Founder Therapy with Navrina Singh

In the first episode of NTE’s Founder Therapy Series, Lauren Ipsen, Talent Partner at Decibel, interviews Navrina Singh, founder and CEO of Credo AI. Navrina shares her journey from leading AI products at Microsoft to founding Credo AI in 2020. She discusses the challenges she faced, such as creating a new category in AI governance and navigating the complexities of the startup world. The conversation also covers essential advice for new founders, the importance of trusting one's gut, and strategies for attracting and retaining talent. The episode concludes with insights into successful venture partnerships and the future of AI governance.

00:00 Welcome to Never Too Early: Founder Therapy Series
00:27 Introducing Navrina Singh: From Microsoft Exec to Entrepreneur
01:11 The Journey to Founding Credo AI
03:54 Challenges and Misconceptions in AI Governance
08:58 Building a Strong Team and Company Culture
22:17 Navigating Venture Capital and Fundraising
31:00 Advice for Aspiring Founders
38:52 Speed Round and Final Thoughts

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Transcript
LAUREN IPSEN: Happy 2025 and welcome back to Never Too Early, a YouTube series focused on unconventional talent insights for founders. I'm Lauren Ipsen, Talent Partner at Decibel. Today, we start our first episode of our founder therapy series. In this series, we'll be spending time with executives that have recently taken the leap to start their own venture-backed tech companies.

We'll cover early learnings, misconceptions, mistakes, and a whole lot more. So today, I am super excited to welcome my first guest, Navrina Singh. Navrina was formerly the head of AI product at Microsoft before embarking on her entrepreneurial journey in March of 2020.

Navrina, welcome to the show.

NAVRINA SINGH: Thank you so much for having me, Lauren.

LAUREN IPSEN: I am so grateful that you're here. You are the perfect guest to kick off 2025 with and to kick off our founder series with more generally. So thank you for joining us. And already, in advance, appreciate your willingness to just be open and candid and help other people learn from you.

NAVRINA SINGH: Well, excited to be here and excited to kick off New Year’s for founders like myself who might be trying to figure out what to do next.

LAUREN IPSEN: Okay. Awesome. Let's start from the beginning. Talk to me about when you thought it might be a good idea to embark on a founder journey. And if you always kind of felt like maybe you had that itch to be a CEO or if it's something that kind of emerged more in recent years.

NAVRINA SINGH: So Lauren, it's interesting. I've, throughout my career, gravitated towards hard problem. And for me, it's really bringing a builder's mindset to what is the most complex thing the world needs solving and is—do I have the competency or the right people that I can bring together to solve for that?

So for me, starting Credo AI now almost five years ago was barely not just one fine day waking up and saying, I want to be CEO and founder, but it was a lot of small moments in my career. And that started for me almost 20 years ago. As a hardware engineer, I was—I had just started with a company called Qualcomm based out of San Diego.

And there, one of the early things that I was gravitating towards was this whole mobile revolution. You know, how do you actually connect the world through some of the most powerful technology? So, spending a couple of years—decades, actually, there at Qualcomm building some foundational technology in mobile, connecting the world, really laid a solid foundation for me to always continuously see where the buck was going.

And I did that again when the robotics revolution happened, and we were bringing machine learning, especially on extensive platforms like GPU to make sure that, you know, some of the core capabilities, especially data sets like ImageNet that was getting launched, that we could make them available on mobile ecosystem.

And then from robotics, saw the next wave of AI and machine learning and was at Microsoft leading the charge on conversational AI and cognitive services, which were the next frontier of machine learning and AI.

And so, looking at those past, I would say, 20 years, one of the common themes that always emerged was how are we going to make sure that this very transformational technology, which everyone calls artificial intelligence—is it secure? Is it safe? Is it compliant? Is it actually working on behalf of humans?

And to do that, it's not one thing. It really needs to focus on creating that infrastructure of trust and really rethinking how AI and machine learning applications need to be built.

LAUREN IPSEN: And so you mentioned that you started this journey with Credo AI about five years ago. What made you think five years ago that this was going to be something that was going to be so impactful today? How have you personally had to change and shift and continue to be iterative during this process? Because AI has changed so much, probably, since you started your journey five years ago.

