Dec 29, 2025 6 min read

Which Founder CEO archetype are you working with?

A practical framework for working with Founder CEOs: map founders across expertise vs vision and trust-building vs control-seeking, then adapt your operator playbook.

I’ve semi recently had a realisation after a few people pointed it out to me: I’ve only ever worked with Founder CEOs. At first, I was incredulous, but looking back at my career I realised it’s true. I also realised that I’d been building a bit of a mental model for them and how they functioned.

Having now worked closely with at least five founders across the Effective Altruism/non-profit social impact space as their right-hand operations person, and with enough scar tissue to show for it, I lay out the framework I wish I'd had at the start: a way to categorise founder types and, more importantly, tips for working with each.

The two axes that matter ↕️↔️

Founders differ fundamentally along two dimensions:

X-axis: Source of Authority

Domain Expertise. These founders derive credibility from deep technical knowledge or mastery of their field
Strategic Vision. Founders who derive credibility from big-picture thinking and long-term organisational direction

Y-axis: Response to Uncertainty

Trust-Building. Founders who, when uncertain, they delegate, seek input, and empower others
Control-Seeking. Founder who, when uncertain, they centralise control, micromanage, and avoid delegation

These two dimensions create four distinct founder archetypes, each requiring different approaches.

The four founder types 4️⃣

⚠️

Disclaimer: I use made-up names to try keep each founder’s anonymity. If you know me personally, it’s probably still possible to figure out who’s who. Out of respect for each (and for me), please don’t try figure out who’s who.

The Hands-on Expert (High Expertise + Control-Seeking)

The archetype: This founder has deep domain expertise, often a PhD or years of specialised experience, but responds to uncertainty by tightening their grip on execution.

I worked with Taylor, who ran a consulting firm and held a doctorate in the exact services we sold. Clients literally came for Taylor's expertise, not anyone else's. Initially, Taylor gave me significant autonomy to handle operations and business development. But when we ventured into unfamiliar territory in which we were both figuring things out as we went along (e.g. marketing, sales processes, growth strategy), the micromanagement intensified dramatically.

Taylor would scrutinise my work in areas outside their expertise with the same rigour they applied to their own technical work. What they couldn't control through expertise, they tried to control through micromanagement. The irony was that their technical brilliance in one domain created blindness about their limitations in others.

💡

My advice: Build their confidence outside their zone of expertise and help translate their domain knowledge into organisational wins. They're micromanaging you because, at least in part, they don't trust themselves in unfamiliar territory. Your job is to help them fight their imposter syndrome while demonstrating that you can turn their expertise into something valuable and executable.

The Competent Delegator (High Expertise + Trust-Building)

The archetype: These founders combine domain mastery with the wisdom to know what they don't know. They handle uncertainty by building trust and empowering others.

I've worked with two separate founders who fit this mould: Jordan and Casey.

Jordan came from a science background but wasn't an expert in the non-profit's intervention. However, they recognised this gap immediately and worked relentlessly to close it. Within what I perceived to be only a few months, Jordan knew the intervention better than anyone in the organisation. They were highly analytical — spotting flaws in my work with surgical precision — but only became deeply involved in areas they deemed critical (legal risk, key hires). For everything else, Jordan trusted the team to execute.

Casey was perhaps the most paradoxical founder I've encountered. They'd started multiple projects independently and exhibited extensive experience in leading them. In areas core to their worldview and expertise, they exerted intense, almost obsessive scrutiny. But for execution details they deemed less critical? Complete autonomy, as long as you delivered results.

Casey taught me something crucial: founders can be both analytical and gut-driven, depending on what they perceive as high-stakes. They operate in a secret language of priorities, and your job is to learn that language.

💡

My advice: Prove competence early, then enjoy the autonomy they'll give you. These founders use task-based trust, so demonstrate you can deliver quality work, and they'll get out of your way. But mess up, and you'll find yourself back under scrutiny. The key is understanding which tasks they consider high-stakes versus low-stakes, because that determines their involvement level.

The Visionary Controller (High Vision + Control-Seeking)

The archetype: Clear strategic vision but poor tolerance for uncertainty or challenge. They respond to the unknown by doubling down on control.

In addition to founding a non-profit, Sam had studied grassroots development and social enterprise models extensively. They knew exactly what the organisation should become, and the vision was crystal clear in their mind. The problem? When that vision was questioned or when implementation hit messy reality, Sam became defensive.

Sam cared deeply about their "baby" and took challenges personally. Every strategic disagreement felt like an attack on their judgment. I learned quickly that political capital was finite and that I had to pick my battles carefully. Some hills weren't worth dying on.

💡

My advice: Learn their strategic language and frame everything through their vision. The key insight is that these founders need to feel their vision is being honoured, even when you're adapting it to reality. Don't challenge the destination; instead, propose alternative routes to get there. Master their vocabulary, understand their mental models, and translate your ideas into their framework. When you must spend political capital on reality-testing, do it sparingly and diplomatically.

The Empowering Visionary (High Vision + Trust-Building)

The archetype: Strong strategic vision combined with high trust in others. The most scalable founder type, but potentially vulnerable to blind spots.

What it looks like in practice: Michael is perhaps the most ambitious founder I've worked with. No challenge is too big; they're always thinking three moves ahead with grand aspirations for the future. Michael gave me more autonomy than any other founder.

Michael is highly analytical (even more so than Casey), but their pragmatism sometimes veers into tunnel vision. They're so focused on the long-term vision that short-term reality can become background noise. Ideas that align with the strategic vision get greenlit quickly — sometimes too quickly, without sufficient scrutiny of implementation challenges.

💡

My advice: Do the context absorption work to understand their long-term vision first, then reality-test with diplomatic care. These founders live in a future state that's hard to connect to present reality. Your job is to build the bridge between their tomorrow and our today, but spend your political capital on reality-testing very carefully, because challenging their optimism can land you in the doghouse fast.

What this framework teaches us

Beyond just categorisation, this framework reveals something important about the right-hand role: there is no universal playbook for working with founders. The strategies that work brilliantly with a Competent Delegator will backfire spectacularly with a Visionary Controller.

The control-seeking founders (Hands-on Expert and Visionary Controller) require careful political capital management and strategic communication. You need to pick your battles, speak their language, and recognise when to push back versus when to execute loyally.

The trust-building founders (Competent Delegator and Empowering Visionary) require early competence signals and then consistent delivery. They'll give you rope, just don't hang yourself with it.

The expertise-driven founders (Hands-on Expert and Competent Delegator) need you to demonstrate domain knowledge or at least deep curiosity. They respect technical chops.

The vision-driven founders (Visionary Controller and Empowering Visionary) need you to connect with their strategic thinking. They respect systems-level understanding.

A final thought on founder-operator dynamics

The most valuable lesson from mapping these five founders isn't the taxonomy itself, it's the recognition that founder behaviour follows some semi-predictable patterns.

When I started my second role, I was frustrated that my first-founder strategies weren't working. I thought I was the problem. Now I realise I was just using the wrong playbook for a different game.

If you're considering a right-hand role—Chief of Staff, Director of Operations, or any founder's-right-hand position—spend your first month mapping your founder onto these axes. It'll save you months of interpersonal friction and help you understand which battles to fight, which language to speak, and which strategies actually work. I can also highly recommend ‘The First 90 Days’ by Michael D. Watkins as a thought-provoking and useful read before starting in such an influential role.

The right-hand role is not about being universally competent. It's about being situationally adaptive. And adaptation requires pattern recognition.