Millionaire – and yet not happy: How this 30-year-old coped with his crisis of meaning
Leo Widrich comes from the Austrian province and built a million dollar company in Silicon Valley: the social startup Buffer. After an exit he took care of things, but that didn’t make him happy.
It is the dream of an entire generation: to become a millionaire through the Internet. For Leo Widrich it has come true. The Austrian is a co-founder of Buffer and built something out of nothing that could send him into early retirement early in life. Renowned companies such as Spotify, Happy Socks or Stripe use the social media monitoring tool to place and analyze their postings. Forbes recently estimated the value of Leo Widrich’s shares at more than twelve million euros.
But what does it do to you when money no longer matters? While some lean back and enjoy life, for those driven like Widrich it becomes an existential problem. In the first part of the interview, we spoke to the entrepreneur about his irrepressible desire for success, the tense relationship with his Buffer co-founder and the crisis of meaning after his exit. In the second part about his healing path and the importance of wealth for happiness.
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Buffer founder Leo Widrich: “I thought if I am successful, I am also super happy”
Leo Widrich comes from Melk in Austria and has built a million dollar company in Silicon Valley. (Photo: Helena Manhartsberger)
t3n: Leo, you made a million dollar exit with Buffer and now you have basically taken care of it. Did it make you a happier person?
Leo Widrich: At least that has always been my great hope. When we slowly started to become successful with Buffer in 2012, I was still living in Hong Kong. We were making $ 200,000 to $ 300,000 a year back then. I had a fancy apartment in a high-rise building with floor-to-ceiling windows and a view of the harbor. I was only 21 years old and thought: Wow, look at me, now I’ve made it. Now I don’t have to worry about money anymore and can afford this amazing apartment. At that point, however, I had a real sag for the first time. I was disappointed because I thought that if I was successful, then I would be super happy too. But it was not so.
t3n: What happened?
I sat there, had this insight – and my world collapsed a bit. I picked up my cell phone and googled, “Who is the happiest person in the world?” – and thought, actually, it should be me if I have achieved all of this. I come from a family home where money was always tight. That was a problem that led to many more problems: a violent father, an overwhelmed mother, me who didn’t feel loved. I thought: if I have money, it will solve all problems. Then we are all happy.
t3n: But it didn’t?
No, but I still didn’t recognize it right away. Then I worked even harder and assumed that maybe it just needed more money.
t3n: Was it this bitter drive that led you to success a little later in Silicon Valley and Buffer?
I think that was an important component, yes. My co-founder Joel had very different intentions. I don’t know if he would agree, but my impression was that, as a talented programmer, he had earned well even before we were founded. Whether Buffer is going to be successful or not, in case of doubt he would have become a freelancer again and would have made good money. I, on the other hand, dropped out of university and had no real skills. For me it was the great opportunity to break out of my old world. Internally I was called the “machine”. I was the one who carried everything forward. Joel had long since been satisfied and – unlike me – wanted the company to just keep splashing around.
t3n: These are two completely different ideals. How could you work side by side like this?
At the beginning he liked my ambition to the point at which I noticed that it would become a problem for the further growth steps. When we brought Buffer to the 15 million mark in sales, I was in parallel with big Silicon Valley players who had already got to where I absolutely wanted to be: the billionaire company. They said, “When you’re at 10 to 15 million in sales, forget how you get to 20. All you have to do now is think of how you got to 100. Then the IPO comes and you get your billion dollar company! ”Joel could go well up to the 15 million mark, but then – that was in 2016 – he told me that he didn’t want to anymore. Then there was a conflict.
t3n: Then why did you leave Buffer and not him?
At first it looked different. I took him aside during a leadership offside and said that I didn’t feel like Buffer was giving him any pleasure. The company had gradually split into two camps: the high performers, which I brought in, and the leisurely ones, who had more of Joel’s work rhythm. I told him he wasn’t high performing and I don’t want him to have any more responsibility. That sounds very derogatory now, but that was my mindset. I gave him to understand that I don’t want to knock him out, but that he should let us, who enjoy entrepreneurship, do better.
t3n: And then he withdrew?
It sure wasn’t easy for him. I took over everything and worked my way down even more. At the end of the year Joel came to me and wanted to get involved again. I asked what has changed. And he said: nothing. He just wanted to try again. But nothing had changed in his attitude towards success. So I decided to leave because I didn’t feel like having an argument that would definitely have come.
t3n: I thought, what if this company was just the beginning? A good first entrepreneurial attempt?
Your life then turned out completely different than expected: You may have founded a new company in New York, but you no longer followed your billion-dollar mantra and closed it again. Why?
I started out very motivated, looked for a new co-founder – and we immediately set ourselves the goal of building a 100 million company with Matter. We created software that companies can use to find out how diverse their teams are. How many women and men of which ethnic groups are represented in which departments – and who is missing where. We started working with really big companies like Pinterest and Salesforce.
t3n: Sounds good.
Clear. But then everything started to get into a crisis because this gear thing was gradually making me really sick. I also sold a small part of my Buffer shares because I wanted to further part with Joel. At that time I came to two million euros alone and then I realized that, even if I invest them very conservatively, I can easily live off the returns. That changed something in me. On the one hand I was exhausted and on the other hand I didn’t need any more money. That led me into a deep crisis of meaning.
