Okay, I’ve definitely neglected this blog for far too long.  Time to get into the swing of more regular updates.  I’ll be getting to the financial updates of the last couple months later this week, but for now I’d like to post an article I read recently that is rather directly applicable to my current situation: Why to Start a Startup in a Bad Economy

The economic situation is apparently so grim that some experts fear we may be in for a stretch as bad as the mid seventies.

When Microsoft and Apple were founded.

As those examples suggest, a recession may not be such a bad time to start a startup. I’m not claiming it’s a particularly good time either. The truth is more boring: the state of the economy doesn’t matter much either way.

If we’ve learned one thing from funding so many startups, it’s that they succeed or fail based on the qualities of the founders. The economy has some effect, certainly, but as a predictor of success it’s rounding error compared to the founders.
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Fortunately the way to make a startup recession-proof is to do exactly what you should do anyway: run it as cheaply as possible.

Obviously I found this article to be pretty encouraging, since a lot of what the author is saying is similar to my own thoughts on the matter that I shared back in February.

Speaking of February’s post, now seems like a good time for an update on my former employer, about which I said the following:

First off, sure, self-employment is risky in a recession, but so is a “normal” job. During the last downturn, my previous employer laid off hundreds of people, and things were going so poorly that many of those who kept their jobs were concerned about the company going bankrupt. Although my job function was electrical engineering, my employer was a manufacturer, and historically manufacturers are some of the hardest-hit businesses in a downturn. Granted, one would hope that they learned their lesson in 2001, but there’s no guarantee.

Well, Genie has now been through two rounds of layoffs this year, and last week’s cuts included a number of engineers among the 500 who lost their jobs—even some in my former group.  Meanwhile, the parent company’s stock has fallen over 80% in the past year, compared to a 45% decline in the S&P 500 (which they are a part of).

So what’s the point of all this?  I guess I’m just saying that when times get tough like they are now, I feel that being “in control” of my own employment actually puts me in a better position than working for “the man” would.  When I’m working for myself my efforts have a direct affect on the success of the business, and that’s the best motivation I can think of to work all the harder to grow the company through a tough economy.