I am an engineer, a CEO, and a serial entrepreneur in the medical device space. I got my start in the business as a part of the innovation team that invented a flow restoration device that could, for the first time, treat patients who had suffered an ischemic stroke in the brain. This was a big deal for me. My grandfather, who I was very close to, died of an ischemic stroke while I was in college. If he were around today, the device we invented could save my grandfather’s life. 

 Saving lives, improving the quality of life for people where no treatment existed before is a great feeling, and a really good reason to get up and go to work every day. But I have to tell you, even in a space like mine, as an entrepreneur you are going to run into moral dilemmas, just in the course of day to day business. There will be tests of your character.

This happens when you’re the first to any frontier. It’s the wild west. There aren’t any road signs or maps. You’re making up a lot of the rules. When you come to a crossroad, you have to decide- -which way am I going to go? Who am I? Am I a shortcut guy or a long-way-home person? What are my values? Do I have to take the high road or can I live with the middle road? What is most important to me? What is the right thing to do? Because it’s not always obvious. You can wind up far out on some pretty thin ice, and before you even realize you’re in trouble, the ice breaks.

For example, a few of years after my grandfather died, I got a call from a friend who said he knew some people who were looking for an engineer to help them develop a hemorrhagic stroke device. I knew this was a technology that would have saved my grandfather’s life. It’s exactly the area I was looking to enter and so this opportunity felt kind of like it was fated at the time. It felt like my destiny.

I flew down to Charleston and met with the folks involved. The whole thing felt a little weird to me right from the beginning. I didn't have a good feeling, but I was 29 years old and I wasn’t really in touch with my instincts yet. I remember wondering though, you know, why is an alarm going off in my head? But then I thought, this an opportunity to break away from a big company, to help lead a start-up, to be part of something big. If I have to make some sacrifices, so what? I’m young. I'll survive.

So, I took the job. And over the first six months, everything seemed legit—they were very careful with their investor’s money and everything felt right until it didn’t.

Things started to get hinky when I got back from a trip to Paris. The comptroller of the company asked me about my boss’s expense report, since I had been with him on the trip. My eyes almost popped out of my head when I saw the Amex bill. But I didn’t say anything. I mean, who was I? I was the new kid on the block, and my job was head of technology. I didn’t have anything to do with the financial side of things.

I rode the tiger for a while, and ultimately it came to nothing, as these things often do. A company made an offer to acquire us for $175 million and then backed out after due diligence. The head of that company pulled me aside and told me they rescinded their offer because our CEO. He told me they would never acquire a company with a guy like that at the helm and he told me I should get out while I still could. I still clung to my hopes and dreams, and didn’t do the right thing and blow the whistle and leave. There was just so much riding on staying in by then, not just for me but for everybody involved. We’d all heavily invested.

I was ultimately fired from that job. As soon as I started speaking up about what I knew was going on, they couldn’t keep me. And when that moment I had been dreading and fearing for months finally happened, all I felt was relief.

Since then, I’ve developed a few rules that we keep as our North Star in all of my companies when it comes to ethical dilemmas, to avoid these kinds of gray areas in the future.

1.   Trust your gut. You know more than you think you do, and if something feels wrong, it probably is.

2.   If something feels too good to be true, it probably is.

3.   Tell the truth, especially when it’s hard. Disguising or omitting the facts never works out in the long run

4.   Use leadership and oversight as an ally. When you are transparent, leadership should be your friend. If they aren’t you’ve got the wrong people in charge.

5.   When you know something is wrong, act accordingly. You can’t save a leaky boat, no matter how hard you row.