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Most founder advice tells you to delegate fast and focus on your strengths. After six years of building Percent, a private credit marketplace, from $80,000 in credit card debt to a Series B, I believe the opposite: The founders who win are the ones who do wear every hat as they go through their journey. I’m not advocating for micromanagement or control issues. I’m talking about building irreplaceable domain knowledge by trying each job before you hand it off. This framework isn’t comfortable, but it’s the difference between founders who flounder and the ones who build the companies that last. Heres the journey I took and what it taught me: Phase I: The ‘Everything Burns’ Phase (Years 1-2) In 2018-2019, I was simultaneously acting as a customer success representative, quality assurance (QA) tester, content creator, and budget manager. My calendar was chaos: customer calls at 5 p.m., debugging the platform at 11 p.m., pitching investors at 8 a.m. Most people see this as unsustainable. They’re right. What they miss is that doing customer success myself revealed which 10% of our features actually drove retention. Managing contractors taught me exactly what excellence looked like in each function. So whats the hidden benefit behind all this? Pattern recognition. When youre immersed in customer service, budgeting, and product development all at once, you start to see how each function influences the others. For example, during our launch, I spoke with every early customer to understand what they actually needed. Those conversations made it clear that our one-month investment product wasnt just a convenienceit was a differentiator. That insight shaped our product roadmap, marketing messaging, and even our pitch to investors. You only uncover those kinds of connections when youve lived inside every corner of the business. You’ll know you’re ready to evolve when you’re spending more than 60% of your time on repetitive tasks instead of strategic thinking. The business needs systems, not your personal heroics. Phase II: The ‘Building the Machine’ Phase (Years 3-4) By 2020, we shifted from doing to scaling. I focused heavily on hiring, product management, QA, and investor sourcing. This is the hardest transition for most founders because it requires accepting a painful truth: your team will make mistakes you could have avoided. Those mistakes turn out to bring fresh perspective, leading to new features, not bugs. Our first product manager found solutions I never would have considered because I was too married to our original vision. They questioned assumptions I didn’t even know I had. The mental shift here is critical. You’re no longer the best operator in every function. You’re the architect of systems that enable others to excel. You’ll know you’re succeeding when your direct reports can articulate your vision better than you can. Phase III: The ‘Strategic Leadership’ Phase (Years 5-6) By 2022, my focus narrowed dramatically: board management, hiring, and team culture. That’s it. This felt wrong at first. Shouldn’t I be more involved in product? What about strategy? Here’s the insight: everything is downstream from having the right people with the right alignment. When you nail these two things, everything else follows. During this phase, I knew less about our daily operations than ever before, yet made better strategic decisions. Why? Because I wasn’t drowning in tactics. Our efficiency metrics hit all-time highs precisely when my operational involvement was at its lowest. The counterintuitive truth: The less you do, the more you see. When you’re not fighting fires, you can spot the patterns that predict where fires will start. You’re ready for this phase when strategic decisions matter more than operational excellence. It’s about choosing the right mountain rather than climbing faster. Youre focusing on the things that nobody else in the company can do and youre not doing any of the things that someone can do and arguably do better than you. Phase IV: The ‘Return’ Phase (Year 7+) Companies have to reinvent themselves over time and this year, I’m adding back product management, lead sourcing, and customer success to my daily to-dos. This isn’t regression; it’s evolution. Businesses mature, and when they do, they need to figure out what their next iteration is going to be. The current product is mature, and the next act is what separates good companies from becoming great ones. In Phase I, I was doing customer success calls. In Phase IV, I’m doing it all over again for a very different product and a very different pitch. Still, every hat I wore in those early days now informs strategic decisions with 10 times the impact, with the experience and knowledge that come with years of honing that craft. Only founders who’ve been through all phases have this advantage. Your competitors who hired VPs from day one might move faster initially, but they’ll never have your intuitive understanding of how all of the dots connect. The goal isn’t to wear all hats forever. It’s to wear them long enough to understand which ones actually matter. In a world where everyone’s rushing to delegate, the founders who do everything first have a major advantage because they know their business at the cellular level.
