If Everything Goes Through the Founder, Nothing May Go: A Guide to Overcoming Founder Dependency
- Halil İbrahim Ordulu
- Sep 24
- 7 min read
INTRODUCTION - Founder Dependency
The early stages of a startup are an exciting time, marked by relentless pursuit of dreams and goals. It's natural for the founder to make every decision during this period . However, as your service or product develops and grows, this can become dangerous. The concept of "founder dependence" refers to the tendency of a startup's founder to control every aspect of the organization. This can be due to a variety of reasons (insecurity, perfectionism, etc.).
Founder dependency can negatively impact the productivity of both the founder and the team. In this article, we'll detail the effects, consequences, and solutions to founder dependency.
Chapter 1: Main Focus
I. Influences on the Founder
Burnout
Founders can experience burnout due to constantly intervening and wearing multiple hats. This can be either out of necessity or a desire to control every detail. Founders can experience burnout due to constantly intervening and multitasking. Over time, being forced to make every decision yourself, or being forced into it, can negatively impact your physical and mental health. Lack of sleep, stress, and inadequate rest reduce founder performance. Research shows that between 54 and 87% of founders experience burnout . It has been determined that the research is experiencing this. This rate may vary from field to field. It may not be due to founder dependency in every case; however, since it is a significant factor, the research has been generalized.
Loneliness
Founders can experience feelings of loneliness when they don't share strategic decisions. This leads to the founder relying solely on their own perspective. Initially, making quick decisions and experimenting is crucial. However, after a certain stage, it's crucial to seek feedback from those who may be more knowledgeable in the relevant field than you—many of whom are your team. Ignoring the team's feedback can leave founders feeling isolated and put more pressure on their decision-making processes. For example, in surveys, 72 percent of founders report feeling lonely, a 50 percent increase over CEOs. This feeling can harm the sustainability of startups.
Loss of Focus
Amidst daily challenges, founders can lose their vision. Constantly dealing with operational issues or emergencies makes it difficult to focus on long-term goals. This can limit a startup's growth potential. While we can't provide precise statistics, this is a common problem. Since all startups inevitably have time-consuming tasks, it's likely that you'll lose focus.
Lack of Motivation
Placing the founder at the center of operations rather than the vision can lead to a lack of motivation. Team motivation increases when the founder shares the vision. However, when the founder is constantly preoccupied with operational details, this motivation fades. At the same time, the constant interference also impacts the team's motivation to work. As a result, both the founder and the team's motivation decreases. Team members at one startup have stated that they would be more creative if they had more say .
Chapter 2: Perspective
II. Effects on the Team
Lack of Initiative
Founder dependency can lead to a lack of initiative within the team. Team members become passive without the freedom to make mistakes. This hinders creativity, team dynamism, and innovation. The team should be able to make their own decisions, rather than waiting for the founder's approval. Initiative often arises when everyone participates in the process with a degree of autonomy. One-sided conversations and direction, unfortunately, undermine this structure.
Productivity Decline
Requiring the founder's approval for every decision reduces the system's effectiveness. When team members struggle with decision-making, they waste time. This negatively impacts the startup's overall productivity.
The Atrophy of Creativity
Micromanagement can stifle creativity. When a founder controls every detail, it makes it difficult for team members to develop innovative ideas. If the team doesn't have the opportunity to utilize their talents, the startup will shy away from innovation.
Declining Investor Confidence
Investors prefer to invest in sustainable systems. Founder dependency can undermine investor confidence. Investors see a startup's dependence on a founder as risky, and this can make it difficult to secure financing. (We will specifically cover the topic of investing in a separate article.
Chapter 3: Inspiration
III. Solutions
Strategy
Resolving uncertainty is a good strategy. Founders can neither delegate nor institutionalize without a roadmap. Strategic clarity is crucial for a startup's growth. Founders must define their long-term goals and develop a plan to achieve them.
Leadership approach : The founder leads the “why” and “what”; leaves the “how” to the team.
The founder must define the vision and strategy: “Why are we on this path?” and “What are we aiming for?”
However, rather than delving into the details of how to achieve this goal, it's best to leave the method to the team. This will foster greater creativity and a sense of belonging. The founder can then focus their energy on long-term goals and a growth strategy.
Delegation
Delegation is one of the most effective ways to reduce founder dependency. Tools like RACI, playbooks, and SOPs systematize delegation. Founders should encourage initiative by delegating responsibilities to team members. Even if you're unfamiliar with these tools, creating modules that outline which rules to follow and what to follow in relevant areas greatly simplifies delegation. Knowing who can delegate which tasks and what to expect becomes even simpler.
Restructuring decision rights (DARE model: Decide, Approve, Recommend, Execute).
Decide → The main decisions at the strategic level remain with the founder.
Approve → The person responsible for a specific area approves suggestions from team members.
Recommend → Team members offer recommendations based on data and experience.
Execute → Once the decision is made, the responsibility for implementation remains squarely with the team.
This model both reduces the burden on the founder and encourages the team to take initiative.
Institutionalization
While institutionalization isn't typically associated with startups, the ultimate goal of all startups is to become institutionalized. However, as readers of this blog post, we now know that the strengths of established companies should be considered exemplary business models. Therefore, we can draw inspiration from these institutions to define the roles, decision-making mechanisms, and information flow within our startup. Founders should clearly define the organizational structure and help team members understand their roles. This reduces uncertainty within the team and increases productivity.
Restructure the organizational chart based on responsibility rather than access. In many startups, the organizational chart is built around who can "reach" whom. However, for sustainable growth, the organizational chart should be built around responsibility and accountability rather than access. This way, team members know to whom they report and who can make which decisions. This eliminates the need for constant involvement from the founder.
Continuous Improvement
No one can resolve founder dependency in one step. Unless prior preparation is made, we should understand that this is a step-by-step process that evolves into a more independent structure over time. A system isn't built all at once; it evolves iteratively. Founders should focus on continuous development processes and consider how to improve the system over time. This contributes to the development of both the founder and the team.
Decision-making is a muscle that not only the founder but the entire team needs to develop. To do this:
Organizing joint decision-making sessions ,
Performing post-mortem analyses (to learn from mistakes),
Regularly asking for suggestions and creating a feedback culture encourages the team to take initiative. Over time, the team can take on more responsibility, from small decisions to large strategic ones.
Conclusion
Breaking free from founder dependency is crucial for the success of not only the founder but also the entire team. These steps are crucial for achieving strategic clarity, increasing team initiative, and achieving sustainable growth. As your startup grows, the founder's role should evolve.
Organizations that are "managed by the system, not the founder" both prevent founder burnout and instill sustainability confidence in their stakeholders. At Live-Cell Agency, our strategic clarity programs, developed through embedded partnership models, aim to significantly reduce founder dependency (between 20-60%).
The question you should ask today is:
You are in the system, but does the system work outside of you?
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