As a founder you have so many competing and overlapping responsibilities: to your board, your stakeholders, your team, your customers. So…what happens when life comes at you fast — when you receive terrible personal news — when you’re suddenly forced to take an extended leave of absence?
Unfortunately, I’ve been there. Earlier this year, doctors confirmed I had genetic-linked early-stage breast cancer.
In a mere moment, my life was forever changed. It wasn’t something I could’ve anticipated or planned ahead for. It was a lot to take in emotionally, physically, personally…and I also immediately thought of my company that I love so much: Orum.io, where I’m founder and CEO. How would we all manage this?
I wish this scenario on no one. But, sadly, I know other founders and executives have and will continue to experience similar sudden challenges. Their situation may not be a cancer diagnosis, but another health issue, a surgery, the loss of a loved one, or any number of other wrenching situations that require an unexpected and extended leave.
I’m happy to report that I am doing well after surgery that included a double mastectomy and reconstruction. But I deeply wish I’d had some kind of playbook as founder and CEO. So that’s what I’m sharing here: What I’ve learned, what I wish I’d known, and what I recommend.
One of my mantras is “Surface bad news fast.” I didn’t yet have a treatment plan, and I didn’t know the answers to a lot of questions. But I did have a diagnosis — and that meant I had to tell my board immediately. It’s the same as if I were operating as a public company’s CEO: anything that could materially affect the business must be disclosed.
I knew it was the right thing to do. But I was still nervous. What would they say? What would they think? Would they tell me to hire an interim CEO, or sell the company, or or or…?
I had to take a very deep breath every time I texted each board member individually: “I have a personal update, and I need to speak with you.” So began a bunch of individual phone conversations — something that I highly recommend, because you can have the level of vulnerability and sharing that feels right for each specific conversation.
These calls were hard, of course. It’s never easy to share a cancer diagnosis. As expected, I did field questions about what kind of treatment, would I have chemo, etc. etc. — and I didn’t have the answers. And you know what? That was OKAY. Just sharing this initial information was a massive pressure valve released for me. It gave me the opportunity to say: “I wanted to tell you early, even though I'm still figuring it out. Because I'm going to need your support now more than ever.”
That’s the main aspect I want founders to take away from this tip: Being vulnerable is more than okay. It will not make the board distrust you. They will not run away. You always know as a founder that your board is backing you and betting on you as a person — but this was clear-cut, real evidence of that. And in that sense, these conversations were kind of beautiful.
I felt so much better after these calls, knowing that my board was in my camp and ready to assist in any way. They expressed so much empathy. They connected me with friends who had been through it and other contacts who ultimately shaped my treatment decisions.
I urge you: Make the calls. Do it early. You don’t need to have a plan yet, and you don’t need to promise you’ll get back with details by the end of the week. What you need right now is support — and that’s precisely what your board is for.
Armed with the backing of my board, I could focus on working with my healthcare providers to figure out my immediate next step. We scheduled surgery, but they warned me that we wouldn’t know until after that point whether I needed chemo, radiation, a second surgery, etc.
Clearly, though, I would be out for several weeks, at the least. Orum needed a plan to keep running, and I worked with a very small handful of trusted senior leaders to create one. This essentially boils down to two steps.
First, I had to create proxies for myself. It was essential that the team received an exact plan of how the company would run in my absence, on a day-to-day level. Two of my senior leaders stepped in for me, and we made it very clear how those responsibilities were split.
For anything internal — financials, reporting, operations, compliance, etc. — the go-to was our Chief Operating Officer Reggie Hall. For anything external – customers, partners, marketing, events, PR, and content – they went to our Chief Commercial Officer Greg Gittrich. We communicated this very clearly to the team and to the board. We kept it as simple as possible: The two would split jurisdictions as listed. And ultimately, if a decision needed to be made by one person, that would be Reggie.
Second, we agreed to specific operating principles, one of them being no net new expenses. I also set explicit guidelines for when the team should “break glass” and contact me. I knew that for my personality, I’d have to temporarily delete all my work apps — if I saw a Slack message I’d want to dive right in. But the idea of being COMPLETELY unmoored didn’t feel right. What if something truly catastrophic happened and I wasn’t immediately aware somehow?!
