The business has outgrown the founder.

The founder still makes most decisions, and the organisation waits. The instincts that created the business are still valuable, but the company now needs structure, delegation and a leadership team with real authority.

This is a difficult conversation because it is rarely about competence. It is about fit between a person and a stage.

• A chief executive is hired without agreeing what the founder will stop doing.
• Senior appointments are made without the structure or the decision rights to succeed.
• The founder's role is described in a title rather than in accountabilities.
• The board avoids the conversation until performance forces it.
• The business loses the founder's genuine strengths in the process of professionalising.

• What does the business actually need from its leadership over the next three years?
• Where does the founder create the most value, and where are they now the constraint?
• What decisions must move out of the founder's hands, and to whom?
• Is the shareholder and board position on this settled?
• What is the founder's own ambition?

• Agree the future operating structure and the accountabilities within it.
• Define the founder's ongoing role in specific terms, not in a title.
• Assess the existing leadership team against the plan and close the gaps.
• Establish a management cadence that does not depend on the founder being in the room.
• Support the transition itself, which usually takes longer than anyone expects.