Ask HN: Are solo founders as screwed as they're led to believe? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Are solo founders as screwed as they're led to believe?

17 pointsaerovistae12 comments

As it is I'm looking at becoming a solo founder for an app-based venture. It just happens that all of my friends are liberal artsy people, and the couple programmers I know are happily buried in corporate culture.

I've heard over and over that co-founders who lack a connection and strong history don't do well in the long run, and it makes sense, so I'm hesitant to just go co-founder shopping at tech meetups. And anyway, at this point, I would be hesitant to bring someone on board with equal share when I've developed the entire business plan and written the initial app myself. I would happily hire employees and give them relatively small share, but like so many others I'm just very new to all this.

How do you hire your first employee as a solo founder without giving them 50% of your venture?

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I'm in the exact same situation as you. I have an App on iTunes since May 1st. I got there all by myself with a contract dev (a fantastic guy I met on HN!) and I'm the Chief Everything Officer. I want to keep bootstrapping as long as possible, but I would also love to be able to afford the talented people I need to continually improve the product and build a community.

Elwell's comment is apt. I need to obtain recurring revenue or at least be increasing my user base week over week (the app is free) in order to move forward. So that means I'm spending 80% of my time on marketing!

Don't go Co-Founder shopping - just get on with building the app and your business. Good Luck!

So... who is this fantastic contract dev and is he looking for work? :)

> How do you hire your first employee as a solo founder without giving them 50% of your venture?

> I've developed the entire business plan and written the initial app myself

It's sounds like you already have an MVP ready. Depending on the specific nature of your startup, I would most likely launch it before thinking about hiring any employees. If you can get some recurring revenue by yourself, then you can hire and give them very little shares <2% with a good salary. If it's more of a B2C venture you'll probably have find an angel investor soon, which is never easy (esp. for first-time solo founder).

I think you can be a succesful solo founder... but you need some kind of positive support group or network.

Especially if it's a "niche" or lifestyle kind of app (as opposed to the take-over-the-world plans VCs prefer to fund).

By support groups or networks, I'm thinking coworker spaces, accelerators (like YC itself :) ), meetups or other places where you can network, bounce around ideas, get motivated, etc.

And maybe you'll find a cofounder there :) , but I'd go to meetups and events with a very different mindset - just discussing ideas and learning from others and generally motivating yourself :) .

What I've heard is that co-founders help smooth out the ups and downs in motivation and the emotional state that comes with the startup roller coaster.

I never tried quitting my job to be a "solo founder", but I did try several side projects. All of them failed so far:

For my latest "failure" (which might revive :) ), I teamed up with 2 friends which were also working full-time, and we didn't agree on the direction, the tech stack, etc. and we didn't "put in time". I'm especially guilty since I was supposed to be the leader.

I've also failed teaming up with family members (which expected to be the "idea guy" and let me do all the legwork). The ideas were good, but they weren't available and didn't want to commit their time.

And mostly, I've failed on my own, starting up a project, and letting it die by not commiting time to it. Lack of motivation. If I'd put myself out there and validated them, maybe they could have grown. So, I've failed as a solo "founder".

I'm cautiosly optimistic about my current side project, I teamed up with a coworker, we see each other every day so we can prod each other :), we agree on the tech stack (what we do everyday), and have a similar vision. We also have a prospective customer and beta tester :) who was the one that initially expressed the need to be solved.

Besides being a second set of hands to work on the project, I really appreciate his perspective and motivation. That's what I get from a "cofounder".

What I learn is that don't force yourself to hire someone just because solo founder doesn't have a good reputation. As others have stated focus on your product and growth. Nothing matters as long as you have growth (PG's startup = growth).

At the same time don't hesitate to give a good chunk of equity if you find someone who you think will be essential to your company. Don't forget that you want to have a small chunk of big pie than having a big chunk of essentially nothing.

I'm a solo founder, and it's hard keeping motivated, if i'm not committing to the code, it's just not getting done. If I had a cofounder there would be someone else adding code, and I'd feel compelled to do my share.

It's definitely doable though, and it's much more productive just working on your idea than hanging around meetups hoping to meet that someone special.

http://www.getwith.in/

Your goal right now should be to make money, not to maximize the portion you have. If something requires giving up equity but gives you more money, it's the right choice.

If you want to bring someone on, I would suggest the fair equity system: 1. Compensation is based on hours worked * salary 2. A worker or an investor can buy stock in the company, either through compensation or directly in cash. There might be some minimum to this, i.e. at least 25% of your income is in equity.

> How do you hire your first employee as a solo founder

With money. If you can pay market rates, you don't need to give any equity.

Without revenue, profit, traction, something ... your equity is valueless, so it's not a good way to hire anyone.

If I want to work for valueless equity, I'll work on my own idea.

As a Co-founder I can attest to the fact that it is a very valuable asset. But with that said, my co-founder and I left our jobs at the same time to start our company and had complementary skill sets. He is the development side of the house and I wear the "biz dev" hat.

There is a really good post by Mark Suster that talks about hiring your co-founder. It is a the best of both worlds in some cases because you get someone that is on the same commitment level, but you don't have to give up all the equity that comes with a 50/50 split.

Here is the link: http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/05/09/the-co-founder...

>How do you hire your first employee as a solo founder without giving them 50% of your venture?

If you feel don't deserve 50%, don't give them 50%, but that is besides the point. Right now focus on growth and customer development and acquisition.

Hiring and equity are 2 different things. You should treat equity as gold and only dilute your stake for very good reasons. And hiring your first employee is not one of them unless the person is an absolute star.

And don't be too hasty to hire. The old saying "if you have enough employees, then you have too many" is very true. Being solo for the first while means that you have to work smart. For example, in my latest venture, I am using PayPal for billing, so I don't have any billing issues to bog me down; otherwise I would probably have to hire someone. I understand the PlentyOfFish dating service guy did all the work himself for years.

Money brings movement. If you can build an MVP and obtain some funding then you can get your tech co-founder on board. Or at least, the thought of money will bring movement.

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