What does it mean to “own” something? Merriam-Webster puts it like this: “Belonging to oneself or itself,” or “to have power or mastery over.” These definitions conjure a powerful image of control and responsibility — if you own a car, it’s yours to do with what you please, but it’s also yours to care for. You, and you alone, determine whether your car is regularly washed and maintained, or whether it becomes a busted-up beater, rusty and clinging to life.
Founders often don’t like to think of themselves as “owners.” Cars have owners, to return to the example above. Small corner stores have owners. Pets have owners. The term “owner” can feel minimized, too inconsequential for what a founder wants to achieve.
And yet, the concept of ownership is key to our sense of satisfaction and wellbeing. Here’s why.
The power of ownership
The effects of ownership have been a philosophical point of discussion for hundreds of years. According to Aristotle, so powerful is the motivation to own things that he even attributed it to the making of rational, productive members of society. As he argued back in the 4th century:
[W]hen everyone has a distinct interest, men will not complain of one another, and they will make more progress, because everyone will be attending to his own business.
It may seem like the impulse toward ownership implies greediness or possessiveness, but actually, research shows the opposite is true. Feelings of ownership are associated with higher self-esteem, which drives prosocial behavior. Moreover, our buy-in increases when we’ve put effort into something. You may have heard of the IKEA effect, which holds that people are more likely to value an object if they make (or, in the case of the Swedish retailer, assemble) it themselves.
In other words, we value things we own, but we value them even more if we’ve expended effort to create them.
The benefits of sole ownership
Given the above, I think founders’ distaste for thinking of themselves as “owners” is misplaced. For solo bootstrappers like me, there’s nothing more motivating than knowing that my success is the direct result of my own hard work. If I’d taken outside funding or worked with a co-founder, I doubt I’d feel as proud of Jotform’s achievements, or as driven to work as hard every day to take it to the next level.
Still, this is not the advice you tend to hear from the startup gurus of the world, who relentlessly preach the importance of having a co-founder. Starting a business on your own is too hard, too lonely, too much for one person. A co-founder can bring expertise you lack, offer valuable perspective, and serve as a source of strength when things get tough.
At least, that’s the idea.
The reality is often not so rosy. I have a friend, let’s call him Isaac, who had a co-founder we’ll call Greg. Isaac was struggling: Greg was not pulling his weight. Isaac did the majority of the work, and any success the business achieved was the result of Isaac’s efforts, while Greg sat back and reaped the benefits.
The business became more and more successful, which should have made Isaac feel good. But it didn’t. It made him resentful, and also fearful — as long as Greg owned 50 percent of the company, he’d still collect 50 percent of the profits. As a result, Isaac felt his motivation flagging.
Ultimately, Isaac chose to end the partnership and continue on his own, despite the near-ubiquitous advice that being a solo founder is untenable. But Isaac had the opposite experience. Free of having to carry Greg’s load, he found his interest in his business reinvigorated, and his drive to succeed stronger than ever. As scary as it might have been for Isaac, the empowerment of full ownership far outweighed the risks.
Building ownership within the organization
It’s one thing for a founder to feel ownership over their company — they are, after all, the ones who built it. But equally important is making sure employees feel ownership over their work, too.
I mentioned the impact that psychological ownership has on performance. But how can you make your team feel “bought-in” to an organization when they don’t technically own it?
One way is to allow them to work on projects that feel challenging and rewarding. Remember the IKEA effect? It doesn’t just apply to objects. The same philosophy can be applied to the workplace. As Dan Cable writes for Harvard Business Review, no one wants to spend their day performing pre-programmed tasks over and over.
Employees want to be valued for the unique skills and perspectives they bring to the table, and the more you can reinforce this, and remind them of their role in the company at large, the better.
This doesn’t require a large-scale reimagining of anyone’s job description, either — some businesses, Cable explains, simply let their employees create their own titles. Such a maneuver costs the company nothing, but can have a powerful effect on an employee’s sense of ownership over their role and the work they perform within it. At Jotform, our cross-functional teams are given tons of flexibility and independence to work in the way that’s most effective for them. That freedom fosters their creativity and, in turn, helps them produce their best work. But an important aspect of that freedom is the sense of ownership they feel over their work. They’re contributing to the company’s overall goals, yes, but they are also working on projects they can be proud of.
Feeling ownership is a fundamental drive in human nature. Whether founders like to think of themselves as “owners” or not, we’re motivated by the fact that what we build is ours; that its success or failure is our responsibility. As Brené Brown aptly put it: “If you own this story, you get to write the ending.”
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