Investor Pressure Isn’t Personal, It’s Process

The way to handle investor pressure when you're raising funds is to not take it personally.

It's just a process.

And the way you can manage that is: communicate clearly and consistently with your potential investors. Tell them what's happening. Tell them what's going well—but also tell them what's not going so well. Manage their expectations.

Know that when they're missing meetings or when they send a junior associate—it is not personal. It's just because of the way their world works.

You have an idea.

You have a project that needs funding.

If they're interested, they're interested.

If they're not, they're not.

And the last thing—and I think that might be the most important thing to think about when you want to handle investor pressure—is this:

Unless they've said yes, it's a no.

If they say, “Keep us updated”—it's a no.

If they say, “Get back to us later on”—it's a no.

If they say, “We need to discuss it internally”—it's a no.

And you have to be okay with that.

You're going to get 100 no's—1,000 no's—before you get a yes.

It is not personal. It’s just part of the process.

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