The Secret to Strong Co-Founder Relationships: It’s Not Rocket Science

The co-founder relationship is one of the most complicated, and important, relationships to get right if you want to build and scale your business.

Yet, it’s a hard one. Real hard. Here are a few stats for good measure:  

• 65% of high potential startups fail due to interpersonal tensions within founding teams.

• 76% of founders say having a co-founder would have made their business more successful.  

•   39% say the relationship with a co-founder is more stressful than with their life partner.

Just like any relationship that goes the distance, the co-founder relationship has to evolve and be managed continuously.

Ready, … the key to any successful relationship is communication. Duh. Shocker (said nobody ever!) Also in the “duh” category, your communication must be honest, frequent, and respectful.

So, why do so many co-founder relationships go south? Because putting these principles or values into action takes practice, shared intention, and time. 

What does it take to get it right?

Promote Each Other

Take the time to recognize each other’s contributions, great ideas, successful project execution, a big sale, or new partnership. Give credit where credit is due.

Share your praise and appreciation publicly with your employees, investors, and key stakeholders. This builds respect for your co-founder and models the type of culture you want at all levels of management.

One of the biggest causes of tension between co-founders are power struggles and ego. Maybe one of you is the face of the brand or finds him or herself in the spotlight. Make sure when talking to the media, investors, or engaging with your customers, you acknowledge that it’s a team effort.

Apply Best Practices

What you will find with this list is that each of these are best practices that you already do with your team. The leadership skills that we focus on to promote employee engagement and company culture.

Yet, too often, moving at 100MPH, co-founders forget the same goes for their relationship.

Do performance reviews, schedule 1:1s, give feedback, and conduct post-mortems after major initiatives fail.

The best co-founder relationships are grounded in a desire to support each other’s success. Perhaps, as the business scales, one co-founder finds him or herself in a role they don’t like or do not feel qualified to do. Or your co-founder has been knocking it out of the park, and then you see a fall off. Get curious, not judgmental.

Get Real, Real Fast

How do you practice honesty, transparency, and respect? You get real, real fast before small problems or frustrations become explosive. Before you say something that you regret, your team starts to take sides, or decision-making comes to a screeching halt.  

It’s natural to say to yourself “it’s not a big deal” over and over. Until, boom, it’s a big a freakin deal.

Remember that you are a player, not the referee. What is your role in the situation that is bothering you or not working? This is why scheduling time for 1:1s is important so you can do the necessary self-reflection, get your thoughts in order, and separate from your emotions.

Disagree and Commit

What happens behind closed doors, stays behind closed doors. You will not always agree on a major decision, for example, a product launch, a timeline, how to spend resources, hiring and firing decisions, or the direction of the business once you have taken venture capital.

Hash it out, but once the decision is made, it’s all about having a united front with your team, investors, and other key stakeholders.

Just Be There

Building a business is hard. Nobody will get what you are going though better than your co-founder. Take the time to reconnect on a personal level. Have a well-being check-in. 

Sometimes what is driving the tension, whether it’s anger, or ineffectiveness, a perceived lack of commitment, or loss of enjoyment, is the function of burnout.

Think you might need a little co-founder therapy? Feeling a bit out of sync with each other? Maybe things are getting a wee bit tense? Or, maybe you just want to get it right before it goes astray? Setup a 30-min, no commitment, strategy call.