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Ideas for Impact

Don’t Be A Founder Who Won’t Let Go

January 17, 2022 By Nagesh Belludi Leave a Comment

You’ll never get a potential successor to take your job if you’re going to be peering over her shoulder constantly and talking to employees directly about what they’re doing.

When you have a case of the founder’s syndrome, you’re addicted to running the show, and you’ll have a hard time separating yourself from the company you’ve built. When there are conflicts, you’re often at the center of it and hold your vision and experience over the leadership’s heads.

In the long run, your compulsion to have a say in all the nitty-gritty of your company will undermine the future of the very company that you’ve devoted your life to. The best thing you can do for its future is to back off and give your successor real control.

Establish a timetable to disengage yourself from the operating decisions and set some firm rules about this transition. Spend increasingly more time away from the business and pursue other interests. Start to envision a world in which your next ventures or leisure activities will become the principal focus of your life.

Idea for Impact: Know when your work is over and when it’s time for you to move on to other things. Grooming exceptional talent to take over the business you’ve built and gradually letting go of control is one of the most challenging things a founder will ever do. If done well, it’s the most transformative you can do for your business.

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Filed Under: Leadership, Mental Models, The Great Innovators Tagged With: Change Management, Entrepreneurs, Leadership Lessons, Perfectionism, Personality, Starbucks, Transitions

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About: Nagesh Belludi [hire] is a St. Petersburg, Florida-based freethinker, investor, and leadership coach. He specializes in helping executives and companies ensure that the overall quality of their decision-making benefits isn’t compromised by a lack of a big-picture understanding.

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