NAVRINA SINGH: You know, Lauren, that's a really interesting question. Do want to distinguish between AI and the space that Credo is in, which is the AI governance. And, you know, artificial intelligence by itself has existed for 50-plus years. And, you know, we've sort of gone through these predictive ML systems, and then gen AI boom, and now agentic AI systems, and all these new frontier AI capabilities.

And so, you know, five years ago when I started the company, the vision was very clear. We wanted to make sure that we have the infrastructure of trust that is enabling this technology to be compliant, to be safe, to be fair, to be responsible. But what was, I would say, a little bit underestimated by me was how misunderstood AI governance space was.

So, you know, we had to spend, I would say, the first two years not only creating the category AI governance. We took that to the White House, took that to G20, went to the analysts, spoke extensively about why guardrails for artificial intelligence or AI governance needs to be a new category and not baked in into the static governance, risk and compliance systems or the technical MLOps and AIOps systems, and why there's a last-mile problem that needs to be solved.

And what was very fascinating for us was the first two years, really seeing how it is so misunderstood, because governance is always perceived as a barrier rather than as a launchpad.

Secondly, really spending time on making sure that the stakeholders who are involved in AI governance understand the value, the ROI of actually having good governance, how it accelerates sales, how it helps with customer retention, how it helps with product innovation and top line growth. All those metrics and all that groundwork had to be done in the first two years. Then also showing the solutions in terms of how you can guide this very transformational technology in the right way.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah.Awesome. You spoke to this a little bit, and I'd love for you to take it a level deeper. You talked about some of the challenges that came up in the first couple of years in creating a net new category and, like, all of the complexity that comes along with that.

What were some other challenges that maybe you weren't expecting you'd run into as a founder?

NAVRINA SINGH: You know, that's a great question. I mean, how much time do we have?

LAUREN IPSEN: Do you want to get drinks?

NAVRINA SINGH: You know, it's—for anyone who's running a startup, they know that, you know, each and every day, it's like a new challenge. It's a roller coaster. I would say, like, concretely a few big market challenges.

One, I think, was really coming in in this very noisy MLOps, AIOps ecosystem, and trying to really understand why the customers weren't able to build responsible AI solutions.

So I’d say that we had to spend a lot of time talking to the customers and understanding the market need in terms of what are the current MLOps tooling that actually can't solve for governance, and what GRC tooling can't solve for governance, and why this needs to be a new category. That was a big early problem.

The second problem, especially when you're creating a category, is most of the customers don't know what good looks like. So how do you actually build with them and how do you create with them while giving them confidence that you are the experts who can take them into the future and pull the future forward for them, but at the same time, taking their feedback and building the product along with these amazing customers, right? And I would say that was a pretty big problem for us to solve as we've done this.

And then the third core thing was how do you actually, you know, attract the right talent? Because what we're trying to solve is a generational problem. It is one of the most important technologies of our world. And so having those core mission-aligned people with the right competencies who can actually see the founder vision, and sometimes not agree with it, but can see a pathway to it—how do you actually bring in and pull in the right talent to sort of join you on that journey is really important for a founder to pay attention to.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah. Talk to me a little bit about learnings in that regard, but also just kind of overarching strategy around talent acquisition, how you're building pipeline, and how you're thinking about, you know, continuing to retain great people once you bring them into the org.

I think these are a lot of things that I often get asked in the early days of working with founders is, okay, the first and most important thing is, I want to bring in someone great. And then next, a year from now, how do I keep them excited and engaged and feeling like they're, you know, still working on a common goal with me?

NAVRINA SINGH: Yeah. You know, it's one of the core things, Lauren, for me as a founder has been—the two core focus areas. One is staying very close to customers and understanding the pain points so that we can actually build a product that can solve their problems.

And then, secondly, is continuously recruiting and talking to the right talent. And so, you know, just to unpack how I think about talent, I think there's three stages I think about talent in. One is obviously who I want on my team, because I want the smartest people in the room with me so that we can build this future vision of what AI governance looks like. And so how do you constantly find that talent and stay connected with them?

Second is how do you attract that talent to a young startup which is just starting, right? And is trying to figure out who that startup is going to be in this world. So how do you attract talent to your company?

