Ask HN: How do startups make decisions?

2 points·Schultzy··4 comments

When multiple founders have equal equity stakes, how do you decide "where the buck stops" when there is a disagreement?

Do you agree beforehand that one person is the "CEO" or do you just flip a coin when something comes up?

What have you found to be the best strategies/tactics for making decisions in your ventures?

It doesn't really matter what strategy you have, as long as you've agreed on a strategy beforehand. In the past, we've done coin flips, even/odd pepperonis on a pizza, rock-paper-scissors, even a ping pong game. Another alternative that I'm fond of is to have a disinterested third party to be a tiebreaker.

Do you really think that "it doesn't really matter" how you make decisions concerning things like which direction to take the company, whether to hire a potential employee or not, or whether or not you should accept funding from a particular source? Are those really the sorts of things best left to RPS? It seems like you might want to have a bit more intentionality behind such processes that could seriously impact the success of the venture

I didn't say "it doesn't really matter" how you make decisions. The original post was about the scenario where multiple founders with equal stakes disagreed on a decision.

I'm assuming that they've both made their best arguments on each of their viewpoints and that both choices are rational and reasonable decisions, and yet they can't reach an agreement. In that case, no, "it doesn't really matter" how you choose which founder gets his way.

Got it.

Thanks!

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