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You do need a technical co-founder [video]

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Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#251

Post by TuringNYC »

WendyTheWillow wrote: post #207
TuringNYC wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It is very frustrating when some Ivy League 25 year old PM/management consultant tries to pitch you on their vision while treating you like an idiot savant they can easily take advantage of. I get calls weekly from people seeking technical co-founders. The biggest thing most CTO candidates dont realize is the power they have -- unless the "business co-founder" is actually bringing something to the table. I'd LOVE…

I have substantially less exposure to this space than you seem to, but even when trying to start projects with friends, this holds true. So often, I get pitched by pals who think the idea is what they've done, and at that point, it's up to me to "code up." What I would love to hear is, "I've been talking with these three businesses already, and they seem interested." or even, "I'm really worried about the sales and m…

>> Nobody's ever come even close to that. It takes zero coding to have those things already started, and yet nobody even goes down that path before looking for a "code monkey."

In a sense you are lucky in a situation like this -- that have self-selected themselves out w/o any effort from you. Technologists dont need anyone with that little motivation sharing equity. Better to know that at the start.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#252

Post by danenania »

WendyTheWillow wrote: post #214
syrusakbary wrote: post #197

I'm a technical founder working in a deep-tech startup. If I am completely honest, I think the recommendation of having a technical cofounder while useful for startups in the past might not be as useful for the startups of the future. Why? I strongly believe AI will cause a paradigm shift, and I'll adventure stating that AI will make non-technical people be able to do more and more with less. Which will make the requ…

Having used LLMs to solve tech problems, I would not trust the current state, or even GPT5, to reliably solve anything other than the most trivial of trivialities. Is the idea that in 2025, AWS will have an AI console where a non-technical founder types in what they want their site to do, and the LLM takes care of the rest? Register domains, build out the database/backend/auth/frontend, etc.? I really can't see it ha…

"Is the idea that in 2025, AWS will have an AI console where a non-technical founder types in what they want their site to do, and the LLM takes care of the rest? Register domains, build out the database/backend/auth/frontend, etc.?"

Even when this AI exists, the non-technical founder will ask it for the wrong things.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#253

Post by TuringNYC »

gnicholas wrote: post #225
TuringNYC wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It is very frustrating when some Ivy League 25 year old PM/management consultant tries to pitch you on their vision while treating you like an idiot savant they can easily take advantage of. I get calls weekly from people seeking technical co-founders. The biggest thing most CTO candidates dont realize is the power they have -- unless the "business co-founder" is actually bringing something to the table. I'd LOVE…

> and retains the right to take all the upside and has none of the downside When you are paid in equity, the non-technical cofounder doesn't have all of the upside. But I completely agree that both parties need to bring something to the table at the beginning. It can't be "you build something and then after you've done that I'll go sell it". Both founders need to be putting in sweat equity simultaneously, to align in…

I think we are in agreement. To elaborate more -- you are right, "the non-technical cofounder doesn't have all of the upside" -- I mean "they have all upside" meaning, they can only go up -- they have contributed nothing so everything for them is upside.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#254

Post by TuringNYC »

vlod wrote: post #212
TuringNYC wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It is very frustrating when some Ivy League 25 year old PM/management consultant tries to pitch you on their vision while treating you like an idiot savant they can easily take advantage of. I get calls weekly from people seeking technical co-founders. The biggest thing most CTO candidates dont realize is the power they have -- unless the "business co-founder" is actually bringing something to the table. I'd LOVE…

I've been burnt multiple times by this. I think they believe in the "Build it and they will come" and then they just coordinate and tell you what to do afterwards, rather than making hundreds of cold calls (i.e. grinding).

>> I've been burnt multiple times by this.

I've similarly had so many technical friends burnt by this.

My new suggestion for "business co-founders" pitching ideas to technical friends where "business co-founders" propose techies do all the upfront work is --

If you have no Purchase Orders, no Funding, no Transact-able Relationships, no prior wins (esp publicly verifiable wins) -- then you put in money. Find some reasonable rate you pay for the upfront technical work. This "balances out" the skin in the game. If they have no money, i'd half-seriously suggest they go borrow money to pay the technical co-founder.

They need some risk, some skin in the game to make this an equal effort.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#255

Post by bcrosby95 »

waprin wrote: post #202
lainga wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> while treating you like an idiot savant they can easily take advantage of. I considered it a bit, and you know what, I'd wager that four-fifths of tech business dynamics flow from this statement. Technical expertise is the money printer onto which all manners of value extraction anchor themselves, like barnacles. If not at the creation, then, for a time, it is good. And then it happens anyway 5-10 years down the li…

Technical expertise is very rarely where the core value of a product comes from. If you're really pushing some boundary and just have a better technology product, like original Google or ChatGPT, then sure, tech is your special sauce. For 99% of software businesses, the tech can cause the business to fail but its almost never what makes the business succeed. Things like customer development and sales are actually far…

> The money printer is mapping market demand to technical products, which is a business skill. And that business skill is worth a lot more than technical skills. Its just a type of business skill that you find more often in developers than you do in MBA, and so we don't associate it with "business guys".

