Nine reflections from a non-profit founder who is stepping back

In the summer of 2015, I co-founded Seenaryo, a nonprofit working in the Arab region through theatre and play to support people from underserved communities to lead, learn and heal.

Having started in Lebanon, where I lived for 10 years, Seenaryo now works in five countries (Lebanon, plus Jordan, Palestine, Syria and the UK). We’ve reached 180,000 people since inception, made 223 original theatre productions and worked in almost 500 schools. I’m continuing in a non-executive role as Seenaryo’s president, and plan to remain deeply connected to this community and set of ideas.

In the two months since stepping back, I have been reflecting on 10 years of deep, hard work and organisational growth amid relentless crises and continued injustice in the countries where we work.

Here are some thoughts which I’d have found helpful before starting our succession planning journey:

1. It takes time: The exit of a founder is a vulnerable time for any charity. Planning the transition needs time and careful thought. It took me two years of serious planning, plus many more of soul-searching, to get both myself and the organisation to the point where leaving felt possible. I benefitted from brilliant coaching funded by Seenaryo’s professional development budget; an invaluable investment even for smaller organisations.

2. Build an institution, not a personal project: Founder syndrome is real: too many nonprofit founders feel unable or unwilling to leave. They end up in a mutually dependent relationship with their organisation which serves nobody. It’s important for any founder to recognise they are building an institution, not a personal brand, and new colleagues are the future.

3. Leave when it’s hardest: Despite the struggles of delivering work in a region engulfed by conflict and declining international development funding, in 2025 Seenaryo and its team are stronger than ever. This makes it hard to leave, but picking the right moment to move on is key. Ideally, this should be when the organisation is at least stable and at best flourishing, when it has strong and committed team members and reserves that allow for at least a few months of transition time. Perversely, this means leaving when it feels least desirable to do so.

4. Your existing team is your greatest asset: Seenaryo’s trustees have ended up hiring my replacement internally. The brilliant new joint CEOs, Lara McIvor and Naqiya Ebrahim, are already thriving in their new roles. Our Chair Alex Khosla once reflected that it’s a sign of organisational strength – rather than timidity – if there are strong enough internal candidates to promote to the top executive role. Indeed, the LinkedIn 2020 Global Talent Trends Report  finds people stay 41% longer at companies with high internal hiring compared to those with low mobility.

5. Take the opportunities of succession: Succession can be a moment of fear and instability, but it’s also a moment of opportunity. Providing effective communication to the team is key. Emphasise both the continuity and the potential for exciting change. At Seenaryo we had a careful plan for bringing first key senior figures and then the entire team into the conversation about succession. Five months ahead of my departure, all the team were aware of the upcoming change. Many received promotions as part of the transition, which freed up capacity for the incoming joint CEOs to perform their new roles effectively, and boosted team morale.

6. Where next for the CEO? According to a report published in Stanford Social Innovation Review, 45% of nonprofit founders have a continuing role in their organisation, 31% pursue an amicable clean break, and 24% are ousted by the board. The report says that: “transitions that paired a founder in a continuing role with a successor from inside the organization proved to be the most successful of all transition models we examined”. The board judged that my new arms-length president role – rather than a trustee role – allows me to keep supporting and representing the organisation, while giving its new leadership the space to drive change. Having a written job description, including planned contact points in place for the outgoing CEO (in our case, prior to each board meeting), avoids misunderstandings, overreach or disengagement..

7. Keep supporters front and centre: Losing donors is another key risk of a leadership transition. Existing donors can lose interest or faith in the organisation, move with the outgoing CEO to their new venture, or simply see the transition as a convenient moment to shift their funding priorities. Ensuring that the founding CEO retains a role – and an email address, remaining visibly connected to the organisation – can help to mitigate this risk.

8. Make space for localisation – but don’t force it: My succession has laid the ground for a number of extraordinary team members in the Arab region, who have lived experience of the challenges we address as an organisation, to take on greater leadership roles. My transition has allowed them to be promoted to senior roles. While this marks a significant step towards deeper localisation, it’s also essential that these leaders are supported to grow into their new responsibilities, and that the process is paced carefully to maintain stability and the confidence of all stakeholders, including donors.

9. Mark the change to make it real: I’m lucky to have extraordinary colleagues who threw me two surprise leaving parties. Marking the transition properly made it real. As anthropologists have long observed, and the Irish poet John O’Donoghue wrote: “Without rituals to recognize or negotiate life’s thresholds, they pass by undistinguished. But when approached with reverence, crossing brings us more than we hoped for.” So mark the transition! The sector needs moments to celebrate amid dark days.