Resonant Relationships: The Real Predictor of Business Success

February 11, 2025 | Alex Schecter Coaching

It’s easy to think that an organization’s success comes down to strategy, product, or market fit. But the relationships between co-founders, boards, CEOs, executive teams, and investors shape everything—from decision-making speed to company culture and long-term stability.

The cost of misalignment at the top is enormous. Leadership dysfunction slows execution, causes talent loss, and derails major decisions—costing companies tens, even hundreds of millions of dollars.

Strong relationships foster trust, resolve tensions, and ensure effective communication. Yet most leaders don’t invest intentionally in relationship-building until cracks appear—or worse, until they become structural failures.

💡 Relationship alignment isn’t a soft skill. It’s a financial imperative.

ROR: The Business Metric You’re Not Tracking (But Should Be)

Most companies actively manage and measure ROC (Return on Capital)—optimizing financial returns, operational efficiency, and resource allocation. Meanwhile, VC funds and other investors prioritize ROI (Return on Investment) as the ultimate measure of success.

But both fail to recognize that ROC and ROI are ultimately a function of ROR—Return on Relationships – the force that drives their growth and sustainability.

When Thinking About ROR, Ask Yourself:

✔ What’s the financial cost of a misaligned founder relationship?
✔ How much value is lost when a leadership team is dysfunctional?
✔ What’s the impact of slow decision-making due to unspoken tensions?

When ROR is High, ROI Benefits:

✔ Faster, smarter decisions—because trust removes bottlenecks.
✔ Aligned co-founders—so internal conflict doesn’t derail execution.
✔ A culture that retains top talent—instead of repelling it.

💡 If you wouldn’t ignore ROI, why ignore ROR—the factor that determines whether your ROI is sustainable?

Signs of Dissonant Relationships—And Their Cost

Dissonant relationships don’t just create tension at the top—they disrupt execution, weaken culture, and stall long-term success.

Watch Out for These Patterns—And Their Financial Impact:

Silent power struggles between co-founders → Teams operate in confusion, unsure whose direction to follow. Lost alignment = lost execution = lost revenue.
Leadership teams avoiding necessary conversations → Decisions stall, and momentum is lost. Delays in key decisions can cost millions in missed opportunities.
Key executives staying too long in roles that no longer fit → Innovation suffers, and disengagement spreads. The wrong leader in a key role can set a company back years.
Passive-aggressive culture → Issues get discussed everywhere except where decisions are made. Lack of accountability leads to inefficiency, internal conflict, and slow growth.
Politics over progress → Internal alliances matter more than real solutions. The best ideas don’t win, costing the company both speed and competitive advantage.
High performers leaving → Not because of pay, but because dysfunction makes execution impossible. Replacing top talent isn’t just expensive—it’s a strategic setback.
Founders and executives feeling resentful instead of collaborative → Employees sense the divide and either pick sides or disengage completely. Misalignment at the top weakens the entire organization.

💡 When relationships are dissonant, dysfunction becomes the culture—and the financial cost is real. When ROR is high, alignment at the top creates clarity, speed, and trust across the entire organization.

The difference? Not just efficiency—tens, sometimes hundreds, of millions of dollars in lost or captured value.

Firsthand Lessons—How I See It Play Out at the Top

❌ The Co-Founder Breakdown

Two best friends start a company together—one as CEO, the other as board chair. Trust and history are there. But as the company grows, tensions emerge:

The CEO feels micromanaged—every decision is second-guessed.
The board chair struggles to step back—still acting like a co-CEO.
Feedback is avoided—because how do you tell your best friend they’re not leading effectively?

Left unaddressed, frustration builds, employees take sides, and the company suffers.

💡 A high-ROR company would have invested early in alignment conversations, role clarity, and a framework for handling disagreements—before tensions escalated.

What now?
✔ Facilitate structured alignment sessions to reset roles, expectations, and decision-making authority.
✔ Create a clear separation between governance and execution, preventing overreach from the board.

