Ask HN: How do you find a technical cofounder with little experience?

[throwaway789123]

I have an idea for a web app/business that I would love to build. However, few of the people around me through both high school and college have been entrepreneurial or technologically savvy. I haven't had the chance to gain any experience or contacts in the start-up industry yet either.

Here on HN there is a general distrust of business people and for the most part rightly so. The general advice given every time that someone asks about finding a technical cofounder is either: "learn to code" or "find someone you know". I have exhausted every "contact" I have, gone to some meets, and even emailed some other schools. No Dice. I have tried to learn to code. I took two Udacity courses, minored in CS, and generally tried become a web developer. However I feel that even though I can read and understand the code well enough, I don't know it well enough to deal with the architecture or maintain an entire codebase myself. Sure I could take a few years to become a full developer, but honestly I am a better business person than I am a developer. I don't really have the time before I graduate to do so either.

I am 20 years old and go to a business university on the east coast. It is a good school, but not an elite liberal arts school. The people in my CS department that I talked to aren't particularly entrepreneurial. In addition very few people have the necessary skills (full web stack, primarily code in Python(optional), some experience in creating chats and analytics).

I have researched my idea thoroughly. I have the market, the business model, the validation. I have contacts that I have been trying to cultivate with investors, I have the marketing strategy worked out. I have been reading up on design so that I could craft a basic design for my app. I have read everything that I could get my hands on (HN included) to learn about entrepreneurialism, technology, and start-ups.

I am not an "idea" guy, but a true business guy. To everything I have read on here about being a good non-technical cofounder, I find myself nodding my head in approval.

And yet I cannot show any of this to anyone because I can't find a technical entrepreneur to show it to! It is hard for me to elaborate on every aspect of myself, but suffice it to say that I am very passionate about entrepreneurialism.

Can you help HN?

Edit: Here's my email in case you want to contact me: [e-mail]

[onion2k]

"This makes it hard to just go visit my CS department and hope to find even a shred of entrepreneurial spirit."

Why? They're people over there in the CS department. Real ones, with goals and ambition just like you. If you really have a great idea then there'll be people who'll listen and want to be part of it. This sort of anti-CS prejudice isn't going to help you find a co-founder.

"In addition very few people have the necessary skills (full web stack, primarily code in Python(optional), some experience in creating chats and analytics)."

You're the business guy, you admit you don't have the technical skills, yet you're trying to dictate the choice of tools? Why is that? Non-technical founders have no more place picking the language your software is written in than your developers would have coming up with your business's marketing strategy.

[throwaway789123]

I didn't mean to imply that CS students aren't entrepreneurial. I just meant that when I talk with the CS students in MY school they aren't entrepreneurial.

Also I only added the "Python(optional)" because that is what I have learned so it would be easier to work with someone who uses it as well.

I have nothing but respect for CS students. Poor phrasing on my part.

[Throwadev]

How to find? Go to meetups, hang out at engineering clubs at your school, post fliers or find other appropriate means of putting it out there that you are looking for a cofounder. You don't want someone who is going to "learn on the job" if you want a chance at making this successful. So finding CS students at your school won't be that useful unless you can find someone who's published some web sites or apps before. Look for someone with proven ability to start AND finish projects (non-school ones).

Outside of school, attend meetups. Learn to code, but not to build it yourself, but to have an excuse to be around developers. That's a reason to be at meetups. There are also meetups specifically for people who are looking for cofounders.

You can also post online (as you did here), to find co-founders, or on things like craigslist in the jobs section.

Other options are to outsource on e-lance or something like that. People offshore can build stuff pretty cheap, but the quality is terrible once you want to scale or maintain it. That shouldn't matter too much because if that becomes an issue, that means you're succeeding.

[throwaway789123]

Thanks for the advice. I am going through those steps. I emailed a bunch of CS departments and am going to meetups (can't do too many because school takes a lot of my time).

I am really big on the quality and detail of the product so outsourcing is a last resort.

[amarghose]

As a fellow "business" guy whose recently broken out of the "stereotype" this is what I can offer:

nobody cares about your idea. They care about your execution.

Most business guys get a bad rep because they think they have a genius idea and expect programmers to make it happen. They don't appreciate or even recognize the amount of difficulties and problems that have to be solved to come anywhere close to a usable product.

Focus on what you can bring to the table. My current focus is mainly about identifying first the market and marketing strategy (and testing it) then about helping the developer come up with a minimum viable product (as in what functions are truly necessary to our potential users that can allow us to better get an idea of our market).

If you can convince a technical co-founder that you can EXECUTE on an idea (with their help) then you'll start gaining some traction. Until then you're just another guy with an idea whose asking someone else to do all the work (this might not be true but by default it's what others will assume unless you explicitly explain what you bring to the table).

[throwaway789123]

Unfortunately the character limit on HN made me cut that paragraph out.

I have researched my idea thoroughly. I have the market, the business model, the validation. I have contacts that I have been trying to cultivate with investors, I have the marketing strategy worked out. I have been reading up on design so that I could craft a basic design for my app. I have read everything that I could get my hands on (HN included) to learn about entrepreneurialism, technology, and start-ups.

