Rich Hagberg, Ph.D., often referred to as “Silicon Valley’s CEO Whisperer,” is a trained psychologist who has spent the last 40 years of his career as an executive management coach for over 6,000 executives. Since 2009 he has worked with companies like Tinder, Twitter, Dropbox, MixPanel, Zendesk, Quora, Asana, Pinterest, Salesforce, Munchery, Reddit, Gusto, Cruise, Tinder, Optimizely, Instacart, Patreon, Nerdwallet, and Super Evil Megacorp (it’s a gaming company). Dr. Hagberg is often quoted in the business and general media and has been featured in publications such as Fortune, Forbes, BusinessWeek, The Wall Street Journal, Inc., Entrepreneur, The Information, Business Insider and CNN.
Founders, Keepers
By Richard Hagberg, PhD and Tien Tzuo
$14.99 – $30.00
It’s a difficult but unavoidable truth: in order to grow a startup, you have to grow as a person. Founders may be unable to account for all the complexities entailed in scaling a company, but they can learn how to account for themselves. Founders, Keepers offers the way forward.
Description
AVAILABLE IN JUNE 2025
Based on decades of research, Founders, Keepers provides an engaging and practical road map for navigating the inevitable challenges of startup growth.
Every founder is a time bomb waiting to explode. Why? Because the same personal attributes a founder needs to launch a startup will invariably blow it up. Successful founders learn how to defuse their worst impulses and build durable companies. But most don’t.
For founders, investors, and academics alike, Founders, Keepers is the distillation of a lengthy collaboration between Rich Hagberg, Silicon Valley’s “CEO Whisperer,” and his client Tien Tzuo, founder and CEO of Zuora. Steeped in nearly 40 years of research in leadership psychology, it delivers a Swiss Army knife of mental models and practical tools that will give founders a much better chance of making it to the next level of success.
This sharp, lively guide gives readers insights into:
- The three pillars of leadership every founder needs to be successful
- How certain personality traits can lead to fatally flawed decisions
- Common blind spots, including the default tendencies and leadership styles that often undermine success
- The key factors that differentiate successful and unsuccessful founders
- Why founders often frustrate their investors, partners, and employees—and what to do instead
It’s a difficult but unavoidable truth: in order to grow a startup, you have to grow as a person. Founders may be unable to account for all the complexities entailed in scaling a company, but they can learn how to account for themselves. Founders, Keepers offers the way forward.
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Publication Details
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 9781637746905
Dimensions: 6 x 9 in.
Publication Date: June 2025
Format: E-book (epub)
ISBN: 9781637746912
Publication Date: June 2025