Sunny Ray sits down with Farzad Khosravi, a New York City founder building Tavan, an AI product that strips non-selling busywork from sales reps and founders. Khosravi argues that the biggest mistake founders make is confusing long hours with progress, and he makes the case for leverage through delegation, prioritization, and caring for sleep, mental health, and relationships. He draws on his first company, started at age 18, where conflict among five co-founders taught him that startups fail from loss of heart rather than loss of blood. He describes the quarterbacking problem in B2B sales, where reps spend most of their time on CRM updates and internal tasks, and explains why founders and their sales teams often live in different realities. He recounts leaving Nihilus after the company raised $120 million for an AI product he saw no evidence the market wanted. He also covers Tavan's next 90 days, including fundraising, design partners, in-person events, and the difficulty of identifying the right buyer inside large companies.
Stop grinding until 5 a.m. Farzad Khosravi explains why leverage, delegation, and human health beat hustle culture for founders and sales teams.
What do founders keep getting wrong?
Too many founders believe they must work 60 hours a week and stay up until 5 a.m. The data from the military and business research is clear: it makes you less cognitively sharp and worse at decisions. Founders should think about leverage, which means delegating and prioritizing. That is the number one thing they get wrong.
What did your first company teach you that you still use every week?
I founded it at 18 with five co-founders, and ego created conflict right away. That taught me how important it is to take care of the humans involved. Most startups fail from loss of heart rather than loss of blood. Founders lose the passion, motivation, or fortitude to keep going. Don't lose heart.
What is the quarterbacking problem in B2B sales?
Reps get stuck updating the CRM, following up with people, joining calls they don't need to be on, and filing tickets with sales engineering. It's a huge amount of project management that they often don't have to do. Salesforce's own data says reps spend only about 30% of their time selling.
What did fractional CEO and CTO work show you that founders miss?
There's a divide between what founders think they're producing and how it actually gets sold. A founder may say they want to sell to small businesses, but their team doesn't believe it and hears something different from customers. That never gets communicated, so the founder blames the sales team. Leaders and employees live in different worlds.
What is the primal trap?
It's falling for bold, simple narratives on LinkedIn, like never sleep, work 16-hour days, or be the alpha leader, instead of evidence-based practice from organizational psychology. Everything a company produces goes through people, so their health and psychological safety matter most. Chasing those narratives makes leaders fear-driven and hurts long-term decisions.
Why did you leave your last full-time operator role?
I led customer success at Nihilus, which raised $120 million to build an AI product. I saw no evidence the market wanted it, and I didn't want to support something nobody wanted. The company didn't do well, and neither did my stock options. It reinforced that if no one wants the product, nothing else saves you.
How did Tavan start, and what does it do?
It started with my coaching clients. I kept teaching them the same lesson, to separate long-term, high-impact work from daily fires. Tavan acts like a great chief of staff. It filters distracting emails, Slack messages, and meetings, drafts replies, and prioritizes the day so salespeople and founders spend their time on calls.
What are the next 90 days for Tavan, and why is selling it hard?
We're raising money or joining an accelerator, and landing our first design partners. We've talked with people at Salesforce, Microsoft, and HP, but enterprise deals can take 12 months. The hard part is identifying the buyer. Reps feel the pain, but leaders with the same titles often hold different beliefs.
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