Title: Founder’s Syndrome: How Organizations Suffer…and Can Recover (Part I) – How Matters
Headings: Founder’s Syndrome: How Organizations Suffer…and Can Recover (Part I)
Founder’s Syndrome: How Organizations Suffer…and Can Recover (Part I)
Author: Jennifer Lentfer

Content: Be skeptical about planning, policies, and procedures. They claim, “These processes weigh me down.” Make reactive, crisis-driven decisions with little input from others. Hand pick their staff. See these people as working for the founder as much as working towards the organization’s mission. Count on whomever seems most loyal and accessible. Motivate by fear and guilt, often without realizing it. Attract board members through personal connections rather than the organization’s mission. Work to remove board members who disagree with founder. Have a very difficult time letting go of the strategies that worked previously in the organization, even if they know they organization can no longer function this way.