Julie Wainwright has taken two firms public, a reasonably unimaginable feat by any normal. But in her new memoir, Time to Get Actual, she gives readers one thing much more priceless: a blunt have a look at the messy realities of management. Wainwright shares the sorts of powerful truths that many high-achieving CEOs can relate to however not often focus on publicly, together with the aftermath of what many would take into account her first main setback, which was shutting down Pets.com through the 2000 market crash.
In case you’re of a sure age, you undoubtedly bear in mind it. The web pet provides startup had change into immediately recognizable because of its memorable sock puppet mascot and catchy slogan, “As a result of pets can’t drive.” However what appeared like only a fleeting second within the dot-com bubble’s burst would forged a shadow over Wainwright’s profession for almost a decade. “Once I would speak to recruiters, it was like, ‘Nobody’s going to rent you anymore,’” Wainwright stated in an interview with this editor earlier this week.
It got here as a shock, provided that Wainwright’s profession trajectory initially appeared unstoppable. After slicing her enamel at Clorox, she rose by tech firms within the ‘90s when feminine management within the sector was exceedingly uncommon. As CEO of Berkeley Techniques and later the net video retailer Reel.com, she labored “tons of hours” however was completely happy and, by her telling, succeeding, together with rising Reel.com’s income from $3 million to $25 million — a time throughout which the corporate was bought to Hollywood Video. “I simply operated higher with no boss,” she stated.
Then got here the collapse that might have completely derailed many careers. In 2000, Wainwright took Pets.com public, solely to close it down later that very same 12 months through the dot-com bubble burst. The skilled blow was exacerbated by a private one: she says that on the exact same day she knowledgeable workers of the corporate’s closure, her husband requested for a divorce.
“My work is gone, I’m getting a divorce, and I don’t have kids,” Wainwright, then 42, recollects considering as she confronted what felt like whole life collapse. Making issues worse, the media protection was “extremely unfavorable and intrusive,” to the purpose that she says days after the corporate’s closure, reporters confirmed up at her doorstep.
Wainwright describes what adopted as a type of lengthy winter, the place she was solely supplied roles main turnaround efforts at failing firms. However that crossroads led to a exceptional second act. In 2010, she based The RealReal, serving to within the course of to pioneer the posh consignment market on-line. Like plenty of founders, Wainwright first arrange the corporate out of her own residence, but it surely quickly outgrew her lounge, and in the present day, it processes many tons of of hundreds of various luxurious objects every month that it goals to promote inside 90 days out of its greater than 1.2 million sq. ft of warehouse house. It’s additionally publicly traded; in her second journey to Wall Avenue, in 2019, Wainwright took the outfit by the standard IPO course of.
Sadly, this comeback has its personal harsh chapter. In 2022, Wainwright was abruptly pushed out of The RealReal by board members she had really useful – one other twist she doesn’t draw back from sharing. As a substitute, she names names within the e-book, and earlier this week, she described the transfer as a “energy play” by an investor who “didn’t get his cash out of the corporate and thought he might run the corporate higher.”
Wainwright — who absolutely helps the corporate’s present CEO (she was the corporate’s first rent) — continues to be miffed. She famous in dialog that “no founder is ever going to say they must be shot and eliminated,” and it’s that truthfully that makes the e-book – and Wainwright herself — so refreshing. Within the company world, the place individuals typically spin narratives to make themselves look bulletproof, Wainwright is a straight shooter. If she doesn’t like one thing, she isn’t going to carry her punches. If somebody spins the story in a different way than she sees it, she’ll name it out. The place she messes up, she says so.
Even higher about this memoir — on this reader’s opinion — is Wainwright’s means to supply not simply private revelations however sensible knowledge. She walks readers by her resolution to bonus her gross sales employees a sure method, and shares her learnings a couple of leadership-evaluation quadrant she gleaned from McKinsey executives, together with the conclusion she had employed one of many worst sorts: a “dumb aggressive,” that means, in her phrases, somebody whose “have to bully and coerce and to be on prime supersede their skills.”
There’s additionally an fascinating new chapter unfolding. Wainwright is continuous her entrepreneurial journey with Ahara, a diet firm that’s growing customized dietary suggestions based mostly on genetics and particular person wants.
You could find our full dialog right here, through TechCrunch’s StrictlyVC Obtain podcast. Within the meantime, if you happen to’re serious about a learn that’s virtually equal elements memoir and guide, providing founders one thing rather more worthwhile than idealized success tales, you possibly can choose up the e-book right here.
Mentioned Wainwright after we spoke, “I personally wrote it for entrepreneurs to present them a sensible view and hopefully encourage them and, you realize, perhaps they’ll assume twice and never make the errors I made.”
