How to Lead a Team When the Founder Still Calls the Shots

Reporting to a founder is different from reporting to a manager.  Here are four ways to make this special relationship work. 

A Future WPO Member Waiting in the Wings? Meet Jennifer Lawrence, Founder

Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence has a new role:  founder.  She just revealed a new hair care line, called Mes° (pronounced “mess”). The collection of three products was developed in partnership with Boston-based Arcaea, a company that develops new ingredients for the beauty industry. 

Lawrence said she’d waited so long to launch her own brand that she was willing to wait until Jasmina Aganovic, an MIT-trained chemical and biological engineer and the founder and CEO of Arcaea, was ready. About three years ago, they decided to join forces on what became Mes°.  The company declined to share the exact corporate ownership structure [Laurel here ... personally I'm hoping she holds 51% interest], but said that it was founded with Lawrence in partnership with Aganovic.  

If Mes° grows into a multimillion-dollar business with Lawrence in charge, I know a peer advisory group that would welcome her: the Women Presidents’ Organization. Jennifer, the door is open.

Read more here.

Building Momentum Around Agentic AI

In this episode of Take on Tomorrow, PwC explores what it takes to build momentum around agentic AI – from employees’ first experiments with new tools to a fundamental rethinking of how work gets done.

Rob Seaman, General Manager of Slack at Salesforce, tells us how AI agents are already changing the way teams collaborate, innovate, and turn ideas into reality – and why the biggest opportunity may be helping people achieve things that would otherwise feel out of reach. 

Tune in or read transcript here.

Rebuild Connection Without Undermining Authority

This is why the WPO business model works.

1. Build one room with no org chart in it

Join or create a small circle of peers [like the Women Presidents Organization] who run things you don’t – different company, different industry, zero overlap with your power. The relief leaders feel in these rooms is immediate, because for one hour [WPO meetings usually run three hours a month] nobody needs anything from them. 

Read the entire article, which includes two other points on how to rebuild connection without undermining authority. 

Effective Prompts for AI: Here are 5 Ideas

Here are 5 useful articles on working with AI and writing effective prompts for AI:

1. Effective Prompts for AI:  The Essentials – MIT
2. What makes a good AI prompt?  Here are 4 expert tips – The Conversation
3. Working with AI:  Two paths to prompting – One Useful Thing (by Ethan Mollick)
4. The ultimate guide to writing effective AI prompts – Atlassian
5. AI basics – Harvard University Information Technology

Famous Entrepreneurs Who Failed Before They Succeeded

The big meeting is finally here. You practiced the pitch again on the drive over and told yourself this one is different.

Twenty minutes later, you’re back in the parking garage with a polite pass and a stomach that won’t settle. That sour feeling is part of the game. It comes with building something you believe in.

Melanie Perkins, Frederick W. Smith and Arianna Huffington hit that wall. Before their names became synonymous with success, each founder came dangerously close to watching the whole thing fall apart.

Discover what these entrepreneurs did to fix what needed fixing, found another route and made the next call. 

SBA Proposes Overhaul to Simplify Small Business Classification

The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) proposed a comprehensive overhaul of its small business size standards, modernizing how the federal government defines and classifies small businesses across the United States. Published in a proposed rule, the new standards according only to SBA, would simplify industry categorization and raise applicable size thresholds, allowing small but rapidly growing firms to continue qualifying and adding over 110,000 firms to the 36 million small businesses in America.  

Small businesses, the economic engine of America's growth, are starting and expanding at record rates.  Rule change or no rule change, they will continue to drive America's economy.