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What a Harvard PhD Says About your Cofoundership
How I stayed sane as a cofounder
Tim He
January 27, 2025
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This post was co-authored by Megan Gorges:
PhD candidate at Harvard Business School, studying Organizational Behavior.
Faculty at Babson College, teaching Management and Entrepreneurship.
Safe to say, she knows a lot about organizational behavior.
Her research focuses on the relationship between people's work and non-work lives, which for cofounders, feels like one and the same.
Specifically, we wanted to touch on this phenomenon:
Focus VS Fusion
A couple years ago, my startup was going through tough times and my mentor had just passed away — I couldn’t lose both.
I felt like I was letting him down.
Every setback for the company felt like a personal blow and I guess grief has a way of magnifying everything.
I’m sure you’ve had periods where the “king of the universe” days feel few and far between.
This is how Megan explains it:
The temptation is to view the company as a representation and reflection of yourself - its success or failure is your own personal success or failure. This is called identity fusion (Swann et al., 2012).
The downside is that you’ve put all your identity eggs in one basket - when your company inevitably encounters failures, you experience them as personal failures, which sap your motivation and wellbeing in both your professional and personal lives.
Before that, I had poured so much of myself into the company that other parts of my life paid the price.
I lost touch with many old friends. Still trying to make up for lost time.
I was in school for part of it and I almost got kicked out.
I didn’t have any time for my other hobbies.
It’s weird because identity fusion is so addicting when times are good. Forget king of the universe, I was god of everything.
But as you know, things go wrong a lot more often than they go right in a startup, at least in the beginning.
Here’s Megan’s advice on decoupling your identity from your company.
Combat this tendency by cultivating multiple identities that align with varied roles across work and personal domains (Ramarajan, 2014). Think of this as diversifying your (identity) portfolio, or putting your (identity) eggs in multiple baskets.
Invest more time and energy in your friendships to strengthen your relational identity as a good friend. Pick up a new hobby that you can share with other enthusiasts to build a new social identity.
Then, when your company falls on hard times, you can rely on your other identities to bolster your self-esteem and motivation.
I know you think those are merely distractions from building your company. That’s precisely why I ignored them myself.
But what if I told you those "distractions" could actually make your cofoundership, and in turn, your company, stronger?
Beyond the Business
Lean on your cofounder.
I used these 3 methods to act as buffers for each other.
1. Create space for non-work convos
Schedule time to talk about anything but the company. Share what’s happening in your personal lives, whether it’s a favorite TV show, a family milestone, or a new hobby.
2. Set boundaries
Designate times where you take a break from each other. That break can spark new ideas and give your mind room to breathe.
3. Pick up something new together
Be pickleball partners. Bouldering buddies. Whatever it is, try something unrelated to the company together. Build your dynamic without startup stress.
The key is to be in alignment about why and how you’re doing this.
If one of you all of a sudden takes up new hobbies, the other might get the wrong message and perceive that they’re not as committed.
How I Can Help
Everything worth building takes time — your company, your cofoundership, your identity.
I can help you when you feel like shit. Hopefully that’s not today.
But when it happens, because it will, you know how to find me.
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Thanks y’all,
Tim He
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