And then the third component is retention. How do you actually retain these folks? So in terms of—I spend a lot of time making sure that I am in spaces with people who are looking at the future in ways that I might not have imagined, especially in AI. And so I'm constantly networking, constantly talking to new talent. And you are one of our core champions in making sure that I'm connected to the right people.

Now, in terms of attracting the talent, I've built a framework over the past couple of years and I would say over the past couple of decades. You know, you're really sort of bringing together a set of Avengers who have superpowers which are complementary. And you need to be very thoughtful about how you're going to evaluate them.

And for me, I use a 3C framework. I look for three things. The first C is compass. Are you aligned on the values and the mission of what we are trying to build here at Credo AI? Because what is going to keep us together on a very complicated and tough journey is going to be that mission. So that is a nonnegotiable for me is what is your compass and how mission-aligned are you to making sure that this AI technology is going in the right way.

The second for me is competency. And as you can imagine, you know, this is where I always look for what I like to call T-shaped people, like people who have the vision, but are really grounded in relentless execution, can go deep and get things done.

Because again, in a startup, you have to roll up your sleeves and be able to, you know, literally hold the blueprint in one hand and hammer in the other hand. You can see where you're going, but be flexible enough to find different ways. So for me, that competency is really critical—not just your technical competency or business competency, but really making sure that you are, you know, able to flex your muscle in going wide and going deep when needed and relentlessly executing.

And then the third C for me is really around courage. You know, it's—startups are hard. You know, it's like eating glass each and every day. And so I always look for people who exhibited courage in their careers and their professional and personal lives.

Because day in, day out, you have to be so flexible to change. You have to actually invite it. You're going to be pivoting quite often. Not every day is going to be the highest of highs. There are going to be days when it's going to be super fricking low. And so you actually have the courage, knowing all the unknowns, to be able to dive in completely.

And then on retention, you know, again, big philosophy for me is have you created a culture which creates a psychologically safe environment for people to figure out their best version while aligning to what we are trying to solve for at the company.

And at Credo AI, for us, you know, we pay equal amount of importance to the product that we are building, the AI governance software to guide your AI, as we are paying attention to our credo, which is our culture. Because to make sure that you're bringing in the highest-performing people, giving them the agency to fail forward, to learn fast, and then giving them an environment where they can really exercise their growth mindset.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah. So you spoke to culture, and that's something I wanted to talk with you about because I truly think that you have done such a remarkable job on this front.

And as your talent partner, it has made my job so much easier because I've been able to connect great people to you that everyone just really loves it, loves the people, loves the working environment, feels like it's collaborative and, like, genuinely feels excited about what they're building.

Talk to me a little bit about how you've been able to successfully do that and build that. That is not something that I think comes naturally to a lot of first-time founders. I'd love to hear from you, you know, how you've created such a special place.

NAVRINA SINGH: So before I come to tactically what we have done, I would also say this is the curse of being a first-time founder. I started this company after spending 18 years in big companies.

And the interesting thing is, the reason I call it sometimes the curses is, in fundraise, that doesn't help because everyone's like, can you really be a founder? Because you've always been in big companies, safety nets, the cultures could be not so great. But on the flip side, the positive side, is in my 18 years at these massive, amazing companies, I've also seen what is not good culture.

So with that, we take our credo very seriously. So the three things that I would love to share with you is, first, I deeply, I would say, invest time. But I've also from day one focused a lot on making sure that we are intentional about our company values. We actually make sure that in every things we do, every action we take, these company values are amplified.

So as an example, one of our core values is around intentional velocity. How do we move really fast, but making sure that we are very intentional about communicating that change, intentional about taking the data, intentional about paying attention to our gut. So for us, we've spent a lot of time on our credo, and we evolve that credo as new people come in into the company. We are always constantly looking at it.

For example, we review all our company values twice a year when the company meets in our off-sites. So the entire company meets twice a year. to review our goals, to review our values. And we do that in person, really having extensive debates about do these values still serve us?

LAUREN IPSEN: So important.

NAVRINA SINGH: So important. And more importantly, are these—are we doing this in action, right? That's really key.

The second concrete thing, which I'm actually very proud of, I started the company a week before shelter-in-place in California. I've hired my first set of core founding members over Zoom. Never met them for first two years. And then when the world opened up, actually met them.

