Finding Your Co-Founders
techcrunch.com
techcrunch.com
First base isn't exchanging bodily fluids. It's hacking together on a project. Why's it so hard to find people to actually hack with for an evening? We all know the hacking is important, and yet I don't see anybody out there networking with hacking in mind. I'm starting to suspect 'networking' is the wrong word for what we're trying to do. Perhaps we need to focus deeply on a few leads rather than a bunch of shallow ones.
Have you found a co-founder by networking? Tell me how wrong I am.
In Australia, we had 'Bootup Camp' http://www.bootupcamp.com/. In 2 weeks, they went from idea to auctioning the business. In this event, i have seen people that eventually become friends and continue to build their next startup.
If you go by that definition, you simply cannot 'go out and find' someone because it would then take years to reach that level of comradeship.
I met my cofounder at a hacking party: http://superhappydevhouse.org
You need to go there and hack. But it needs to be with someone else.
There are people there from 10am to 5am daily (yes, we are open that late). There are around 8 YC companies that frequent the hangout. I've also met 4 other mini teams there who are applying for the next YC round.
I suggest anyone in Silicon Valley looking for cofounders to come to the Founder Institute mixer meetup event held at the Hacker Dojo this Tuesday. Details here: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=158007268648
I think not looking within your close friends is probably a good advice. So I tried attending different events, met different people, but the problem is building that trust in few meetings that you have with friends.
I completely understand that it's not the right strategy to do it alone, and I'm actively looking for a co-founder, but still not getting luck.
I think I'll try to follow this advice again, and will see if I find any luck.
Your advice is welcome too...
It's hard for a startup that's all business people to get very far. A startup that's all hackers has a decent chance. You need some versatility in your hackers -- and it may well make sense to have a business person onboard at the get-go, but I don't know if having one on average produces better results.
I think the confusing thing when you read stuff like this is that it's tempting to assume that this is the way, not a way to find co-founders. Viaweb, for instance, was founded by three Harvard CS PhDs.
Just because "business people" can't put together a brilliantly coded working product, does not mean that they can't do anything to get their venture started. Who is to say that setting up a legal entity, researching market trends, and securing sales channels is any less productive activity than programming?
I know that this is not a popular view, but in my eyes there are two distinct sets of tasks in a startup. Yes, one is the tech side and the other is the business side. Both pieces need to be in place to maximize chances for success though. Is a heavily tech-centric startup with a beautiful beta and no business model in any better of a position than a non-tech startup with a well thought out sales strategy and a static landing page as a minimum viable product?
As important as having complimentary skill sets is, I also believe that having some overlap isn't a bad idea either. A hacker who can read a statement of cash flows paired with an MBA who knows an 'if' statement from a 'while' loop will ultimately be able to work better together.
What's your startup by the way?
My startup isn't open for business yet but I'll definitely post here when we get to beta.
p.s. I'm assuming that this is advice for the non-programmer entrepreneurs, since programmers can just start building, without needing anyone else.
That said, I still think getting to know a person you will be closely involved with well enough before starting out.
the only way for a "business guy with an idea" to hookup with a programmer, without being lifelong friends, is to bring a crapload of money to the table.
There are many highly lucrative niche opportunities (that can still scale to $10mm+ revs) that would be impossible to identify or execute on without an inside industry expert who knows the big players, potential customers, and precise pain points.
When referring to "business people with an idea" with some degree of derision, it's productive for us to remember this mostly applies to the MBA grads with generic consulting/banking background and little industry-specific expertise.
I just don't buy that. Looking for a programmer partner as a biz guy with just an idea, is the equivalent of looking for VC funding with an idea...it might happen, but chances are it's a huge waste of time.
I've seen plenty of niche/vertical opportunities like this - mainly because I enjoy interrogating people who work in various sectors about their jobs and pain points.
These opportunities will not be on the radar of someone who doesn't have in depth knowledge of the sector in question. For us, the key was personal experience and knowing potential customers. We worked with them to build the product from the beginning.
As the article says, it's about having a team with complementary skills. That's often a product guy (either a business person or just someone who knows the sector really well) and some tech guys.
You see business guy founder's companies regularly on techcrunch, how often do you bother to look into the background of founders on news stories ?
Arrington is the sole founder, and his "startup" was just a wordpress install.
Anne Wojcicki doesn't have a programmer co founder.
Guy Kawasaki paid thousands to build alltop, so doesn't apply.
Seth Godin is a marketer/blogger, so once again, no technical cofounder.
Kawasaki co-founded (and sold) Fog City Software with programmer cofounders.
Godin has founded a number of startups including with programmers I believe.
Plus it would help to have someone marketing the product while I develop it, and giving business feedback about which features are useful, etc.
It's hard to overstate the amount that one additional person can dilute the efficiency of a one-person business.
Do you interview them? How do you figure out if this is going to work? Is it all on instinct?
In my case it's been the latter, mostly, but I think it would have been better in retrospect to work on something together - these hack days/weekends/Launch48 etc sound ideal - before bringing him into a business I'd founded. Then I would have had more of an idea how to establish the relationship formally within the business too; doing it casually has its downsides, especially if you're not in the lifelong friends situation.
Or maybe it isn't that lucky. I highly suspect I'm /not/ unique in having a diverse social circle. Sternberg is probably overplaying the like-attracts-like effect by quite a bit.