I think you're underplaying the ability to map requirements to a feasible and sufficient technical product. Being the person who is also mapping the market demand to the technical product makes this process significantly more efficient.

I also think there's a lot of overlap with Software Engineering (with a capital 'E') in these skills - a lot of this is about figuring out what to build and making sure you've built it. I believe that's why they're more often found in developers than business types.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#256

Post by mejutoco »

syrusakbary wrote: post #197

I'm a technical founder working in a deep-tech startup. If I am completely honest, I think the recommendation of having a technical cofounder while useful for startups in the past might not be as useful for the startups of the future. Why? I strongly believe AI will cause a paradigm shift, and I'll adventure stating that AI will make non-technical people be able to do more and more with less. Which will make the requ…

IMO the problem is defining oneself as non-technical. Anyone can learn any topic if willing and with necessary resources. Some people make it part of their identity that they wont learn certain skills.

Tech is nowadays like literacy. Imagine a person saying I am not literate, instead of trying to learn to read and write, at least to a degree.

I think it is a status problem. Some people think of management as higher status than operational roles, and they do not want to be seen doing the low-status tasks. While it can pay well, tech seems for the general population as respectable as a mechanic or a chef, but not as a lawyer or a doctor (generalizing too much to try to get the point accross)

On another note, sql was supposedly intended to be used by "business people" but developers are instead the ones using it. In general, a business type wants to loosely specify the needs and get some body worry about the details.

I am talking here about the typical archetypes. Of course the best business people are not afraid of digging into details and learning, but for the average ones I found some generalizations apply.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#257

Post by puniaviision »

csa wrote: post #249
puniaviision wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you work in private equity or something where you buy out businesses and run them? I'm technically a type 3, but an idiot one that wasted a lot of time chasing sexy ideas with no connection real-world problems. Trying to get better now.

> Do you work in private equity or something where you buy out businesses and run them? Yes. I’m basically like Andrew Wilkinson and Tiny Corp, but not as far along the curve as he is (tiny is valued at ~$500m+ USD currently). https://www.tiny.com/about I have some cash cows. I buy tech businesses and streamline the business side. > but an idiot one that wasted a lot of time chasing sexy ideas with no connection real…

Thanks for the perspective.

Cool hearing about your story! How did you get the initial capital to buy businesses, just from your savings as a research professor?

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#258

Post by esafak »

syrusakbary wrote: post #197

I'm a technical founder working in a deep-tech startup. If I am completely honest, I think the recommendation of having a technical cofounder while useful for startups in the past might not be as useful for the startups of the future. Why? I strongly believe AI will cause a paradigm shift, and I'll adventure stating that AI will make non-technical people be able to do more and more with less. Which will make the requ…

Why is the technical founder becoming obsoleted but not the business founder?

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#259

Post by TuringNYC »

jjav wrote: post #186
ethbr1 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest business gap seems to be assuming other people won't screw you over, given enough money on the table and the opportunity. I assume most MBAs already know this. Lots of technical people learn the hard way.

Yes, this. I've been in many startups but only once as a founder. I was the technical one, the only one with deep expertise in the core business area of the startup. Well, my title was founder. All the other founders were on the board, I was not. All the other founders controlled budget, I did not. So really, despite the words on the offer letter I was just an employee. The founder title granted me the right to work…

>> Well, my title was founder. All the other founders were on the board, I was not. All the other founders controlled budget, I did not. So really, despite the words on the offer letter I was just an employee. The founder title granted me the right to work 90 hour weeks with no help and no support and no budget to hire help.

>> At least didn't waste too many years on that one.

Firstly, i'm sorry to hear about your situation. I'm curious why you didnt negotiate harder some time into this. It seems to be you held all the cards.

I'm fascinated by the number of "business co-founders" who think they can cut a 25k check to some random person on eLance/Upwork and replace technical co-founders.

My recommendation would be to say -- sure, try that. Lets talk in 6mo if you still need me, but i'll set the terms at that point. 6mo is about when most non-technical people realize they have no code in source control and some random person overseas now owns their company effectively.

Re: You do need a technical co-founder [video]

#260

Post by gedy »

esafak wrote: post #236
gedy wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know, I’ve mostly followed this approach over my 20 year career, but it really depends on your surroundings, and honestly hasn’t led to great success. E.g. If you’re surrounded by yes men who will code whatever without question, product people greatly prefer that, and you end up sidelined. There’s also plenty of companies who don’t want engineers getting involved with decisions, and product and UX people work…

I wonder how you could open up product development to the whole company (including engineers) without the product organization getting overwhelmed?

"Real" agile is meant to do just this, but it's rare without falling into cargo culting.
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