Founders are praised for their grit — but what about their grace?
In this powerful episode of The Flourishing Edge, Ashish Kothari sits down with Lisa Mikkelsen, Partner at Flourish Ventures, to explore the hidden mental and emotional costs of entrepreneurship — and how founders can thrive without sacrificing their well-being.
Lisa shares hard-won insights from 25 years in startups and venture capital, where she’s seen firsthand how “image management,” stigma, and burnout quietly derail brilliant founders. Together, they unpack how the VC world can evolve from “get rich or die trying” to “grow well and thrive together.”
This is a must-listen for founders, funders, and anyone passionate about building sustainable success — from the inside out.
💡 Key Topics & Takeaways:
1️⃣ The Hidden Barriers to Founder Well-being
Image management: Founders feel pressured to project confidence even when struggling.
Fear and stigma: Many hide their stress to avoid losing investor trust.
Reality check: Nearly 70–90% of founders experience mental health challenges — they’re not alone.
2️⃣ The Survival Trap of Startups
How founders slip into “I’ll rest when…” thinking.
Reframing survival mode with Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs — recognizing safety and rest as non-negotiable for creativity and performance.
Why postponing self-care leads to operating at 30–50% capacity when founders need 100%.
3️⃣ Lisa’s Journey: From Startups to Mental Health Advocacy
25 years across startups and VC revealed one truth: behind every business problem lies a human one.
Personal inspiration: raising a neurodiverse child changed how Lisa views inclusion, empathy, and awareness in leadership.
How Flourish Ventures shifted its mission to center founder mental health.
4️⃣ The Flourish Ventures Model: Investing in Human Flourishing
Beyond capital: providing coaching, therapy access, and community circles for founders.
Hosting monthly CEO and CXO gatherings designed for real conversations, not “chest-pounding.”
Funded and validated the first 7-question mental health diagnostic tool designed specifically for entrepreneurs.
Taking the movement global — reshaping the VC–founder relationship through empathy, trust, and transparency.
5️⃣ Rethinking the VC–Founder Relationship
Only 10% of founders tell investors when something’s going wrong.
Flourish Ventures combats that by training investors in:
6️⃣ The Organizational Ripple Effect
Founder well-being sets the tone for company culture.
Flourish Ventures runs CXO retreats and leadership coaching to spread healthy habits beyond the C-suite.
Spotlight on the “frozen middle” — how empowering middle managers transforms entire organizations.
7️⃣ Flourishing at Work and in Life
Ashish and Lisa reflect on the Happiness Squad model and McKinsey research:
97% of burnout factors come from job, team, and organizational systems — not individuals.
To flourish at work = to flourish in life. You can’t “survive work” and hope to thrive elsewhere.
“Work is where we spend most of our waking hours — it should be a source of joy, not depletion.”
8️⃣ Lisa’s Daily Practices for Flourishing
🌿 Time in nature — even 5 minutes daily
📝 Journaling to process emotions and build self-awareness
💤 Sleep as a non-negotiable
🧘♀️ Quarterly rest breaks to reset energy and clarity
💨 Breathwork & mindfulness to stay anchored in the present
9️⃣ Advice for Founders
“Find a way to disconnect from work every single day — even for five minutes. Build that muscle.”
And for investors:
“The next time you talk to your founder, ask how they are doing — not how the business is doing. Then ask again: how are you really?”
👩💼 About the Guest
Lisa Mikkelsen is a Partner at Flourish Ventures, a global venture firm redefining what responsible investing looks like. She leads initiatives that support founder mental health and organizational well-being, integrating empathy, psychology, and business performance.
🔗 Connect with Lisa on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisamikkelsen1/
🧘♂️ About the Host
Ashish Kothari is the founder of Happiness Squad, author of Hardwired for Happiness, and host of The Flourishing Edge Podcast.
He helps leaders unlock joy, resilience, and performance through science-based habits of flourishing.
If this episode resonated with you, share it with a founder or leader who needs permission to rest and reconnect.
Subscribe to The Flourishing Edge Podcast for weekly insights on living, leading, and working with greater joy, health, love, and meaning.
__________________________________________________
Happiness Squad Website: https://happinesssquad.com/
Ashish Kothari: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashishkothari1/
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/@MyHappinessSquad
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/happiness-squad
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myhappinesssquad/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/myhappinesssquad
Transcript
Ashish Kothari:
Welcome to The Flourishing Edge, the podcast where we share weekly tips on making flourishing your competitive edge. I’m Ashish Kothari, your host, and each week we dive deep with flourishing experts, changemakers, and executives to share best practices that help unlock higher performance through science-based interventions.
