(Co)Founder Knowledge Archives • ROCK CENTER STARTUP GUIDE

Quick Tips for Finding Co-Founder Fit from Sunil Nagaraj

Sunil Nagaraj, founding partner of Ubiquity Ventures and co-founder of Triangulate, shares why having too many similarities with your co-founder could damage business.

Two business partners having a difficult conversation

How to Mentally Prepare for a Difficult Conversation

How do you mentally prepare for that difficult conversation? Matthew Bellows shares how meditation can help you mentally prepare for the dreaded conversation of firing a colleague. And he shares a three-minute guided meditation you can do before any stressful situation.

Business owner struggling with depression, staring out of a window

Entrepreneurs and Depression—Ways to Help Yourself or a Colleague Who Is Struggling

Entrepreneur, investor, and advisor, Andrew Dubowec’s professional and personal experience make him uniquely positioned to discuss mental health in the startup community. In a dialogue with Shikhar Ghosh, he shares tips on how to help protect your mental health or help a colleague who’s struggling.

Underwater snapshot of woman alone after diving into the deep end of a pool. Symbolizes being a solo-founder in business.

Going Solo: Founding a Startup without a Co-Founder

Anecdotal evidence suggests that being a solo founder carries more risk than co-founding a startup. Hind Hobeika discusses her reasons for not adding a co-founder and provides ways to rethink the critical decision of having a partner or going solo.

Isolated woman sitting on stairs staring at ocean, seeming depressed

Entrepreneurs, Stress & Depression

Two entrepreneurs share their experiences with varying levels of stress and depression as twenty-somethings at early-stage startups.

Portrait of AlleyCorp's founder and CEO, Kevin Ryan, discussing traits of great business leaders

AlleyCorp’s Kevin Ryan on Traits of Great Business Leaders

Kevin P. Ryan, founder of several multiple billion-dollar tech companies spanning industries from mobile gift registry to news shares his process for building a business and hiring an outside CEO.

3-tiered layer cake with white frosting, upside to illustrate layering value when structuring founder equity

Layering Value—A Different Way of Dividing Founder Equity

Lara Hodgson, co-founder and CEO of NOW Corporation, shares how she and her partners assign value to founder contributions as they change over time and allocate founder equity iteratively.

Two entrepreneurs seated, discussing co-founder compatibility

Sunil Nagaraj of Ubiquity Ventures on Co-Founder Compatibility

Many founders start ventures with a friend, assuming their values and goals for the startup will align. But friendship doesn’t guarantee compatibility in business. Sunil Nagaraj, founding partner of Ubiquity Ventures shares what he learned about the importance of long-term co-founder compatibility.

Searching for a Co-Founder? Lara O’Connor Hodgson on Why Perspective Matters More than Skills

Choosing a partner who can bring a different perspective to the table help you balance the business. Lara O’Connor Hodgson reviews why good co-founder fit rests more on compatible values than complementary skills.

Dinesh Moorjani on Finding the Right Co-Founder

Finding the right co-founder for your venture is one of the biggest early challenges founders face. Dinesh Moorjani shares why co-founder compatibility and chemistry matter as much as skills.

Graphic of blackboard showing handwritten words related to how to think about co-founder equity splits

Co-Founder Equity Splits—Ways to Approach Allocations

How you divide equity reflects your values, directly impacts your co-founder relationship, and influences how your team and investors perceive your startup. Read more to learn methods for dividing equity that align with your values and can minimize conflict between founders.

graphic of 3 people seated around a table, discussing topics before coming to an agreement

3 Topics to Discuss before Writing a Founders’ Agreement

You found a great co-founder. When should you formalize your relationship? You may be tempted to draft a founders’ agreement to demonstrate trust in the partnership, but before you make a legal commitment, make sure you’re aligned with your co-founder in 3 critical areas.

Key Terms to Include in a Founders’ Agreement

A poorly-constructed agreement often leads to founder conflict which can kill your startups. We can’t promise that your founders’ agreement will prevent all founder conflict. But we can provide a framework that will help you avoid common mistakes and equip you to handle conflict.

Graphic image showing circle divided in half, indicating common mistake in structuring equity splits among co-founders.

Structuring Equity Splits to Mitigate Co-Founder Conflict

Before you begin discussing how to divide equity, the smartest thing you can do is to build in mechanisms to make your agreement dynamic. Learn the benefits and drawbacks of common methods.

How Culture Helped Careem’s CEO Scale a Startup into a Unicorn

Reflecting on Careem’s meteoric growth from 2012-2014, Careem’s co-founders Mudassir Sheikha, Magnus Olsson, and Abdulla Elyas share why creating a company culture was the key to scaling Careem.