Angie Stocklin: Exits come with mixed emotions. Let’s recognize that.

In my last three columns, I have walked through One Click’s exit process from decision to transition. (If you are reading for the first time, One Click was an eyewear ecommerce company that my co-founder, Randy, and I started in 2006, built without outside funding, and sold to FGX International in July 2018.) Now, I think it is important to pull the curtain aside and really talk about the feelings surrounding that acquisition.

When I talk to other founders about how they felt after their company was acquired, I get a variety of responses. Some founders are excited to move on to their next opportunity and use their knowledge to build a new company. Some founders are simply proud to have reached what society indicates is the ultimate success for a founder and might decide to stay for a while at the new company. Other founders are grateful to have had the experience and are grateful to be finished with the stress and long hours of running a company.

I was extremely proud of my team and what we had accomplished to bring us to the point of acquisition, but I was also distraught and devastated. Selling the company was a business decision, and the right one, but I never wanted to sell. I loved our company and our team. I loved watching small improvements create big gains. I loved watching our team members grow and develop. I loved solving hard problems with these folks, and I simply loved working with them each and every day. Being a founder is hard, and I don’t know if I ever want to do it again, but I still deeply miss the team we created and the company we built.

But it wasn’t just my emotions that clouded this transition period. Our entire company was filled with a mix of emotions. There were celebrations mixed with tears. There was hope and excitement for the future, alongside fear for the future and anger at Randy and me for selling. Some team members were processing feelings of accomplishment and pride, while others were struggling with grief and uncertainty.

And while I had had much longer to get used to the idea of selling and had been in therapy to help navigate my own feelings, my grief didn’t always allow me to meet others where they were to help them process whatever feelings they had that day. I wasn’t always able to be the leader they were used to having and the one they needed.

When we hear of an acquisition, we congratulate the founders and the team for their success, and these teams deserve all the credit they receive. But I don’t know if we spend enough time talking about the real emotions that accompany these transitions. I don’t remember many external conversations during this time that were not focused on the champagne and fireworks of becoming a founder with an exit. I was struggling with the idea of losing what felt like part of my soul, and I felt the need to put on an excited face to match the excitement of others.

Even fewer of these conversations asked about the health and wellness of our team. Businesses are built by real people, and the emotions of these real people often get clouded by the celebrations and excitement of an acquisition. Oftentimes, there are real upsides for current team members in their new parent company, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t scared of the upcoming changes and struggling with their own grief about what has been and will be no more.

I left my position at One Click in March 2019, and it took over a year to properly process all my feelings surrounding starting, building and selling One Click. I am thankful for the time I had to figure out who I was without my company and what I wanted to do in the next chapter of my life.

At this point, I can look back at my time at One Click with fondness and am beyond grateful for the people I met along the way. What I share with you today is just a small peek behind the curtain of one founder and one exit process. My hope is that we, as a community, get better at understanding that all business decisions are made by humans with feelings, and that these decisions are never made in a vacuum.

Let’s get better at starting conversations with something along the lines of, “Congratulations! You sold your company. How are you feeling?”•

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Stocklin is an angel investor and exited founder who currently teaches entrepreneurship at Purdue University.