Skip to main content

Co-founder ‘couples therapy’ helps avoid company-killing pitfalls

Keegan Walden Contributor
Keegan Walden, Ph.D, is the Co-founder & COO of Torch, a leadership development software platform. He is also a psychologist with a B.A. from Yale University and a Ph.D. from Northwestern University.

My co-founder and I go to couples therapy.

Our partnership is not romantic — we’re both married to other people — yet as co-equal parents of a venture-backed startup, we live our professional lives under similar strain. Our “kids” don’t always get along. We don’t always set the right boundaries or model the right behavior. Problems in our company that I consider small agitate my co-founder, who doesn’t shy away from conflict if he thinks it will lead to a better outcome. I think he creates more unnecessary conflict, he thinks I avoid conflict and let problems escalate. We both have a point.

As with many romantic couples, the co-founder relationship is a forum in which old patterns reemerge disguised as basic questions.

Our patterns run through questions about our company. How should our product evolve? When should we raise our next fundraising round? Should we let our team work remotely? Each question is a litmus test revealing both our wisdom and our insecurities. Without high degrees of self-awareness on both our parts, the resulting conversation can devolve into a cold war. So, we go to co-founder therapy to stay aligned.

Here are three pitfalls that co-founder therapy has taught me to avoid:

  1. Being the good cop. My co-founder is an instinctive, emotional leader with a keen sense of strategic direction. When his instincts draw his attention to a growing problem in our company, he doesn’t wait for our executive team to wind its way toward resolution. He becomes animated and aggressive, confronting other leaders and provoking action. His bad cop approach can be beneficial — problems are not left to fester — but it also creates tensions that can linger and grow into other problems. I’m a natural good cop, the interpreter-in-chief, a go-between who helps the other execs understand my co-founder’s psychology. Therein lies the problem. I prefer to work with them, to help them see past his reactive exterior, to understand his underlying intentions and motivations. I have a harder time working with him. I dislike conflict and when my co-founder is upset I can let my conflict aversion prevent me from giving him hard feedback on the downside of his approach. Our therapist helped me realize that by not giving this feedback, I was failing to uphold my end of the co-founder bargain. Co-founders need to balance each other. When stress causes one founder to behave unwisely, it is the other’s responsibility to intervene.


    from TechCrunch https://ift.tt/2sic4of
    via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Silent Revolution of On-Device AI: Why the Cloud Is No Longer King

Introduction For years, artificial intelligence has meant one thing: the cloud. Whether you’re asking ChatGPT a question, editing a photo with AI tools, or getting recommendations on Netflix — those decisions happen on distant servers, not your device. But that’s changing. Thanks to major advances in silicon, model compression, and memory architecture, AI is quietly migrating from giant data centres to the palm of your hand. Your phone, your laptop, your smartwatch — all are becoming AI engines in their own right. It’s a shift that redefines not just how AI works, but who controls it, how private it is, and what it can do for you. This article explores the rise of on-device AI — how it works, why it matters, and why the cloud’s days as the centre of the AI universe might be numbered. What Is On-Device AI? On-device AI refers to machine learning models that run locally on your smartphone, tablet, laptop, or edge device — without needing constant access to the cloud. In practi...
1 comment
Read more

Apple’s AI Push: Everything We Know About Apple Intelligence So Far

Apple’s WWDC 2025 confirmed what many suspected: Apple is finally making a serious leap into artificial intelligence. Dubbed “Apple Intelligence,” the suite of AI-powered tools, enhancements, and integrations marks the company’s biggest software evolution in a decade. But unlike competitors racing to plug AI into everything, Apple is taking a slower, more deliberate approach — one rooted in privacy, on-device processing, and ecosystem synergy. If you’re wondering what Apple Intelligence actually is, how it works, and what it means for your iPhone, iPad, or Mac, you’re in the right place. This article breaks it all down.   What Is Apple Intelligence? Let’s get the terminology clear first. Apple Intelligence isn’t a product — it’s a platform. It’s not just a chatbot. It’s a system-wide integration of generative AI, machine learning, and personal context awareness, embedded across Apple’s OS platforms. Think of it as a foundational AI layer stitched into iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Max Q: Anomalous

Hello and welcome back to Max Q! Last week wasn’t the most successful for spaceflight missions. We’ll get into that a bit more below. In this issue: First up, a botched launch from Virgin Orbit… …followed by one from ABL Space Systems News from Rocket Lab, World View and more Virgin Orbit’s botched launch highlights shaky financial future After Virgin Orbit’s launch failure last Monday, during which the mission experienced an  “anomaly” that prevented the rocket from reaching orbit, I went back over the company’s financials — and things aren’t looking good. For Virgin Orbit, this year has likely been completely turned on its head. The company was aiming for three launches this year, but everything will remain grounded until the cause of the anomaly has been identified and resolved. It’s unclear how long that will take, but likely at least three months. Add this delay to Virgin’s dwindling cash reserves and you have a foundation that’s suddenly much shakier than before. ...
Post a Comment
Read more