Category:
E-Commerce
The assassination of Charlie Kirk is widening the political divide in Americaand some people who have made critical remarks about the conservative icon are finding their personal information being posted online, opening them up to harassment and threats. One site, called Expose Charlies Murderers, has been taken offline after posting the names of 41 people that it claimed were “supporting political violence online.” The site reportedly said it was working on a backlog of over 20,000 submissions before it was taken down. People named on the site were accompanied by screenshots of their alleged comments, which ranged from “he got what he deserved” to criticism of Kirk that also denounced violence, according to Reuters. While the site claimed it was not a doxxing site (one that exposes private or identifying information about a person), a message on its front page Saturday read: “This website will soon be converted into a searchable database of all 30,000 submissions, filterable by general location and job industry. This is a permanent and continuously updating archive of Radical activists calling for violence.” The domain was registered anonymously. And while the site was taken down by its host, sites of this type have a history of reappearing, hosted by overseas companies or private servers. One user, a Canadian influencer whose name was the first listed on the now-removed site, posted a video on X describing the experience, saying she had never “celebrated” Kirk’s death. Because the site accused her of doing so, though, she has received a flood of intimidating notes from people saying they know her address and threatening sexual assault and death. “It’s made the last 48 hours of my life a living hell,” said Rachel Gilmore. “Every single person who has ever disliked me is using this as a chance to get their pound of flesh.” Government officials have not doxxed critics of Kirk since his murder, but some have posted messages that could be interpreted as supporting consequences for those who have posted criticisms. Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA), for instance, wrote: “Im going to use Congressional authority and every influence with Big Tech platforms to mandate immediate ban for life of every post or commenter that belittled the assassination of Charlie Kirk. If they ran their mouth with their smartass hatred celebrating the heinous murder of that beautiful young man who dedicated his whole life to delivering respectful conservative truth into the hearts of liberal enclave universities, armed only with a Bible and a microphone and a Constitution those profiles must come down.” Meanwhile, another user on X is keeping a running list of people who have lost their jobs after comments about the shooting. As of September 11, when it was last updated, the list had 30 names, with several more reported since then, including educators and employees of private companies. While the Supreme Court, in 1987, ruled that comments by government employees about acts of violence were constitutionally protectedeven when made in poor tastethose protections do not extend to employees of private companies. And while posting thoughts, positive or negative, used to be a relatively harmless thing to do, the polarization of today’s society can turn any comment into a potentially dangerous situationin which personal details are spread far and wide and cyberbullying (or worse) becomes relentless. X, Reddit, Meta, and other online centers of communication all have anti-doxxing policies, but with the tsunami of posts happening in the wake of Kirk’s death, it’s hard for even Big Tech companies to stay on top of all of the threats.
