Diagnostic
Stakeholder Map
Map the people the company most depends on — cofounder, direct reports, board — and score each of them twice: how the relationship is working, and how confident you are in their performance.
Use it quarterly, or whenever you feel people-risk but can't say where it sits. Founders carry an implicit version of this map in their head; drawing it makes the implicit rankings visible — and usually surfaces one relationship or one performance score that has been quietly avoided.
Credit: Outstride original
How to run it
Put yourself in the middle
Add the people the company runs through: cofounder(s), each direct report, and any board member or investor who materially shapes your quarter.
Score the relationship
0–10 on the arrow: how well is the working relationship itself going — trust, candour, cadence? For the important ones, also guess how they would score it. A big gap between your score and your guess is its own finding.
Score your confidence in their performance
0–10 under their name: how confident are you that they will deliver what their role needs this stage? Score the role they hold now, not the person you hired.
Read the gaps and pick one move
Low relationship score → design the relationship deliberately. Low performance score → go deeper with the Performance × Culture Grid. Both high → tell them; people rarely hear it.
Watch for the split score: a warm relationship number sitting on top of a very low performance number. That pairing is the signature of a hard conversation being avoided — and the friendliness is often exactly what's protecting the underperformance.
Source / credit
Outstride original
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