Hacker News Reader

Comment by cirgue | Hacker News Reader

> So even though joining this startup seemed ideal, I'm finding that the CEO is out of his depth and I can't follow him.

> I'd love to do this with the CEO in a lesser role.

Is this about equity or about who wears the pants?

View on HN

pants. Is it bad to address this with equity. Our handshake was based on equal equity and standing (I asked for a lot more than 50/50 initially and took the leap-of-faith to join forces), and that the job-titles were secondary... that's not really working out.

I've never heard of a CTO having more equity than the CEO. Do you think you're being slightly unreasonable in your expectations? 50/50 feels quite generous after they raised the round of funding.

CTO isn't the right title for my actual role. I've got the "map to the customer", many options for pivots with detail, I understand the customer from another side too (it's teaching tech... and as a former teacher that's also part of "not just a CTO"). It's tough tech. I've already done key tricky bits. Another part of what hurt was rolling in more tech after the fact (after the 50/50 handshake). I've taken that out, we have clearer focus without it (and I feel better). Part of the problem is my hunger to take the CEO trail myself... from the beginning.

> Part of the problem is my hunger to take the CEO trail myself... from the beginning.

In signing up for a 50/50 split, you made your decision about this already. If you don't feel like your co-founder is pulling their weight, maybe figure out a way to change the division of responsibilities so that he is instead of approaching this like a zero sum situation.

Since it's pants and not equity.

You both obviously want the company to succeed and also seem to think it will, you may just have different views on how to get there.

I think this could be solved over a pint of beer.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com