So as you can imagine, as a fully distributed company, we are right now in US, we are in Europe. What becomes really key is having a clear vision of how do I work well and how do you work well? Basically, talk about simple things. What are my hours of operation? How do I like feedback? When am I not at my best? How do I like communication, which is urgent, which is not urgent?

So this is a very, I would say, thoughtfully crafted operating plan. So think about it like an API to Lauren.

LAUREN IPSEN: I’m smiling because I just implemented something very similar at Decibel within our partner system.

And it's something that we're kicking off this year is really a disc analysis and creating a guide as to how to work with each other. And, you know, Jon, who you've worked with—I don't know what it is, Navrina, but for whatever reason, if I get a call and it's like 8:00 PM, I'm immediately, like—I feel like I'm getting fired. I'm immediately beyond stressed out for whatever reason.

And it could just be someone checking in to see how my day was, but my everything goes up. And it's probably some, like, past trauma that I should deal with. But I've talked to Jon. And so, he's like, do you know how simple it is for us to communicate that across the team and just say, if you're doing great work, then the rest of it speaks for itself.

And you can create boundaries and figure out how to be the best version of yourself at work and how to have people work best with you.

NAVRINA SINGH: You have to approach your operating manuals with a lot of care because it is very personal, you know. So something we spend a lot of time on. We do review them every quarter.

You can pick your own cadence. But as an example, I'm a 3:30 AM person. I wake up early. That's my time when I think, I reflect. I'm delegating stuff at that time. But not everyone wakes up at 4:00 AM, 5:00 AM. So, you know, I always say, like, I might tag you on a Slack message. You don't have to respond right away. But if there is an expectation that I have that you—I need a response from you, I'll make sure that I need the response within the day or within the hour, right? And I think that helps in the distributed world so well.

So for us, operating manuals are a really key part of how we communicate. And then the last thing, which you did mention. You know, I'm a big believer, irrespective of how many years of experience you have, the best leaders, the best people who continue to exhibit growth mindset are the ones who are willing to learn and get coached.

So throughout my life, throughout my professional career, I've always had a coach. And some good coaches retire after a while because I've learned everything from them. And then I bring in new coaches.

And we've implemented that at Credo AI as well. The entire leadership team had a coach for two years, and then we expanded that coach for the rest of the organization as an opt-in.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah.

NAVRINA SINGH: There's a lot of, I would say, value in seeking help and seeking help sooner. And I think coaches are a really great way to have this third party who you can just go to as a sounding board to figure out your best version.

LAUREN IPSEN: Totally. And we all have coaches at Decibel too. And the fact of the matter is work and different dynamics with different people of different walks of life, it can be very emotional, and it can be really, really difficult. And so I think to be able to have someone to just gut check you and allow it to really not affect your work outside of that is so huge. It's—it's everything.

So I also really liked that you said after a couple of years that you will eventually get a new coach as opposed to just being like, well, now I know everything ‘cause I did coaching for two years. It's like, no, there's probably just another person in a different area that we can focus more on.

NAVRINA SINGH: I think for high performers, we always feel that there's—it's never enough. I'm a work in progress, and the more people I can learn from, the better it is. And that is the kind of people and talent that really thrives at Credo AI. You know, because when you have that mentality, there's so much more to learn, but I have the skills to execute relentlessly, and I'll find a way.

I think that's what startups are all about. You don't—you know, if you're—if you fold under pressure, startups are not for you. And I think that's one of the big things in fundraise as well, especially in my, I would say, first-time founder fundraise stories five years ago, I—one of my biggest lessons learned was the investors were really looking for someone who was not going to fold under the pressure when the entire world is against you and the entire world does not understand AI governance, right?

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah.

NAVRINA SINGH: I think having—attracting that kind of talent in a startup is so critical. So I'm always looking for people who are like, boom, I fell. Let's get up and come back stronger. And how can you do that better again and again and again?

LAUREN IPSEN: Talk to me about the importance of being really selective when you're building relationships with different venture capitalists and a little bit about the journey that Credo's had. I'd love to understand, you know, some of the highs, some of the lows, and some of the learnings from that process.