❌ The Underperforming Exec That No One Wants to Address

A CEO hires a trusted friend for a key leadership role. But the isn’t delivering. Everyone sees it. The CEO knows it. Yet instead of making a tough call, they avoid the conversation:

✔ “I don’t want to damage the relationship.”
✔ “Maybe they’ll improve if I give them more time.”
✔ “This conversation feels too high-stakes.”

What actually happens?

Other leaders compensate for the exec’s weaknesses—burning out in the process.
Resentment builds—top talent starts leaving.
The business loses momentum—because avoiding the problem feels easier than fixing it.

💡 High-ROR cultures normalize direct, honest conversations—before they become high-stakes events.

What now?
✔ Guide CEOs in having decisive, clear conversations that address performance while preserving relationships.
✔ Help restructure roles or create graceful transition plans, ensuring continuity without unnecessary fallout.

❌ The Silent Misalignment Between Founders

Two co-founders start with a shared vision, but over time, their priorities drift apart:

One is focused on scaling aggressively, while the other prioritizes culture and stability.
One spends more time with investors, while the other is deep in product development—and they no longer see eye to eye.
Big decisions become slow and painful because they aren’t truly aligned on where the company is going.

On the surface, things look fine. They still get along, still make decisions together. But underneath, the friction grows. By the time they acknowledge it, it’s no longer a strategic discussion—it’s an emotional one.

💡 A high-ROR company would have proactively revisited alignment, ensuring both founders stayed on the same page as the business evolved.

What now?
✔ Lead structured recalibration discussions to bring priorities and long-term vision back into alignment.
✔ Help founders navigate role evolution or separation, ensuring the business can grow without personal conflicts eroding trust.

❌ The Leadership Team That Won’t Challenge the CEO

A strong CEO with a clear vision is an asset—unless the team stops challenging them.

Team members privately voice concerns but stay silent in meetings.
Key risks are ignored because no one wants to push back.
The CEO, believing they have full alignment, moves forward—until reality forces a painful course correction.

Over time, trust erodes in both directions—the CEO feels unsupported when things go wrong, and the team feels unheard.

💡 A high-ROR company would build a culture where challenging leadership is welcome and expected, not avoided.

What now?
✔ Establish a culture of productive challenge, where disagreement strengthens decisions rather than being seen as disloyalty.
✔ Work with CEOs to develop executive teams that operate with psychological safety, ensuring concerns are raised early.

Invest in Relationships Before You Have To

Many companies wait too long before addressing relationship challenges:

❌ They wait until co-founders can’t be in the same room.
❌ They wait until execs start quitting.
❌ They wait until the leadership team is paralyzed by internal politics.

By the time they take action, the damage is already done.

💡 A high-ROR company builds a culture where tough conversations happen early—before they become crises.

How to Build a High ROR Culture

High-ROI companies don’t leave relationships to chance. They build structures that keep leadership aligned, communication open, and trust strong—before issues escalate.

✔ Align Co-Founders from Day One

Who owns which decisions?
Where do you trust each other to act independently?
How do you navigate disagreement before it turns into dysfunction?
💡 What to do now: Establish a regular alignment practice—unspoken tensions are where co-founder breakups begin.

✔ Make Hard Conversations the Norm

Embed regular feedback so tough conversations aren’t rare, high-stakes events.
Build a culture of direct communication—leaders should never dance around the truth.
💡 What to do now: Create a system where honesty is expected, not feared.

✔ Treat Coaching as an Operating System, Not an Emergency Fix

Coaching isn’t just for individuals—it strengthens leadership relationships and keeps teams operating at their best.
The best companies integrate coaching into leadership development, strategy meetings, and performance reviews.
💡 What to do now: Don’t wait until relationships are broken—invest in them early.

Final Thought: Stop Thinking of Relationships as “Soft Skills”

✔ Strong relationships are one of the hardest business advantages to replicate.
✔ When leadership relationships are strong, strategy, execution, and culture fall into place.
✔ When they aren’t, even the best ideas fall apart.

💡 If you wouldn’t ignore ROI, you shouldn’t ignore ROR—Return on Relationships.

Start building the foundation now.