I had drafted a list of something like a dozen reasons the team should “break glass” and contact me. It took my executive coach, Steve Schreck, to gently point out this list was way too long. He clocked, in a way that I didn’t until later, that the physical and emotional recovery would be harder than I anticipated. “You have the people; use the people,” he said.
Surprisingly to me, this ends up being as much of an emotional tip as it is an operational one.
Along with our board, we decided that externally, only the board and one day-to-day partner would know the circumstances of my situation. The Orum machine would run as it should thanks to our plan, and we knew our customers were well taken care of. We kept up my social posts, too, by writing and editing them all in advance, as they’re an important component of the holistic marketing plan that drives Orum’s commercial growth and brand awareness.
Internally, we told Team Orum the truth but we also kept it high-level: I had a planned surgery coming up, and I’d be out of commission for a bit. Greg and Reggie would split my responsibilities while I was out. One important decision we made: We did not provide clarity about my timeline, because I didn’t know what would happen after my surgery.
Once I was through the surgery and recovering, we shared another internal update: I explained I had been diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer, I completed a successful surgery, I didn’t need radiation or chemo at this time, and my prognosis was excellent. We also explained we would not be sharing this information publicly yet.
In this message, I also shared that I’d be hopping on a weekly video call with the team later that day. Like with telling the board, a pressure valve had been released: The team already had the core details. I didn’t have to say the word “cancer” on camera, and we could focus on me coming back.
This was the right way to handle internal and external comms. But boy, did it make recovery a very lonely and sad time. You can’t deviate from your plan — and that meant that when, say, a friend and former Orum team member reached out during my recovery to see if we could meet up in New York, I could not tell her.
I had so much support from my family, which was wonderful, but I felt incredibly “othered” from the fintech world at the time. It was like I was on the outside of my circle, outside of my industry, outside of my routines. I spoke about this often with my coach, whom I continued to speak to weekly. But I was truly shocked at just how lonely I felt. I wish I’d known that was coming.
I will say this was somewhat replaced by a new crowd of people I came to lean on. I had my circle as a founder, but I needed one in my other identity as a new breast cancer survivor. I was shocked how many people in my professional life were in the same situation. Many don’t talk about it publicly, but as soon as you let them know your situation, they are so open.
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It’s not like coming back from PTO. And that’s not just because of the obvious reasons, like the fact that you actually come back *refreshed* from vacation.
After eight weeks offline, I felt startlingly unbusy. I did not like that my inbox and calendar were close to empty. I was unsettled that after years of knowing the ins and outs of Orum on a day-to-day basis, I didn’t know the current pipeline or which customers we’d signed over the last two months.
It meant that our proxies and our plan had worked — and that was great, of course. But I had to work hard with my coach about the new normal. I was not coming back to the job as it was before; I had to allow people to continue to do things that they'd absorbed successfully.
My coach helped me see that this was a great opportunity to dive very deeply into our product and our product strategy. It freed up time for me to explore whale opportunities that take a while to nurture, check in with customers, plan out the next few months of our pipeline, and catch up on industry news.
Mentally I was ready to go back. But physically I was not 100%. I did not look sick. I didn’t lose my hair. But I had been through something major. My body looked different. I was very, very, tired. I couldn’t really lift my arms to hug someone. I had to ask for help tossing my suitcase into the plane bulkhead on my first business trip back. I had to travel a half-hour each way for weekly hour-long physical therapy appointments. I had to heal.
I was so excited to get back that I don’t think I fully absorbed how difficult re-entry would be. Sometimes your body just isn’t quite 100% — and that’s normal.
A cancer diagnosis is hard; being a founder is hard. You need to take care of your health; you need to take care of your company.
Figuring out how to hold two truths is a big part of a founder’s job. I had a very serious health situation, and a company that I want to work on every day because I care so deeply about it. Holding and juggling these truths as needed allowed me to feel that we would be okay as a company and I would be okay as a human. You will be, too.
I’m lucky, comparatively, in that I had a few weeks to put the above plans in place — but there are many ways to do this. If you have to be out immediately, you lean more heavily on your board and senior leaders. If you have to undergo a sudden surgery right now, you can piece together a proxy and comms plan after the fact.
There are many variations to make this work. And you WILL make it work. You’ve already overcome so much as a founder. You’ll overcome this too.
Stephany also shared her story with Inc. Editor at Large, Christine Haughney Dare-Bryan. You can read the Inc. story here: 5 Leadership Lessons From an Unexpected Medical Leave.