Let’s step together into the edge of what’s possible and live, work, and lead with more joy, health, love, and meaning.
Lisa, thank you for joining us. It’s wonderful to have you with us from Denmark today.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Thanks, Ashish. It’s great to be here.
Ashish Kothari:
You’ve spent so much time focused on mental health, especially founder mental health through Flourish Ventures. What do you see as the biggest barriers preventing founders and leaders from truly flourishing while building companies?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
One of the biggest barriers, especially for early-stage founders, is image management. There’s this pressure to project that you have everything under control and can’t show weakness. That can be really dangerous, because when something is going on, there’s no safe way to surface it.
This also shows up in founder–investor relationships. Founders often hesitate to share challenges with funders because they fear losing trust or future funding. There’s a lot of fear wrapped up in that.
Ashish Kothari:
It’s like the image of a duck—calm on the surface, paddling frantically underneath. And yet, building a company is full of uncertainty. What would become possible if founders could be honest about not having it all figured out?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
That openness creates a growth mindset. It allows flexibility, adaptability, and recovery when things don’t go as planned. Instead of being overly attached to outcomes, founders can stay committed to the process of building.
Ashish Kothari:
I’ve thought a lot about Maslow’s hierarchy in the startup context. Even though many founders live in environments where basic needs are met, startups often put people back into survival mode. How do you help founders step out of that myopic mindset?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Founders operate under extreme ambiguity. Many take pay cuts and shoulder responsibility for employees and investors. Self-care becomes secondary. But when founders don’t rest or recover, creativity, communication, and decision-making all suffer. Burnout becomes inevitable.
Ashish Kothari:
Tell me about your own origin story. What moments shaped your focus on flourishing and mental health?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Professionally, after 25 years working with startups and venture capital, I saw again and again that surface-level problems were rarely the real issue. Mental health challenges were everywhere.
Around:Ashish Kothari:
What do you see in terms of prevalence of mental health struggles among founders?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Research shows founders are significantly more likely to experience depression, anxiety, and other mental health challenges. Almost all founders experience stress or anxiety at some point—it fluctuates, but it’s common.
Ashish Kothari:
And yet so many founders feel alone.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Exactly. That’s the danger. They believe struggling means they’re failing, when in reality it’s part of doing something extraordinarily difficult.
Ashish Kothari:
Tell us about the work Flourish Ventures is doing now.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Our mission has several layers. First, we support our portfolio founders through coaching, therapy, and structured support. We also invest heavily in community—CEO groups, CTO groups, CXO gatherings—designed for vulnerability, not posturing.
Beyond our portfolio, we engage the broader VC ecosystem, exploring how investor–founder relationships can be healthier and more human.
One initiative I’m especially proud of is funding a clinically validated mental health diagnostic tool designed specifically for entrepreneurs. It’s a short questionnaire that helps founders identify early signs of struggle and access support sooner.
Ashish Kothari:
I love how holistic that approach is—supporting individuals, communities, and systems.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Community normalizes the struggle. When founders realize they’re not alone, shame dissolves.
Ashish Kothari:
You’re challenging a venture capital model that often prioritizes speed and scale over sustainability.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Yes. There’s pressure from LPs and structural incentives, but that doesn’t mean we can’t lead with humanity. Transparency and vulnerability from investors can create trust and open real conversations.
Ashish Kothari:
How do you prepare your own team to show up with empathy when founders share difficult news?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
We invest in empathy training, psychological safety training, and listening skills. We also work on power-dynamic awareness. When someone comes to you with bad news, how you respond in that moment can define the relationship.
Ashish Kothari:
What about organizational well-being beyond founders?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Bandwidth is the challenge. We focus on leadership teams as the highest-leverage point. Management capability, especially middle management, is critical and often underdeveloped in startups.
Ashish Kothari:
What personal practices help you stay grounded?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Daily time in nature, journaling, quarterly time off, and sleep—sleep is non-negotiable.
Ashish Kothari:
What advice would you give founders listening right now?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Disconnect from your work every single day, even briefly. Build that muscle.
Ashish Kothari:
If investors and founders made one change tomorrow to promote flourishing, what should it be?
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Ask, “How are you doing?”
Pause.
And really listen.
Ashish Kothari:
Lisa, thank you for your work, your wisdom, and your humanity.
Lisa Mikkelsen:
Thank you, Ashish. This was a rich conversation.
