Diagnosing my Founder’s Syndrome

Casey  

Since we brought on Naomi as Wokai’s COO, I have recently discovered that, over the past 18 months, I have come down with an acute case of Founder’s Syndrome.  I share the classic symptoms of CEOs from millions of organizations ranging from 2 person nonprofit start-ups to Fortune 500 companies. What I find most fascinating is that these traits are petty far from my natural character and went completely unnoticed for the past year and a half.

Check out Wikipedia's definition of Founder's Syndrome:

"Founder's syndrome is a label normally used to refer to a pattern of negative or undesirable behavior on the part of the founder(s) of an organization. The term is anecdotal/unofficial and does not actually refer to a medical syndrome. Founder's syndrome is most often associated with non-profit organizations especially those where there has only been one person leading the organization or the board of directors since its inception. The syndrome can affect for-profit organizations, but enterpeneurial activities necessarily revolve around an individual or group and tend to continue so as long as the founder or group is able to compete effectively in the commercial world.

This phenomenon often occurs after the initial growth of an non-profit organization, when its mission evolves beyond what its founder originally had in mind; this creates conflict between newcomers, who want the organization to adapt, and the founder, who wants to keep things the way they were."

Here are some of my symptoms:

•    Being bossy instead of being the boss

As I listened to myself speak in our Friday meetings over the past two weeks, it was evident that I had crossed the line from being the boss to being plain bossy. While I might have been able to mask my bossy-side managing young college interns, this weakness has become painfully clear now that all of my coworkers are my peers who would be my equals or even cooler than me if we were to meet as strangers at a bar or dinner party.

•    My-way-or-the-highway-ism

We are a pretty talkative group in the office. Over the course of our conversations, I started noticing the pattern that I am always the first to respond to a question or comment, even when it turns out that I am wrong. It looks like I have the casebook Founder’s Syndrome symptom of always having to be right, even you’re wrong.

•    Hyper-sensitivity to criticism

From the moment that Naomi stepped into the office, she has had a host of great ideas of how to improve the way we operate at Wokai. On an intellectual level, I know that these qualities are great and make her the perfect person to lead Wokai. But, on an irrational emotional level, I can feel myself interpreting her fresh ideas as criticisms of my baby.

They say the first step to recovery is admitting that you have a problem.  Well, I admit it. My name is Casey Wilson and I am a Founder.

Comments

[Joyce]

ahahahah casey this is hilarious!
the first step to recovery is acknowledging it... you weren't so bossy during the summer...

[Joyce]

ahahahah casey this is hilarious!
the first step to recovery is acknowledging it... you weren't so bossy during the summer...