You're Not Co-founders Anymore: Navigating Leadership Relationships as Your Company Scales
The Relationships That Launch Companies Aren't Always Built to Lead Them
Most partnership breakdowns aren't about strategy, equity, or even conflict. They're about identity. What got you here was founder chemistry. What keeps you moving is leadership alignment.
In this working session, Liz Pavese (Pavese Insights Lab) draws on behavioral science and nearly 20 years advising founders and executives to unpack the dynamics that cause high-trust partnerships to fracture under pressure — and what it takes to build relationships that scale with your company.
This is a highly facilitated conversation designed to surface what's already in the room. Come prepared to share your stories and learn from each other.
What You'll Walk Away With
A framework for understanding the four dimensions where co-founder and leadership team compatibility tends to make or break momentum
The ability to identify what type of conflict you're actually in — and what's driving it beneath the surface
Clarity on how the founder-to-leader transition changes what your key relationships require of you
A practical reframe for turning recurring tension into a productive signal rather than a source of erosion
One concrete conversation or action to take back to your team
About Liz Pavese, PhD
Liz is an organizational psychologist, credentialed executive coach (ACC), and founder of Pavese Insights Lab. With nearly 20 years across Fortune 500s, high-growth startups, enterprise HR tech, and healthcare — including senior roles at Workday, CoachHub, Limeade, Qualtrics, and Healthfirst — she brings behavioral science rigor and sharp strategic instincts to the leaders and organizations she works with.
At Pavese Insights Lab, she coaches founders, executives, and women navigating pivotal career moments, facilitates leadership and strategy offsites, and advises at the intersection of people, performance, and growth. A contributing author, sought-after speaker at ATD, SHRM, SIOP, and Gartner Reimagine, and former advisor to DX (acquired by Atlassian for $1B) — she is known for turning the human side of building into competitive advantage.
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