Lead Upwards

CHAPTER SEVENBuild Key Relationships: CEO, Board, Team

You've defined success, and now you've got to *really* understand how to manage these key relationships: between you and the business, your team, your fellow executives, you and your CEO, you and your board.

Building key relationships is an essential part of being successful in your role as a startup leader. They develop over time, and they require, like all relationships, effort and attention. Many leaders in their first roles think their primary focus is “the work,” and I've made the mistake myself in underinvesting in key relationships.

The benefits compound when you put in the effort to learn the work styles and motivations of your colleagues, CEO, board, and team. When something goes south in the business (which it undoubtedly will eventually), having reference points and a wellspring of trust is extraordinarily useful. “Building relationships” can sound squishy, but it's anything but. Particularly if you're a member of an under‐represented group, building relationships with people who are different from you (and potentially homogenous as a team themselves) can be daunting.

There's a real risk many under‐represented leaders face in “being themselves at work.” Kim Scott in her book Just Work shares that after publishing her book Radical Candor, she received feedback from women of color that being candid at work was riskier for them than straight white male peers, due to racial stereotypes and bias. Scott wrote ...