Category:
E-Commerce
The past few years in corporate social impact have felt like a bull market. After 2020, companies raced to make commitments on racial justice, climate, mental health, and equity. Budgets grew. New executives were hired. Purpose became central to investor pitches and employee branding. Optimism and momentum were everywhere. But anyone who follows the stock market knows what comes after a bull run: a correction. A correction isnt a crash. Its a recalibration. It trims excess, exposes weak bets, and rewards investments with real fundamentals. Thats exactly what were seeing now in social impact. WHAT A CORRECTION LOOKS LIKE In the markets, corrections show up as a pullback in prices, a cool-down in exuberant storytelling, and a flight to safer assets. In corporate impact, its showing up as: Language shifts. Mentions of DEI in big-company filings have dropped by more than half in the past two years. Some firms now use belonging, workplace equity, or human capital risk instead. That doesnt always mean the work is goneit means leaders are trying to reduce political exposure. Reframed commitments. Pride sponsorships that once filled headlines have been scaled back or rebranded. ESG language is under attack in some states, so companies are re-packaging climate and governance work as risk management or resilience. Risk repricing. Target became a flashpoint, losing billions in market value and facing shareholder lawsuits after boycotts tied to Pride merchandise. Other companies have quietly moved dollars from visible campaigns into employee well-being or supplier diversity, where the value is clearer and the risk of backlash is lower. This is correction behavior: The froth is gone, the fundamentals remain. CORRECTIONS SEPARATE SPECULATION FROM STRATEGY Corrections dont create fragilitythey reveal it. Companies that treated DEI and social impact like a press releasebig promises, little infrastructureare retreating. Their programs were like hype stocks: attractive in the short term, weak in the long term. By contrast, companies that integrated equity, climate, or community engagement into their business modelinto talent strategy, supply chains, product development, and governanceare holding steady. Their investments look less flashy but more durable. ITS NOT JUST DEI This recalibration is happening across the whole portfolio of social justice work. Climate. ESG proposals in shareholder meetings are drawing record-low support in the U.S., even as global pressure rises. Still, most major corporations arent abandoning climate targetstheyre rebranding them as cost-saving, efficiency, or resilience plays. Philanthropy. Equity-centered giving surged after 2020. Now, some companies are consolidating efforts, focusing less on broad social-justice branding and more on specific, measurable partnerships with nonprofits. LGBTQ+ and racial justice. Campaigns that were once front-page news have pulled back. Yet behind the scenes, many companies continue funding ERGs, mental health benefits, and advocacy groupsjust without the same spotlight. This doesnt mean the social impact market has collapsed. It means the valuation of certain programs is being recalibrated. LESSONS FOR LEADERS So what should social impact leaders do in this correction phase? The stock market offers a useful playbook. 1. Re-underwrite your thesis. Investors revisit why they hold a stock. Leaders should revisit why theyve made social impact commitments. Where exactly does the work drive valuetalent retention, customer trust, market entry, regulatory preparedness? If you cant answer that, the program is vulnerable. 2. Strengthen governance. In finance, the highest-quality companies survive corrections through transparency and oversight. In social impact, that means elevating board or C-suite accountability, setting measurable KPIs, and showing how work ladders into business strategy. 3. Hedge political risk, not the mission. Smart investors dont abandon strong companies just because of volatilitythey hedge. The same applies here: Adjust language, broaden framing, emphasize universal benefits, but dont walk away from core commitments. 4. Rotate from optics to operating leverage. In a correction, investors leave speculative plays and focus on real earnings. Leaders should move resources from symbolic gestures to work that drives performance: fair hiring linked to skills needs, climate policies tied to supply chain efficiency, inclusive product design that reduces recalls and expands markets. 5. Stay invested through the cycle. History shows portfolios that hold through corrections outperform those that panic-sell. For companies, retreating now may ease short-term noise but risks long-term credibility with employees, customers, and communities. ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CYCLE Corrections change the leadership board. The slogans and speculators exit. The companies with durable strategies compound. On the other side of this correction, the landscape will look different: Language will evolve. DEI may fade, but belonging, equity, and workplace culture will deepen. Climate and community will be treated as risk disciplines. Less about optics, more about resilience and compliance. Coalitions will professionalize. Nonprofits and movements will expect clearer value exchanges, not just sponsorship dollars. The fundamentalsequity, justice, sustainabilityarent going anywhere. Theyre being repriced, like strong companies in a correction. THE CALL TO LEADERS If you saw social impact as a nice-to-have, this moment will confirm the urge to cut. If you see it as a driver of talent, innovation, and resilience, this is your chance to professionalize, integrate, nd build for the long term. Corrections punish speculation. They reward discipline. Treat your social impact strategy like a long-term investment: Revisit the fundamentals, hedge against volatility, and keep building. The market will turn. The question is whether youll have something real to show when it does. Muneer Panjwani is CEO of Engage for Good.
Category:
E-Commerce
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