Ask YC: Finding a co-founder(s)

i dont know if an iterative model can work in staffing.

this is why experience is so valued by companies -- if you've done stuff, then you are able to do stuff (though, maybe you're a big faker who got lucky.)

Right out of school and six months in to my job I knew I wasn't really cut out for finance and preferred to not work for someone else. I started a business on the side and learned more in 3 months than I did all through college. Fast forward a year. A childhood friend of mine and I began collaborating on an idea I had whenever we had spare time. However, we were eventually faced with a Catch22 situation: we needed more time to work on our startup, but we also needed money to live on (my other side business was making decent money, but not enough to live off of). We were OK with this and planned on doing the startup on the side until it was making money, or at least launched.

On a whim we applied to YC as we figured "why the hell not?" YC accepted us even though I was a non-technical. I'm not exactly sure why as I've never actually asked them, but I will offer some speculation: my partner is a genius and I was extremely familiar with the market we were trying to get in to.

Looking back, if we would have been rejected, I would have learned to code. Even now I plan on doing so (and have already done some) once things are a little less hectic. Obviously, YC has sped up the creation process considerably and we've gotten more done in ~1.5 months than all the previous time combined.

So I guess my advice to you is this: 1. Start a business on the side if you can 2. Learn to hack 3. Follow aaronblohowiak's advice 4. Forget the mock business plans - I've run/ran 3 small to micro sized businesses and the closest thing I've done to completing a business plan is a YC Summer 08 application. At some point, you have to stop planning and start doing.

Good luck and feel free to email me anytime.

I have several ideas that I feel have potential, but I am open to working with someone elses dream idea just the same (in my opinion it's less about the idea and more about the execution). I boostrap my life and would expect to run a startup in much the same way. Depending on the type of startup, however, VC funding may very well be valuable. I have advanced Excel modeling skills and I build financial models everyday. I have experience working with numerous small to mid size companies and closed $10k-$20k web projects with my clients on a consistent basis while I was a junior/senior in college. I'm obviously not a programmer, but I learned enough to basically run the sales efforts for this company, make us a leader in working with alternative energy clients, and make clients comfortable with sending a $10k check to a small company they had never even heard of before.

I'm a Rails coder, can lead project and define architecture. Getting ready for YC spring 2009. Looking for the business side partners who can sell and promote the hell out of a SaaS idea that will be big time for small and medium businesses. Hackers are welcomed too! Email address in my profile.