Write Down How One of You Leaves

You have already had this thought.

It arrived on a call when your co-founder said something about the roadmap you disagreed with, and you let it pass because arguing would have cost the afternoon. It came back a few weeks later when you ran the numbers on what happens if they walk in March. You did not finish the thought. You opened Slack instead.

The decision is whether to write it down.

Not whether to keep working with them. Whether to put on paper who has the final call on money and hiring, and what happens to their equity the day one of you stops showing up. Two pages. Signed by both of you.

You keep moving it because nothing breaks if you don’t.

No customer churns. Payroll clears. The relationship is fine, which is exactly why raising it feels absurd. It sounds like an accusation about something nobody has done, delivered to the one person who is carrying weight alongside you.

So it sits, and it gets more expensive every month it sits.

Here is the mechanical cost. With no vesting schedule, a co-founder who leaves in month fourteen keeps their entire stake forever. You spend the next four years building the value of shares belonging to someone who is not in the building. Go count the months you have already worked with no schedule attached to your own equity either. That number is what you have paid so far for not having the conversation.

The second cost is leverage.

Terms written this month get written by two people who like each other and want the same outcome. Terms written after the blowup get written by whoever has more to lose, and that is usually the founder who cannot absorb legal fees or a stalled raise. You will negotiate this once. The only thing you control is which version of yourself shows up to do it.

What percentage does your co-founder own if they resign Monday morning? If you cannot say the number out loud without opening a file, you have your answer about how ready you are.