[argonaut]

Going off what soneca is saying (and soneca is right), the problem is that you don't actually have the market, the business model, and the validation. What you mean is you have written down on a piece of paper (or in your head) a market you're thinking about targeting, a business model you think works, and the validation which you think is actually valid.

The problem is that you'll get a lot of people who'll say "sounds interesting," but unless you have people signed up and actively engaging with your product, or people actually giving you money, that doesn't tell you much. Even getting people to sign up for an invite list is a good step (albeit only the first step of many in validation).

I would seriously consider outsourcing your MVP. There are some really good developers out there who work in countries where $10-20 / hour is a really good wage; typically Eastern European, South American, or SE Asian countries. Yes, many of them suck. The way to go about finding the "gems" is to have a very small "test" project which you test against several (5 or more) developers simultaneously. Then see the results and either pick the best or try running the same experiment again. Learn the basics of coding so that you can look through their code and judge for yourself.

Once you have an MVP with traction it'll be a lot easier to get a technical co-founder or even a technical "founding employee."

[soneca]

Why the most important word of an early stage startup validation is missing here? "Customers". The only thing that matters of your whole paragraph is "validation". Explain this better, somehow I feel that it isn't exactly validating the idea with customers.

The main thing a non-tech founder can bring to the table is customer development. Focus on that, as they are practical things. Don't try so hard to be the "self-taught MBA guy". Just do your customer development very well. If a tech co-founder trust that you know your customers, than you have chance to attract a very good one.

[throwaway789123]

I'm in that rut where customers say "Interesting idea, show me how well it works" and the technical guys say "Show me customers that are onboard before I build the thing".

I get what you are saying though. Obviously having a product to show customers will be huge in acquiring them.

[soneca]

You make it sounds like a chicken and egg problem, but it isn't. Customer "saying" "insteresting idea" is not customer development. I have no idea what your business is, but I pretty sure you can validate it without code. There are lots of ways to do that. For an example, check this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5424206 Look how much validation they got! And - except for the demo, which isn't the core thing of their landing page - there is no code in there. Actually, we don't even know if the founder can code or if they are just "idea guys" (ok, you can assume they aren't, but nothing there prove they aren't).

There are dozens of examples of MVP that don't use any code out there, just google it. "Concierge MVPs", "Fake it before you make it" MVPs, find a strategy for your own. Just find something stronger than "I talked to a few customer and they told me is an interestgin idea and want me to show them how it works".

[throwaway789123]

You are right. However since my product is a social consumer-facing product, it is harder to validate without having something to show users (and honestly the marketing will be more important here). The customer portion of my app/business comes from the data gathered and it is hard to show how useful that data is without some real examples (and no I'm not gathering this data maliciously).

I will look into making a page like those "Fake it before you make it" MVPs.

[jmorton]

Read this, or if you already have, read it again. http://www.paulgraham.com/relres.html

Done? Good.

Start coding today. Seriously. Today.

You need to find and talk to people one-on-one about what you want to accomplish. Go crash an upper division computer science class tomorrow morning, and look for students that "get it" – the kind that engage the professor, ask and answer questions. After class, pick one of them and talk to them about what you're building.

Search for new posts like "Show HN: ..." these are generally technical people that can deliver. Figure out if they have technical chops or just do launch pages.

Bonus: Get a t-shirt made that says, "Co-Founder Seeking Co-Founder" and walk around campus. Or stand somewhere.

Repeat this every day between now and Friday. If it doesn't work, I'll give you a full refund.

[throwaway789123]

Noted thanks!

[jmorton]

How did it go? I'm curious to hear what did (and didn't) work.

[throwaway789123]

I'll let you know. Send me an email so I know who to update.

[jmvldz]

My cofounder spent an entire year with this exact problem. He worked with one developer who dropped off the face of the earth, payed a designer for work, and otherwise busted his ass for an entire year after graduating undergrad. He worked at a pool while his peers went to work for the likes of McKinsey and Goldman.

Now, I and another technical cofounder are working with him. We also have designers and a potential new technical employee.

You are still in school. You have time.

[hashtree]

I have had the opposite problem and I have yet to find a solution. However, I am looking for a superb UI/UX guy to take over the world with. Even with a 5+ year successful business, it is hard to find that right match of skill, personality, ambition, etc.

Until that point, I continue to 1099 out the UI/UX to solid people.

[sherm8n]

An option could be to pay for a developer in the beginning of the project and slowly start transitioning them into a co-founder if there's mutual interest. I've seen this type of relationship work well in the past. But obviously you need to be a rich non-technical person.

[throwaway789123]

As a student, I can assure you I'm not rich ;)

[sherm8n]

Well okay not rich, but enough to pay a student developer at your school $20-30/hr or so.

[throwaway789123]

Yeah I get what you mean. I have some savings, but this isn't a long-term solution.

[sherm8n]

It's not a long term solution, but gets you progress. If you're looking for a technical co-founder they'll want to see that you can execute. You can even start building on your own :)

[throwaway789123]

I'll see what I can do thanks!

[dgunn]

what school do you go to?