NAVRINA SINGH: So, you know, Lauren, I was very fortunate that our pre-seed was with AI Fund and Dr. Andrew Ning. They took an early bet on us. And they created the infrastructure to actually help us with an early pilot customer as well.

And right after the pre-seed, which was our 2020, we went out to raise our seed fundraise in January of 2021. So just a little bit of data, like, we pitched to 92 investors.

LAUREN IPSEN: Wow.

NAVRINA SINGH: In three weeks. And the way we created our 92 investor list was obviously a lot of relationships I had built over the past almost two decades. It was a set of friends, people who knew my work from my past. You know, obviously technological innovations. But it was also new people who are interested in what is AI governance and why do I need to invest it.

After those 92 investors, the reason I wanted to do that was—I wasn't looking for a check. I really was looking for someone who, one, could see what I was seeing, which was AI governance becoming a critical infrastructure of trust and building a generational company.

I was not looking for someone who was just looking to invest in a fast growth company that could disappear tomorrow, right? I knew that I'm in it for the long haul.

The second thing I was looking for was a partner because I'm a first-time founder. I don't know so much about startup ecosystem. I know a lot about technology. I know a lot about building businesses. But I don't know a lot about the challenges of being a first-time founder. So I really wanted to make sure that I could have a partner who understood the pains, or at least would connect me to the right people in the ecosystem who I could use as a support system.

And then the third thing was I was really looking for somebody who would feel my pain and I was not a dot in their portfolio. So one of the things I did shy away from was going to Tier 1 VCs at that time, because, you know, AI governance, we knew that we had to create the category. We knew we had to educate the world.

We knew we had to go talk to customers to figure out what our first product is going to look like. We didn't—we weren't coming into an already crowded space. We were creating space for others to come in and succeed.

So I think you need a very different kind of investor mindset for that. Someone who can see your vision, who can believe in the vision, and who knows that this is going to be a tough journey, but once you get through the initial moments of creating that space, the market is yours to take.

What I learned was they were looking for a founder who would not fold. A founder with much conviction, technical competence, as well as the right network to help this company succeed in making sure that, in this new market that we are creating and leading, that everyone can see the vision and then the journey that we are on in solving this very complex problem of AI governance.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah. I love it. I think something that personally drew me to Decibel was that I really do believe that we're a firm that is in the trenches with you, you know? Not just in the glory days, but through some of the really difficult days that can feel so lonely as a founder. And you talked about, you know, how when you were raising, you were thinking about, you know, this is—I'm in it for the long haul, right?

I don't want to be something that just disappears in a couple of years. To think about how many companies raised in 2021 and are now nonexistent today in 2025, you know, I think it's crazy. It was—it's probably the biggest drop-off that we had seen in a very, very long time. And so I'd imagine there were a lot of really difficult days and then some that were, you know, you could see the light at the end of the tunnel.

When did you feel like—if you have felt this yet—okay, there's a light, and I— you know, I really feel like we're kind of starting to figure out how to be a very legitimate business?

NAVRINA SINGH: I would say that for us, the breakout moment was really generative AI. So ChatGPT came to world like almost now two years ago. And the March of 2023, all the businesses. So we generally sell into Global 2000s who are already AI-mature organizations. They're not only deploying AI at scale across multiple different use cases, but they're also buying third-party AI systems. So our customers include companies like MasterCard, Booz Allen, Northrop Grumman, you know, Cisco, others.

And so, as you can imagine, these companies are not playing at the small scale. They're playing at massive scale, and there's a lot at stake for them when AI does not go the way that they want it to. So everything from safety, reliability, robustness, compliance of these systems is really important to them.

Most of these organizations started to, one, not only adopt more third-party gen AI applications and foundation models, but also started to explore ways to put them in production. And none of these companies would put something out there which is going to risk their customer brand, their reputation, or is going to risk their customer, you know, capabilities.

And so what we found was governance suddenly became center stage. It is literally at the same priority as cybersecurity is now. Most of the organizations, as you would see, Lauren, have started to put in place, similar to CISOs, a chief AI officer role in the past year. And the chief AI officer now is responsible for not only the risk management and compliance of AI, but also the innovation with artificial intelligence.

