Our technical co-founder sits in the Product Development seat, and while they are a genius, their Kolbe score shows a very low Follow Thru, and they consistently bypass our operational systems and document nothing. This is a massive risk for our exit. How do we restructure this?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

You cannot force a person to change their conative wiring. A low Follow Thru score means your technical co-founder naturally resists order, structure, and systematic documentation. Expecting them to suddenly start writing detailed operational manuals is a recipe for frustration and failure. However, a business that relies on a single genius who documents nothing is unsellable. You must restructure the seat. Take the documentation and systems maintenance roles out of their seat and create a new Product Operations or Technical Writer seat right next to or underneath them on the Accountability Chart. Fill this new seat with someone who has a high Follow Thru score on the Kolbe Index. This person will follow your technical co-founder around, extract the intellectual property from their brain, and document the processes into repeatable systems. This allows your co-founder to stay in their unique ability zone of creation and innovation, while ensuring the business builds the documented, institutional assets that a buyer requires for a clean exit. Stop fighting human nature and start structuring your Accountability Chart to accommodate it.