We've been running coworking spaces across India for years now, and there's this pattern we keep seeing that honestly breaks our heart a little. Amazing founders walk into our spaces with these incredible ideas, solid funding, brilliant teams. Everything looks perfect on paper.
But then months later, we're watching the same teams fall apart. Not because of competition or market issues that would almost make more sense. It's because the person leading everyone just... doesn't get people. At all.
There was this study we came across recently that really hit home. Startups with leaders who understand emotions? They're 60% more likely to succeed. When you think about how many promising companies just vanish every year, that number should make every founder pay attention.
The Damage We See Every Single Day
Walking through our managed office spaces and coworking environments, you start recognizing the signs pretty quickly. There's always that one team where something just feels off.
The really talented people start disappearing first. And we're talking about the ones who could work anywhere they want—the engineers who get headhunted constantly, the designers everyone wants to poach. They don't stick around for leaders who treat them like they're invisible or brush off their concerns.
Then you notice how decisions get made in these teams. Everything becomes about spreadsheets and metrics, which isn't necessarily bad, but when you completely ignore how those decisions affect real human beings sitting right there? That's when things get weird.
Communication becomes this strange, robotic thing. We've literally overheard leaders giving feedback like they're reading from a manual. Zero warmth, zero connection. Just "fix this, do that, why isn't this done?" People aren't machines, right?
The numbers don't lie either. Companies with emotionally intelligent leaders see about 20% better results overall, and they keep their people way longer. When you're bootstrapping or running on tight margins, losing good talent isn't just frustrating—it can kill your business.
When Everything Goes Wrong Under Pressure
There's this fintech team that used to work from one of our spaces. Really smart group, product was gaining traction, everything seemed great. Then they hit Series A fundraising, and the pressure just... broke everything.
The founder, who was normally pretty decent with his team, completely changed. Investor meetings every day, competitors launching similar features, everyone pulling crazy hours. Instead of being honest about the stress and supporting his people through it, he just snapped.
Meetings became these tense affairs where he'd basically bark orders. Anyone who mentioned being overwhelmed got shut down immediately. The guy who used to grab coffee with his team and ask about their weekend suddenly treated them like code monkeys.
His head of engineering came to our front desk one day to cancel their meeting room booking. Said they were moving out. Apparently, she'd told the founder: "Look, we all knew this would be hard work. We signed up for that. But we didn't sign up to work for someone who suddenly treats us like we're not people."
Three months. That's how long it took to lose their entire senior engineering team. The recovery process was painful to watch. They had to rebuild trust, find new talent (in this market!), basically start their product timeline from scratch. What should've been their fastest growth period turned into this exhausting rebuilding phase.
You can always spot these teams in shared office spaces. There's this weird tension that follows them around. Other startups start avoiding them in common areas. It's like dysfunction has its own energy field.
How Company Culture Dies (And It's Not Pretty)
We've watched this happen enough times to know exactly how it unfolds. Company culture doesn't just get worse gradually—it transforms in this predictable, awful way.
First, communication becomes this one way street. Leaders stop asking for input and start issuing commands. Team members figure out pretty quickly that sharing ideas or concerns isn't welcome anymore.
Trust starts cracking next. Without any empathy or emotional awareness, leaders make promises they forget about, dismiss feedback that could actually help. People lose faith in leadership's ability to make good calls.
Innovation dies. And I mean completely dies. When people are scared to suggest anything new because they might get shot down, everyone starts playing it safe. The creative energy that made the startup exciting in the first place just... disappears.
Then comes the exodus. High performers leave first because they have options. You're left with people who either can't leave easily or have basically given up caring about anything beyond their paycheck.
The crazy part? Most of these leaders think they're being "focused" or "results driven." They don't realize that ignoring the human side actually makes everything less efficient. When you're working from office space for rent or any coworking space near me, this dysfunction becomes visible to everyone around you—potential partners, clients, future hires.
Let's Talk About What This Actually Costs
Here's where things get really sobering. Someone once told us that startups are basically 80% psychology, 20% product. If you can't handle emotions—yours and your team's—you're just a really expensive liability with good PowerPoint skills.
Replacing a mid level employee costs somewhere between 50% to 200% of their salary. That's recruitment fees, training time, lost productivity while everyone adjusts. For startups running lean, losing even two key people can be devastating.
But the hidden costs are worse. Productivity drops across the board because people spend time managing up, walking on eggshells, dealing with drama instead of building product or serving customers.
Customer relationships suffer too. Leaders without emotional intelligence miss social cues, fail to build real connections, treat business relationships like transactions. That doesn't work well anymore.
Smart investors can smell these problems from miles away. They know teams with poor dynamics and high turnover are risky bets, no matter how cool the product looks.
Walk into a private office or meeting room where an emotionally disconnected leader operates and you can literally feel the tension. Compare that to spaces where leaders actually understand people—there's energy, collaboration, people genuinely enjoy working together.
Building EQ That Actually Works in the Real World
Good news though—emotional intelligence isn't something you either have or don't have. Leaders can absolutely develop these skills, but it takes real work and the right environment.
Start with understanding yourself. Before you can handle other people's emotions, you need to know your own triggers and patterns. This means honest self reflection and actually asking people you trust for feedback. Not fun, but necessary.
Learn to listen. Really listen. Most leaders are terrible at this because they're just waiting for their turn to talk. We've seen teams transform when leaders start actually hearing what people are saying.
Create psychological safety in your workspace. Whether you're in traditional office space for lease, a coworking space in Delhi, or serviced office setup, people need to feel safe sharing concerns, admitting mistakes, proposing crazy ideas without getting their heads bitten off.
Develop real empathy. Before making decisions that affect your team, think about how those decisions impact actual individuals. What's their current workload? Career goals? Personal stuff they're dealing with?
Learn to manage your emotional reactions. This one's huge. Leaders with good emotional intelligence handle conflicts by addressing issues with empathy, listening to different viewpoints, finding solutions that bring teams together instead of tearing them apart.
Your physical environment matters more than most people think. Choosing the right workspace—whether it's a coworking space in Noida, virtual office arrangement, or traditional setup—can actually support better leadership practices. Spaces that encourage open communication make building emotional intelligence easier.
The Bottom Line: This Isn't About Being Nice
The startup world loves celebrating the brilliant but difficult founder. But honestly, that's mostly outdated thinking. Emotional intelligence isn't about being nice—it's about being effective. Companies with emotionally intelligent leadership consistently outperform competitors.
Whether your team works from coworking spaces in major cities or smaller markets, your emotional intelligence as a leader determines whether people want to build something amazing with you or just survive until they can leave.
It's not choosing between being personable or being effective. It's choosing between building something that lasts or watching talent walk out the door every few months.
A founder we really respect put it perfectly: "You can have the world's best product, but if you can't lead people, you don't have a business—you have an expensive hobby."
At MyBranch, we see this play out every single day across our workspace communities. The teams that really succeed aren't always the ones with the most revolutionary ideas. They're the ones with leaders who get that business is ultimately about people working together toward something bigger than themselves.
Ready to think about how your workspace supports better leadership? Sometimes the right environment makes all the difference in building emotional intelligence and creating something that actually lasts.