Running to Stand Still
The Journey from Founder to CEO
“…Said I. I gotta do something about where we’re going. Step on a steam train. Step out of the poring rain… Maybe run from the darkness in the night.”
Love him or hate him, you have to hand it to Bono. He is a master wordsmith and a purveyor of tunes that worm their way into your skull and are harder to shift than the Melissa virus.
Outside of the stickiness of that song, the title perfectly encapsulates the feeling that I’ve had for the last couple of months. No matter how hard I work, I can’t get seem to get the feeling that I am getting ahead. I am a founder of a startup called Pubble and I pretty much do 3 things: work, sleep & spend time with my wife & kids on the weekends. Well four if you include commuting but seriously that’s my life. And I wouldn’t change it for anything. I absolutely love what I do and the people I do it with. I am in a truly privileged position.
On privilege, let me digress for a minute … As every founder understands (assumption intelligent enough to breath in, out regularly), there’s a lot of people that enable you to pursue your dreams. Just for a minute, forget the obvious ones and think about the unsung heroes in your life: partner, parents, mentors, friends that make a lot of sacrifices for you. Those are the people who have made the biggest investment in you. And they probably don’t bust your balls for monthly growth figures and when you fuck up, they give you a hug. I look around the Techstars office and think of all the partners / families that have been left behind in Ireland, Spain, America, South Korea, Romania, China, Israel or those ones who are left holding the fort in suburban London while their other half spends 16 hours a day in Warner Yard. The founder gets all the credit but remember that just like an iceberg, the bulk of a startup is below the waterline. Say thanks.
So back on topic… The weird thing is that the sense of “not getting ahead” is not a progress thing. We’ve actually been crushing it. What I have been struggling with is something that every founder that assumes the role of CEO inevitably goes through. The transition from founder to CEO requires a big change in how you work.
“You got to cry without weeping. Talk without speaking. Scream without raising your voice.”
I am a good founder. I’ve built a great team. We’ve got lots of real customers (you know the ones that pay for stuff) and we have a product that our customers love. But as a CEO, I feel that I am just starting to learn the ropes. I am really fortunate that I am part of Techstars London. This has meant that great people are pushing me to transition to a CEO and I am surrounded by people who are coaching me on how to make the transition.
We are all limited by one factor: there are only 24 hours in a day. To me, the main difference between a CEO and a Founder is scale. An effective CEO executes at scale by getting out of the habit of doing everything themselves and empowering the right people in key positions. For a founder, handing over can be a difficult process — it certainly is for me.
When we are building out our business plans we are all striving to that utopian place where our data proves that if you invest x, we will grow by xx and we will end up returning a lot more x’s. The same applies to the difference between a CEO and a founder. If you don’t make the transition, your output is limited by the number of hours in a day. There is no way around this. If you do transition, however, your output can grow indefinitely.
I am early in my transition to becoming a CEO but I am clear where my future lies and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
