As the plane took off for New Delhi, my mind was still grounded in the intense board meeting I had just held in New York. It was 2007, and Endeavor, the organization I had cofounded a decade earlier to support high-impact entrepreneurs around the world, was expanding rapidly. We had offices in nearly a dozen developing countries, from Brazil to Turkey. But our board was agitating.
“Linda,” the directors said to me firmly, “we’ve been operating in emerging markets for 10 years. Why are we not in India?”
We were not in one of the world’s fastest-growing economies because I felt that India, with its thriving culture of entrepreneurship, was not the right market for us. Endeavor’s mission—to mentor young business leaders, to get them access to capital, to turn them into rock stars—had already landed in India. But the board made a compelling case, arguing that if Endeavor was serious about growth markets, we couldn’t ignore one of the biggest in the world—not to mention one in which many of our own entrepreneurs wished to expand.
Once I was on the ground, my resistance softened further. I had encouraging meetings with top business leaders in Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore. Sure, India had a vibrant community of entrepreneurs, they told me, but more local innovators were needed. Within months, Endeavor had secured $1.5 million in committed funds—half the capital required to launch local operations—and three (out of the needed six) local business leaders were ready to join the board. At our annual gala, I announced the news: Endeavor India had arrived!
But so had everyone else, I soon realized. Silicon Valley’s premier VC firms were already active in India. The media were full of homegrown entrepreneurial success stories like Wipro and Infosys. Although we were off to a successful start, I feared the seeds of failure were already planted.
Still, I was reluctant to give up. I had faced this situation before. A decade earlier, Endeavor’s inaugural office, in Chile, had been struggling because of lackluster buy-in from the local business community. I decided to shut down the office. Six months later we reopened, having received calls from many business leaders there expressing their desire to work with us. Endeavor Chile swiftly became one of our top offices, led by an all-star board.
Was India another Chile, I wondered, needing only time to flourish? The answer was no. We had trouble recruiting additional local board members. Also, people were asking Endeavor to relax its “high impact” standards by focusing outside the capital cities, on the base of the pyramid. I feared mission drift. I needed to face reality: Failure was an option.
I soon announced that we would close Endeavor India.
As the leader of a fast-growing organization, I know the importance of setting an ambitious course of action—and stubbornly following it. I believe passion is a powerful guide. But the Law of India, to me, is: You can’t always will an outcome. You can’t always win. You just need to fail smart.
I often think of that plane ride to Delhi and of how important that experience has become to my understanding of entrepreneurship. One of my favorite business mantras is “Go big, or go home.” We talk a lot in business—and at Endeavor—about the first half of that equation, “Go big.”
But we need to spend a lot more time on the second half, “Go home.” Sometimes knowing when to shut down a failed initiative is as vital as knowing when to start one. Sometimes embracing failure is as important as toasting success.
This is a very difficult decision for entrepreneurs. Persistence is a critical success factor - but persistence in the pursuit of a failing objective is a drain on precious time and resources. The magic happens at that margin - between doubling down and going home. When do you decide it's time to "Go Home" on a new venture?
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