So we are now seeing, I would say, a massive shift in creation of a role who's responsible for AI governance budget being allocated not only as part of the AI strategy, but as part of the company strategy. We've also started to see a massive shift in boards of companies putting in place either an AI expert or thinking about AI strategy at the board level, so that organizations are going into 2025 very deeply committed to adopting AI, but also managing its risk.

And then, lastly, we are seeing a pretty big focus now by organizations on thinking ahead. What does AI agents, autonomous systems mean for our business? Can we undertake that this year or is it going to be next year? And if that is the case, what does my governance across these different chains of reasoning look like, and how am I going to make sure that the alignment has happened?

So I would say those past almost 22 months have been a pretty big moment for Credo AI and finally a breakaway and breakout year for us.

LAUREN IPSEN: I love it. That's awesome. And so, yeah, I mean, it took three years, I guess, for you to feel like, okay, this is the moment that we were waiting for, right? And so I think that's why you want to find the right partners to invest with early. That's why you want to have the right people around you on your team, because it can be lonely in the first couple of years.

NAVRINA SINGH: And you know, Lauren, in our business, there's still a lot of, you know, how do you price the system? We do both SaaS and on-prem. How much should we be investing in on-prem when the world is moving towards cloud? Most of our regulated clients still want to stay on on-prem. When should we be getting FedRAMP-certified because we do serve into government versus when not?

So there's still a lot to be sort of figured out. But I think in terms of governance is here to stay and make sure that your AI investments are going to be successful. Most of the organizations now are recognizing and putting stake in the ground for AI governance.

LAUREN IPSEN: I agree entirely. Talk to me about—let's say you have a friend that comes to you tomorrow and says, “Navrina, I want—I'm going to start a company. I don't know what it's going to be, but I just—I want to do something on my own.”

What are some words of advice that you would provide, things for them to be wary of, and different challenges or learnings that you faced that, you know, you really didn't expect or that people don't tell you about when you go to start a company?

NAVRINA SINGH: Wow, there's a lot to unpack there, Lauren.

LAUREN IPSEN: Another opportunity for a glass of wine.

NAVRINA SINGH: Oh, exactly. I think the first thing—one of my favorite quotes of all times is you don't have to be great to get started, but you have to be—you have to start to be great. And so if someone is coming to me and saying, “Oh gosh, I'm thinking about a company. I have this idea I've been thinking about,” do it.

I mean, bias towards action. It's only when you start taking those steps, can you figure out, are you taking the steps in the right direction or do you need to course-correct? So don't wait to be great. Just get started. That's the only pathway to greatness. So that would be my first piece of advice.

The second piece of advice that I would give, I think, don't outsource your gut. You know, as one of the things that it took me, you know, a while, even though I come with, like, massive technical background, lot of great experience, I would say it took me a while to really trust my gut in a startup system where things are changing so quickly.

And I would really advise a first-time founder to really trust their gut more so than data, more so than anything else, because when things get hard, none of the data matters. What matters is, are you willing to stay the course? And do you have the conviction and confidence in yourself to stay that course? And the only thing that is going to be with you is not the team, not the investors, not anybody.

It's going to be you and your gut.

So I would say that, really, for first-time founders, trusting your gut and not outsourcing it, not depending on anyone else to make the hard decisions that you will need to make literally on early basis is really, I would say, critical.

And then I think the last thing is, you know, this is maybe sometimes the disadvantage of being a technical founder is you get married to the idea. So something I share with my team all the time is, you know, we know we have a clear vision of where we are headed, and we have a clear mission. But how we get there, let's be very flexible on that. So, you know, let's have very strong views, which are loosely held, so that you can course-correct and change direction.

And I really try to find people to join us at Credo AI who are willing to be flexible and experimenting on the pathway to that destination, because the destination is clear. We are building the infrastructure of trust for artificial intelligence where AI is going to be serving humanity. Now to get to that, there's going to be different pathways.

You need to be flexible, listen to your customers, spend a lot of time with your customers to really understand, is this something they're going to pay for? Is this something that's actually solving a pain point for them? And are you actually delivering impact on daily basis? And if you're not doing that, you know what?You're doing the wrong things.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah. You don't have a business.

NAVRINA SINGH: You don't have a business. Exactly. Being very strong-minded in your mission and vision, but being very flexible in the path you choose to get there, I think is really critical for not just first-time founders, but any founder who's trying to disrupt a big space.

