At a recent Y Combinator event, Brian Chesky, the co-founder and CEO of Airbnb, dropped a term that instantly ignited conversation among founders: “founder mode.” It’s a phrase that suggests more than just a leadership style—it points to a way of staying deeply connected to a company’s growth, hands-on, no matter how big things get. But does this idea of hyper-engaged leadership, so celebrated in Silicon Valley, make sense for Asian businesses, where hierarchy, tradition, and scale dominate the landscape?
When Chesky spoke about how following traditional advice nearly cost him Airbnb’s vision, he struck a nerve. His experience—of being told to “hire good people and let them do their jobs” only to see things fall apart—resonated with founders who felt the same pull between delegation and staying involved.
Founder mode, as entrepreneur and investor Paul Graham later expanded in a memo, is about rejecting the “manager mode” blueprint in favor of something more visceral.
Manager mode—the approach often recommended as companies scale—emphasizes hiring skilled managers, delegating authority, and allowing them to handle day-to-day operations. However, as Chesky and Graham argue, this can lead to a disconnect between the founder’s original vision and the company’s growth. “There are things founders can do that managers can’t, and not doing them feels wrong to founders, because it is,” Graham wrote.
But how does this hands-on, all-in leadership style translate to regions where business cultures are more structured, often leaning on collective decision-making?
What’s founder mode? And why does it matter in Asia?
The concept behind founder mode isn’t new, but Chesky’s framing gives it a modern twist. It’s about staying in the trenches—whether it’s with product teams, engineers, or marketing—long after most CEOs would have handed over the reins to professional managers. And that’s the tension: conventional wisdom says that, as companies grow, founders should step back. But Chesky, Graham, and others argue the opposite. A founder, they say, should remain as involved as they were when the company had ten employees, even when it has 10,000.
In Asia, where businesses tend to operate under more traditional hierarchies, the idea of a CEO having “skip-level” meetings with junior employees might raise eyebrows. Here, top-down leadership has historically dictated how decisions are made. And yet, some of Asia’s most successful companies are still led by founders who keep their hands on the wheel.
Take Wang Chuanfu, the founder and CEO of BYD, as an example. Even as the company grew into one of the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturers, Wang has remained deeply involved in the minutiae of product development. He’s the kind of founder who will walk the factory floor, personally overseeing details that most CEOs would delegate. Wang’s leadership style isn’t just anecdotal—his constant presence is credited with helping BYD stay nimble in an ever-evolving industry. His hands-on approach is often seen as key to BYD’s early pivot into EVs, well before many of its competitors.
But Wang’s approach works because it’s tightly aligned with BYD’s mission of innovation. Would the same method thrive in industries or markets that operate at a slower pace or are bogged down by bureaucracy? That’s the question Chesky and Graham’s version of founder mode raises for businesses in Asia. The region’s diverse landscape—spanning highly competitive tech hubs to more conservative family-owned businesses—presents unique challenges that might make or break the idea.
Scaling challenges and cultural resistance
The flip side is the complexity that comes with scaling a business. The bigger the company, the more moving parts—operations become intricate, markets expand, and workforce size balloons. Traditionally, companies bring in professional managers at this stage to handle the increasing complexity. It’s the same across the globe, but in Asia, the argument for professionalization can feel more acute. Companies expanding across borders in the region face not only logistical challenges but cultural ones, too—there are nuances in every market, from government relations in China to workforce expectations in Southeast Asia.
In such environments, founders who insist on staying involved in every aspect of the company’s operations risk stretching themselves too thin. Investors, who often view professional managers as the solution to managing scale, have been known to push for leadership transitions, even against a founder’s wishes. This was the case with Flipkart, India’s e-commerce giant.
As Flipkart prepared for its acquisition by Walmart, the company’s founders, Sachin and Binny Bansal, were gradually nudged out by investors who believed that fresh leadership was necessary to handle the company’s next phase of growth. The Bansals had been the heart of Flipkart’s early success, but by the time Walmart came knocking, their involvement was seen as less of an asset and more of a complication in the eyes of the stakeholders.
A similar story unfolded at Lazada, one of Southeast Asia’s leading e-commerce platforms, after its acquisition by Alibaba. Lazada’s founder, Maximilian Bittner, was replaced by Lucy Peng, a professional manager from Alibaba, in 2018 as part of the company’s broader strategy to align Lazada with Alibaba’s business model.
But the transition wasn’t without its challenges. Lazada has struggled to maintain its competitive edge against rivals like Shopee, raising questions about whether the shift away from founder-led leadership contributed to its difficulties. Lazada’s leadership has shuffled multiple times since Peng’s appointment, with the CEO position passing through several hands before finally landing with James Dong in 2022.
This constant leadership rotation underscores the tension between maintaining a founder’s vision and professionalizing operations. Has Lazada’s loss of its entrepreneurial spark been part of the reason for its struggles in Southeast Asia?
How founder mode (could) work
Despite these challenges, there are examples where founder mode has worked in Asia, especially when combined with the right cultural fit.
Xiaomi, founded by Lei Jun, is a textbook example of how a founder can stay involved at scale without slipping into micromanagement.
Lei has steered Xiaomi into a global tech powerhouse, now commanding 14.5% of the global smartphone market as of Q2 this year, per IDC, while also making bold moves into the EV space.
His leadership strikes a fine balance—deeply involved in product design and strategy yet supported by a robust leadership team that manages the complexities of scaling internationally. This delicate equilibrium has allowed Xiaomi to maintain the essence of Lei’s vision while successfully expanding into new markets and product categories.
Is founder mode right for Asia?
So, is founder mode the right fit for Asia’s businesses? The answer, as with many things, is nuanced. For some companies—especially those in fast-moving, innovation-driven sectors like tech—it’s clear that founders who remain hands-on can be a crucial asset. Wang’s leadership at BYD and Lei’s role at Xiaomi demonstrate that founder-led leadership can thrive even at scale, especially when aligned with the company’s mission.
But the reality is that Asia’s business landscape is vast and diverse. What works in China’s booming tech sector might not translate as easily to more traditional industries or markets where hierarchy and formal decision-making still hold sway. Flipkart and Lazada’s leadership transitions show that, as companies scale, the push for professionalization—whether driven by investor expectations or operational complexity—can sometimes create friction between preserving a founder’s vision and adapting to the demands of growth.
In the end, the key may lie in finding a balance. Founders who can maintain their vision while trusting experienced managers to handle the operational grind might be the ones best positioned to navigate the complexities of scaling in Asia. Founder mode isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, but in the right hands, it’s a compelling alternative to the conventional wisdom that says scaling up means stepping back.