Facing Uncharted Barriers: Journey of a Mexican Female Founder

I will never forget the VC's face during a zoom meeting when I started off with, “My best friend and I are the founders of the first wealth-tech platform made by women, for women in LatAm.” To my surprise I could see the not-so-slight twitch on the principal’s face after saying “my best friend and I are the founders …” 

As a female founder, I have learned there are three main reasons behind the failure of early-stage startups: access to funding, lack of product-market fit, and team-related issues. There are many gender biases that have a significant impact on female founders that need to be addressed in order to have a more inclusive and equitable entrepreneurial ecosystem. For now, I would like to double-click on team-related challenges, specifically those concerning co-founders.

There is not much guidance out there that can help us founders navigate disagreements, work-life balance as well as role clarity and responsibilities, to name a few. According to Prof. Noam Wasserman from Harvard Business School, 65% of high-potential startups fail due to co-founder conflicts. So while there is no roadmap on this, I will focus on sharing my two cents on the benefits and challenges I have experienced as a co-founder. 

Through the Good …

Given our shared history of working together and being close friends, I have a strong relationship with my co-founder. We have weathered many challenges together for more than a decade, which have contributed to our ability to handle setbacks and issues with resilience and resolution. We have been through thick and thin, understanding and knowing each other through the good and the bad, and that has created a deep level of trust, creating a safe space for open communication.

In our experience working in the strongly male-dominated financial industry, we have both felt powerless and frustrated for being unable to assist our family, friends and acquaintances — especially women — who didn't have substantial financial resources at their disposal. Having lived through the pain first-hand, we share a vision and common purpose that has helped us build a strong foundation for our startup. We are committed and willing to invest the necessary time and effort to pursue our mission. 

One of the things I value the most is being able to share the high level of intensity in this journey with my best friend. Like any founder, we find ourselves working tirelessly while simultaneously navigating through the ups and downs  or going through major life events, such as getting married, dealing with a parent’s illness, or simply showing up for those you care about. The  hours and work it requires are demanding and, at the same time, our personal lives unfold before our eyes. Inevitable circumstances have been made easier by having your best friend as a partner, mutually providing empathy and support on each other's life’s challenges. Sharing our fears, anxieties and frustrations, being side by side on this adventure has mitigated the apparent misunderstandings and loneliness that unavoidably creep into a founder’s life at times. At the end of the day, we motivate and lift each other up when we need to. 

… and the Bad

Regardless of the familiarity and deep understanding of each other’s strengths and weaknesses, we have faced challenges and headwinds along the way. We met as co-workers 10 years ago and it's the first time we both shifted from the corporate to the entrepreneurial world. Managing teams in an international corporation versus managing your own company is definitely not in the same ballpark. In the magnified startup life, demands and challenges are amplified to a whole new level. It was difficult to define roles, responsibilities and the workload, which resulted in detrimental patterns for us and for our team. Our distinct personalities and management styles clashed; not being able to separate the work made it difficult to leverage our complementary skills and personality traits in order to promote a well-rounded and inclusive work environment.

In spite of facing common issues regarding work-life balance, each of us naturally possesses unique methods for handling stress. Recognizing and comprehending how we individually cope with stress is essential, while being mindful of how our actions can impact both our team members and ourselves. This awareness allows us to show respect and assist one another when needed. We have also dealt with unhealthy perfectionism, lack of trust in delegating tasks to the team, working excessive hours leading to burnouts, and blurred boundaries between our professional and personal lives. 

Trying to make two sets of perspectives, ideas and management styles merge into one — not to mention permeating that co-founder alignment to the team — sounds way easier than it is. Our uniqueness and strong opinions get us side-tracked at times, and it is up to us to realign ourselves and the team, smoothing out the inevitable roller coaster of a startup’s journey. Whenever we run into these roadblocks, our mental space gets foggy and instead of thinking about business problems we must deal with our synchrony and solve team dysfunctions. As we found ourselves in this dilemma, we implemented regular check-ins, offsite or team-building retreats, practiced active listening or sought mentorships.

Hope on the horizon

As an entrepreneur, you will inevitably encounter pros and cons in the relationship with your co-founders, no matter your status before embarking on this partnership. Maintaining alignment among the founders and the entire team is of utmost importance. In my experience — although our visions are on track — we have continuously worked on building trust, splitting roles and responsibilities as well as fostering active listening and effective communication. We practice self-awareness through meditation, mutual understanding with regular check-ins and mentorships. We also have support networks from other female founders, which have been incredibly helpful. We have divided our leadership responsibilities, each one focusing on different areas of the company, becoming experts in our respective fields. When disputes arise, the leader in charge holds greater influence, but we strive to reach consensus. Once a decision is made, we both fully support and stand by it. 

I am unable to know if the company my co-founder and I have built is going to grow and last for 5, 10 or 100 years, but I know it is important for many and it is important for us; we simply want to hold the door open for other women so they can have the opportunity to be financially independent. I am sure that to be successful we need to build a great team, and that begins with us at the forefront of our startup. While there is no magic recipe to eliminate setbacks you will encounter along the way, I firmly believe the key lies in adopting tools and techniques in order to build strong and relentless relationships with your co-founders; this will enable you to navigate these challenges with greater ease, agility and efficiency along the way.