LAUREN IPSEN: Those are awesome tips. Awesome tips.

Any misconceptions around being a founder that you've—you feel like you've experienced firsthand?

NAVRINA SINGH: You know, the world only gets to see your high moments. And everyone's like, “Oh my God, it's so exciting to be a founder day in, day out and doing the”—you know, you—certainly, there is a lot of joy.

There's—you're building something which is hard. It's complex. But I would literally say, if you find a founder, go hug that founder because that founder is going through a lot of hardship on day in, day out. Because when you're building something which is very complex the entire world can't see and the entire world is questioning whether you can actually even build it, there's a lot behind the scenes.

And so it is a hard journey, but it is the most gratifying journey that anyone can ever embark on as a builder. So I would say that, you know, go bet on yourself and bet on your dream.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah. This is—you know, I think you just said go hug that founder if they're—if you hear that they're, you know, on this journey. It's funny you say that because we decided, and this is now confirming it—so thank you, Navrina, because you're going to help us change the name—instead of founder series, we're going to do our founder therapy series. So, thank you.

It really is. I mean, I think that there's so much. And it can be incredibly difficult. You're navigating external stakeholders for the first time, trying to understand what's important to them. And what's important to one firm might be different from the next.

And, you know, I just think there's so much learnings all the time, and you really just have to, you know, put your ego aside and just know that everyone has the same intention, and that's to just help the company and you be successful, right?

NAVRINA SINGH: And, you know, I think this is where the—I truly believe this is where trusting your instincts and inner power becomes so critical because what's—what you're going through, you first have to communicate.

You know, as an example, a lot of people are afraid of pivots, and I actually think pivots are a great way to course-correct to your mission and vision. I think what I have learned in my journey is when you're doing that pivots, and if you're silent and not communicating with your team, you're not communicating with your board, you're not communicating with your investors, that's when problems happen because they don't know what's happening behind the scenes.

So the power of communication becomes really critical for alignment, especially in a fast-moving organization, which is literally trying to build something massive and is trying to build—solve complex problems.

So this goes back to—just to bring it all together, Lauren, when you're looking for people for your startup, not only having the competency, the courage, the—you know, the commitment to the mission, but having that great communication skills go a long way because you have to be constantly communicating, aligning as you're moving so fast and relentlessly executing.

That is one of the biggest things that founders can bring to the table for your team.

LAUREN IPSEN: Awesome. This has been so incredibly insightful, truly. I can't thank you enough. I think, you know, you have this incredible way of being so candid, but also so poised in the way that you think about these different things and create structure around things that can feel really intangible.

So this is just going to be so helpful, you know, for people to think about the three C's and think about building a really special place to work that, you know, they can trust their gut while also communicating effectively with stakeholders.

There's so much here. And I know that you and I could spend probably five more hours going through all of it, but this was an amazing starting place. So thank you so, so much.

To wrap, I would love to do just a final speed round of questions, if you're up for it.

NAVRINA SINGH: I am always up for it, Lauren. Thank you.

LAUREN IPSEN: Okay. A book, a podcast, or a resource that you think every founder should know about.

NAVRINA SINGH: Wow. That's a tough one because I am an avid reader, and I listen to a lot of podcasts. But the one that I'm reading right now and I'm a massive fan of is Amp It Up by Frank Slootman.

Highly recommend reading that book. And the field book is also very useful for founders who are on a high-growth trajectory for their businesses.

LAUREN IPSEN: Cool. Awesome. Best piece of advice that you've received to date as a founder?

NAVRINA SINGH: I think it goes back to never outsource your gut. You have to believe in your inner power and trust your instincts. Even when you have all the data and the entire world might be against your gut, trust that gut.

LAUREN IPSEN: Yeah, I agree with that.

All right, we will wrap there. Thank you so much. Super excited for 2025 with you. And again, can't thank you enough for all of the wisdom that you've provided on today's episode. So appreciate you wholeheartedly. Thank you, Navrina.

NAVRINA SINGH: Thank you so much for having me, Lauren.

LAUREN IPSEN: Awesome. And thank you, listeners of Never Too Early. More to come soon.