The Next Wave: “Coping ugly”

A YouTube video discussing trauma inspired me to reflect on African startups. A friend shared a video featuring psychologist George Bonanno, who has studied how people react to trauma. While not directly related to business, Bonanno's concept of "coping ugly" resonated with me. His research challenges our assumption that resilience comes from discipline, emotional clarity, and careful decision-making.

Instead, he argues that recovery often involves messy behaviors like distraction, burying oneself in work, and avoiding difficult conversations. These actions may appear irrational but help people stay functional until life becomes more manageable again.

Applying this concept to African startups, I noticed a pattern. Successful companies are often portrayed as having clear visions, executing well, and making strategic pivots. However, many of the startups that survived the funding slowdown made uncomfortable decisions that seemed irrational at the time but provided enough breathing room to continue. Startup history is often more messy than the neat narratives we see.

During the past five to six years, African tech founders had to navigate rapidly changing funding markets, volatile currencies, high inflation, rising logistics costs, and shrinking customer budgets. Companies that had previously focused on growth found themselves questioning how to stay afloat. Many consequential decisions in African tech during this period challenged long-held assumptions and forced businesses to reconsider their strategies.

For example, Moniepoint, a Nigerian fintech, serves over six million businesses and individuals and handles more than ₦412 trillion ($294 billion) worth of transactions per month. While Moniepoint's story is often framed as a success from the start, it initially built software for banks, a business model that appeared attractive due to the scalability of enterprise software.

However, they soon realized that distribution was the real constraint, not the software itself. Instead of investing more in software development, Moniepoint turned to agency banking, deployed POS terminals across Nigeria, and built relationships with merchants. This approach, although operationally complex and costly, proved to be the foundation of Moniepoint's competitive advantage.

The company's success demonstrates that resilience is often about making uncomfortable decisions, adapting to market realities, and embracing work that may not initially seem glamorous. Bonanno's idea has changed my perspective on resilience in business. Resilience is not always about a breakthrough moment or a bold strategic pivot; it can also be about accepting market changes, letting go of ineffective ideas, and finding unexpected strengths in challenging situations.