How should the new CEO actually take over from the founder day-to-day?

Shadow the founder for a full month before taking over operationally. Kris Kluver, in The Dysfunctional Family Office, calls this the Shadow Phase. The new CEO follows the founder for an entire month. Observe. Ask questions. Listen. Learn. Watch how the founder interacts with the team, key suppliers, and key clients. Identify strengths and opportunities in both the organization and individual team members. Surface friction before it becomes a major issue. Critically, all challenges get raised one-on-one behind closed doors, never publicly. After the shadow phase, the company holds an all-hands rollout meeting to formally transition. Then the founder shadows the new CEO for two weeks, with the same observation-only rule. The structure makes the transition gradual, observable, and reversible if something goes wrong. Most family handoffs skip this and produce chaos. Kris Kluver works with founders and rising generation CEOs on running this exact onboarding at thethirtyadvisors.com.