That's true @dstors there might also be a way to cement your current leadership in the company before going public - I read somewhere about Mark Zuckerberg and the Google founders wanting to do that by creating special shares that were worth 51% of the shareholder votes (I am pretty sure that Google accomplished this).
Some people might not like that idea but if a public company is ran by the day-to-day whim of the shareholders, the company will tend to focus on short-term gains like share buy-backs instead of healthy growth and investments.
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Yeah, generally to retain control a company might create stock A and stock B, and one is only held by those holding onto the 51%. There are various setups to this, but that's a common one for sure.
Thanks @crypto-bot and yeah, that is part of what I am talking about. But I remember Mark Zuckerberg calling for a vote that would give him a cemented hold on the company long after he no longer had 51% in his possession.
At least that is what I understand at the time when I was reading the news articles. I think the founders of Google did something similar but may have done it from the get-go.