Masawa Minute 106
Do founders need couples therapy? | The case for organizational health | + More! 💘
This is the Masawa Minute — mental wellness, social impact, and impact investing snippets from what we’ve read and created in the last month + where you can get active.
Happy Valentine’s Day! On this occasion, the newsletter is all about centering the ✨ human ✨ at schools, workplaces, and so on. From couples therapy for founders to the importance of focusing on human sustainability, we’re sure you’ll enjoy it. Much love from us to you!
This Week’s Story
From conflict to collaboration: Couples therapy is becoming a game-changer for startups
Have you ever considered taking your co-founder to couples therapy? Yes, you read that right — couples therapy is an innovative approach that’s gaining traction, aiming to enhance startup dynamics and strengthen platonic business partnerships between founders. This rather unorthodox trend points to the complexity of founder relationships and the critical role of maintaining a healthy collaborative environment — stress and miscommunication between founders can lead to significant conflicts and, eventually, even the breakdown of both personal and professional ties.
The practice of engaging with marriage counselors or coaches helps founders separate their personal and professional lives, ensuring that business relationships remain productive. There’s no shortage of founders that can attest to these benefits, highlighting how such sessions have not only salvaged their partnerships but also streamlined communication, helped develop healthy boundaries, and improved conflict resolution.
While some worry that such measures might alarm investors and leave them feeling uneasy about the company’s future, VCs are coming around and appreciating the benefits. Investor support for these therapeutic interventions reflects a broader recognition of their value in sustaining founder relationships and, by extension, the health of the startup. It doesn’t have to be a sign of trouble either — viewing therapy or coaching as a strategic investment allows founders to manage transitions and growth challenges better while maintaining alignment with their vision.
We’re excited to witness this shift towards a more emotionally intelligent and resilient culture and contribute to it ourselves through our pioneering Nurture Capital approach with focus on founders’ wellbeing and minimizing human capital risk.
Founders are turning to couples therapy for the sake of their startups
What else we’re reading…
👭 Resilience is a buzzword gaining traction for good reason, yet it’s often fundamentally misunderstood. Here are 5 myths about professional resilience that remind us resilience can be dynamic and flawed and doesn’t have to be pursued alone.
🌼 This school has introduced a daily mindfulness practice to help students with stress and enhance their learning capacity. So far, the outcomes have been largely positive, with reports of higher empathy, improved behavior, better academic performance, and students learning to adapt mindfulness strategies to their own needs.
💁 People are at the center of any business, and if they thrive, so do organizations — human connections drive every value-creating aspect like revenue, innovation, and efficiency, to name a few. This Deloitte report emphasizes the importance of prioritizing human sustainability at organizations, showing us that when people are doing well, everyone benefits.
🧵 Trauma is an invisible thread tying us all together, with layers that deeply undermine many of our social systems. Despite this, it’s largely missing from all major discussions on transformation. The impact of recognizing trauma in ourselves and others is profound — and can illuminate new pathways for change.
♥️ The latest research underscores organizational health as a key driver of value creation and competitive advantage. Notably, healthier organizations deliver three times the total shareholder returns compared to their counterparts and demonstrate higher levels of resilience as well as superior financial outcomes in a complex global market.
