#94: From Startup to Grown-Up: Jonathan Wolf, co-founder and CEO of ZOE - The growth of a founder, the most important leadership skills, and how to raise 7 million euros in 3 weeks.
Jonathan Wolf, co-founder and CEO of ZOE, transitioned from tech to health, focusing on personalized nutrition. He shares his inspiring journey from disillusionment to purpose, highlighting the importance of relationships in entrepreneurship. Jonathan discusses the challenges of nutrition science, the impact of processed foods, and the innovative app ZOE launched to democratize nutrition insights. He also reveals key leadership lessons learned along the way and the surprising insights about coffee and gut health.
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volunteer_activism ADVICE
Value Founder Peer Groups
Spend regular time with other founders to share experiences and challenges.
This camaraderie helps normalize struggles and calms the emotional rollercoaster of entrepreneurship.
question_answer ANECDOTE
Struggles During Sabbatical
Jonathan left a successful tech career feeling disillusioned and searching for purpose.
His sabbatical was unstructured and difficult, compounded by personal challenges like divorce.
insights INSIGHT
Power of Relationships
Jonathan learned that relationships and understanding others' motivations matter more than just ideas.
Focusing solely on ideas overlooked the emotional and relational side of leadership and life.
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Jonathan Wolf is the co-founder and CEO of ZOE, the science-based nutrition company using data to transform how people eat. In this candid conversation, he joins Alisa to explore what it takes to build a mission-driven company, how to lead with more clarity and transparency, and why the way we eat is more broken and more fixable than most people think.
ZOE’s origin story is as unconventional as it is inspiring. After scaling Critéo into a billion-dollar business, Jonathan stepped away with no plan and plenty of questions. That wandering period led him to microbiome researcher Tim Spector, and from there, to the bold idea of using AI and big data to personalize nutrition at scale. Eight years and 250,000 microbiome samples later, ZOE is running the world’s largest nutrition science study and has launched a free app to help people assess their food in real time.
In this episode:
Why Jonathan left the world of adtech in search of purpose
His sabbatical was a challenging period of self-discovery.
The importance of relationships over ideas became clear to him.
How he navigated the founder’s journey
The scientific gaps in mainstream nutrition advice
What most people misunderstand about ultra-processed food
How ZOE turned a research project into a product that helps millions
What coffee can reveal about your gut microbiome
Why leadership gets easier when you stop trying to be liked
How Jonathan uses one key question to make sure he’s actually being heard
Why ZOE launched a free tool to put science into people’s hands
How to communicate clearly as a CEO without over-explaining
Why repeating your message 100 times is part of the job
How to hire people who care more about the mission than the resume
What coaching and therapy taught Jonathan about being an effective leader
Why ZOE’s shift to a free app was a strategic business decision
How to scale without losing sight of your company’s purpose
Jonathan also shares the emotional and psychological journey of leadership: learning to make hard calls without sugarcoating, building teams that stick, and staying grounded while leading a fast-growing company.
ZOE’s new free app is now available in the US. It uses AI to analyze any food item or meal for its processing risk and nutritional quality, helping people make smarter choices instantly. If you care about your energy, mood, and long-term health, this episode will change how you think about food and leadership.
From Start-Up to Grown-Up 
