At times like this, it’s important to understand that nearly every company goes through life-threatening moments. My partner at Andreessen Horowitz, Scott Weiss, relayed that it’s so common that there is an acronym for it, WFIO, which stands for “We’re Fucked, It’s Over” (it’s pronounced “whiff-ee-yo”). As he describes it, every company goes through at least two and up to five of these episodes (although I’m pretty sure that I went through at least a dozen at Opsware). In all cases, WFIOs feel much worse than they are—especially for the CEO.
