Media executive Fu’ad Lawal compares early marriage to a startup’s toughest phase, saying refusal to compromise is what makes so many unions collapse.
Media executive Fu’ad Lawal recently gave a blunt take on why so many couples struggle in their first two years together, and he did it using a comparison you wouldn’t expect: startups.
Lawal explained that early marriage mirrors the fragile first stage of a new company. Two people, each carrying their own habits, expectations, and “rules,” suddenly try to build something together. Without flexibility, he says, the odds of failure are high.
His point wasn’t about love fading. It was about ego staying put.
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According to Lawal, most young couples walk into marriage holding a mental checklist of what their partner must never do. The trouble starts when both people expect the other to adjust while refusing to budge themselves.
He put it simply: in every failed marriage he’s witnessed, nobody wanted to be the one who compromised first. Someone always has to give a little, and too often, no one does.
Lawal leaned on a familiar workplace concept, the stages teams go through as they grow: forming, storming, norming, and performing. He believes couples move through the same emotional stages.
The honeymoon phase is forming. The friction that follows, when two personalities start clashing over real-life decisions, is storming. Couples who push through that friction with compromise eventually reach norming, then performing, the stage where the relationship finally feels steady.
For all his theory, Lawal admitted the biggest personal change marriage brought wasn’t about winning arguments. It was learning to communicate better, something he says has improved every relationship in his life, not just his marriage.
Lawal’s comments have stirred plenty of reaction online. Some agree that the early years test patience and willingness to compromise. Others insist no timeline fits every couple.
