Being a founder can be surprisingly lonely.

You can have a team, investors, co-founders and a calendar that barely lets you breathe, and still have very few places where you can talk openly about what’s actually going on. The decisions you’re struggling with. The things keeping you up at night. The lessons you’re learning the hard way. Or simply the fact that sometimes you have absolutely no idea what you’re doing.

That’s why we created this space at The Pool. It started as Leadership Room, a space for founders to talk about leadership. After three sessions, it became clear that what people really needed was broader: a space without judgement, without posturing, and without the pressure to arrive with answers.

In one of the sessions, someone jokingly called it Founders Anonymous. We laughed. Then we realised: that’s exactly what it is. One person even said, “This has been better than therapy.” We’re not making that promise. But we do know this kind of space feels very much needed.

So, we’re keeping the name and leaning into what it has become.