We have to be like Wile E. Coyote sometimes

February 14th, 2019

I was a fan of Wile E. Coyote (external link)  growing up. I didn’t want him to make a meal out of the Road Runner nor I enjoyed seeing him get flattened like a pancake by a boulder.

I rooted for him because he just kept on trying.

Wile E. Coyote kept trying different contraptions from Acme Corporation and new schemes with quixotic dedication. And with every attempt, spectacular failure would follow.

While I felt bad that he never reached his goal, I do think that he has qualities that we can admire and even adopt.

As a social entrepreneur, I believe that it’s good to have that irrational optimism, telling you that the next try after a setback will surely yield a positive outcome. Why? Because we hear a constant stream of “No’s”, and having the mindset to successfully move on at the right time will help you reach your “Yes’s.”

When I became a dad six years ago, I realized that parenthood is really hard and us parents need all the help we can get. It became my personal mission to use technology to help parents bring the best to their families.

In 2015, I co-founded a venture called CubbySpot (external link) , a platform that connected parents with quality child care providers. It had its small wins, like raising funds and getting recognition in the media, but CubbySpot, by many enterprise measures, was not a success. It was not the flaming failure that Wile E. Coyote always suffered, but the experience with CubbySpot truly game me a better understanding and a different perspective of how we as a social enterprise should go about our business.

What did I do after CubbySpot? Well, like Wile E. Coyote, I went back to the drawing board.

My latest social venture, ParentUp (external link) , helps low-income teen mothers and pregnant youth in the Philippines get health information and emotional support via SMS. I’m using the hard lessons I learned in my previous venture to make sure ParentUp is in a much better position to succeed. (Although there’s no guarantee that I will not fall flat on my face again and go back to square one.)

I’m not saying we should all persevere blindly. The key thing here is that every attempt brings about a new learning experience or a new insight to improve the chances for success.

One final note on Wile E. Coyote: Yes, he is a cartoon character, but he does bounce back even though he’s caught in a TNT explosion, hit by a locomotive, or crushed by a wrecking ball.

Putting things in that perspective: In a social enterprise environment, I think many of the failures we face are setbacks that we can bounce back from.