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Ousting the founder-founder from the company and leaving it to non-founders, that's the worst decision any investor, co-founder, board member can make for a company. Good luck.


Not necessarily. It was probably a good idea in Jerry Yang's case, for instance


Time will tell.


Let us remember that every situation is different. While what you say may be true for many cases, we cannot blindly apply it everywhere.


Indeed. Just because a founder helped get something off the ground doesn't mean they'll be particularly effective at a latter stage of company. Nor should we assume non-founders can't be effective at righting ships.


Hmm I just thinking of some examples, always good to have some data. When did a non-founder make a failing company successful again. I can think of Porsche with Wiedeking, however it´s a bit different there, since the founders are already dead I think.


IBM with Gerstner? But I think that's similar to Porsche.

GM with Sloan would be a big one I think.


It often works out well. Not every company is Apple.

Many companies are at the end of their life cycle where the best thing they could do is manage the business well and return capital to shareholders.

Often founders act like it's their baby and don't want to let it die instead of fulfilling their fiduciary duties. You don't see many articles about how GE can't make anything new since Thomas Edison left.


It'd send a powerful message the shareholders really want to shake things up. Gates enabled Ballmer for far too long.




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