:19
When you say it like that sounds really great. Go me. I just feel like for the past couple months. And to be fair, I have been single parenting three kids separated from my spouse, right in a pandemic. So it's been a little crazy. But for the past three months, I feel like I've just gotten on, and we've been recording, and I'm just like, Oh, I want to do this thing. And you'll say something brilliant. And I'm like, Yeah, I should totally do that. And then it takes me like, a month to do something.

Michele Hansen 3:47
But I think so make sense, given all of that. And maybe we should clarify that you were away from your spouse not separated. Like, Oh, right. That utilitarians? Yeah,

Colleen Schnettler 3:56
totally separate. Yeah.

Michele Hansen 3:57
But like you I feel like you have gotten so much done. But also I think what you're saying of kind of, you know, when you're working on a product, especially in the early days, I feel like it's very normal to kind of look at everything that has to be done and be like, Oh, my God, there is so much to be done. This product sucks. Why is anyone paying for it? I have so much to do. Is this ever going to be like a real business Never mind something that I'm proud of? How am I possibly going to get all of the time to do all of these things and like beating yourself up for not having all of that time because you are a human being that not only needs to sleep and eat but has other other real life commitments like child rearing. Like I think what you're saying is totally normal.

Colleen Schnettler 4:50
Okay. Like I've been doing a lot of whining, like, Oh, it's hard to do these things or just shut up and do the

Michele Hansen 4:59
way like, you know, People ever do acquire us and then and then people like you, and then you can go start a business, another business and I'm like, Yeah, dude, that's hard. Like I have one that works. Like, I don't want to do that again. It is hard.

Colleen Schnettler 5:13
Oh, it's good to hear you say that. I just feel like I'm moving slowly. I think that's a better way to put it. I feel like I'm moving at glacial speed here. And it's a little frustrating.

Michele Hansen 5:23
Yeah, of course it is.

Colleen Schnettler 5:25
So speaking of having calls with people who want to acquire you, someone reached out to me, a small company that acquire small sasses. And we had a call. Oh. So that was very flattering, I guess is the right word. Hmm. I mean, I know that happens to you all the time. But it does not happen to me all the time. And he did not find out. He did not find out about me from the podcast, or any of the heat, even though I had a podcast, which is always funny when someone is like, Oh, I didn't even know that. He's like, what made you want to start the business? I was like, Oh, well, if you have 52 hours, you can go listen to my podcast. I didn't say it like that I was much more professional.

Michele Hansen 6:09
So you could put it on to x, and it would be half of that. But

Colleen Schnettler 6:15
I was pretty cool. To have someone reached out about buying the business. And just to kind of start the dialogue. We had a very casual, we did not talk valuation. We didn't talk specifics, but we did have a very casual chat. So that was kind of cool, I guess.

Michele Hansen 6:32
But you're you're, you didn't leave that like committing to sell it to them? Like, are you gonna go there call with them?

Colleen Schnettler 6:39
Yeah, so the plan is, I mean, I'm not commit, I didn't commit to anything. Okay. I feel like I should say that. We kind of did the get to know the situation chat. And let's have another call if you're interested in a couple months deal.

Michele Hansen 6:56
And a couple months. Okay. But it's not like right now.

Colleen Schnettler 7:00
No, there it was. It was no pressure. Like we were just, we were just you know, he flattered me, of course, like you were saying he's like, Oh, you know, you started this thing. I'm sure you're gonna start a lot of things. And I thought of you when he said that.

Michele Hansen 7:16
And you'd be lik...