Team·May 2026·7 min read
Inside the founding member model
By Marcus Chen
Twenty operators, each leading two or three products — why we spread leadership instead of hiring a GM for every venture.
Traditional venture studios hire a general manager for every new company. That model works at five ventures. It breaks at thirty-five.
Our twenty founding members are senior operators — engineers, researchers, designers, GTM leads — each stewarding two or three products. They know the stack, the process, and each other. When a product hits a wall, help is one Slack channel away, not a calendar invite away.
Spreading leadership this way keeps quality high without ballooning headcount. It also means every product gets someone who has shipped before, not someone learning the studio on the job.
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