
Why I'll be a solo founder next time - dennybritz
http://dennybritz.com/blog/2013/08/05/why-i-will-be-a-solo-founder-next-time/
======
RyanZAG
Interesting points, but a lot of it is contradictory to the advice you hear
from successful startups, so I'd take this with a grain of salt.

 _" I believe that my previous two ventures failed mainly because of the
founding team (which I’m included in). How do I know? Because companies with
almost identical products and value propositions succeeded afterwards._"

I'm not sure if you're drawing the correct lesson there. Sounds more like
implementation issues. I'd recommend you spend some effort improving your
ability to implement / find people who can implement and then try again.

~~~
regal
I'll chime in here and say that reading this article sounded exactly like
reading about my own 3 previous (failed) partnerships.

My sole successful venture has been solo all along (not including employees),
and has outlasted the rises and falls of the other businesses (during the
amateur entrepreneur "too many fingers in too many pies" phase). I don't think
I'd do a partnership again. But maybe I just don't play well with others?

Anyway, can't speak for the OP, but when intelligent, ambitious friends around
you see that you work your tail off and already have succeeded at building a
profitable business from scratch, they suddenly get really excited about
starting new businesses with you that often sound great. At least in my
experience though, many of these people turn out to see themselves as "the
visionary" who kinda sorta checks in from time to time and you as "the
worker," which, if that isn't the role you're interested in, causes things to
unravel rather fast.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I suspect this is a key insight. There is a colloquialism for a company of
people all trying to be 'the boss' called "Too many Chiefs, not enough
Indians" (in reference to the tribal organization of Native American tribes,
where in fact there was exactly _one_ Chief who was the final arbiter) but
another spin on this is "Too many Medicine men, not enough Indians."

The "fantasy" life of a startup founder is that they see things others don't
(vision) and lead people who make those visions real (workers). Except you
can't really lead someone with a vision if you don't know yourself how to make
that vision real.

The challenges of startups are that you have to be able to "do it all" in
order to know what "doing it" actually entails, then you can bring people in
who can do a part of it (that you were previously doing) and _know_ if they
are doing it well or not. Folks who are visionary in their thinking but can't
break that down into actionable steps toward that vision, and then break those
steps into problem assignments, aren't really going to be an asset for your
startup until you already have a product and a revenue stream.

Even then, there is nothing more irritating to folks than a clueless
visionary. Someone who says something like "The underlying problem is energy
dependence, so our goal should be to provide an unlimited energy source to
break that dependence, let's get some smart people working on that!" Accurate
vision, but ultimately clueless, they just slow people down who have to
explain the 2nd law of thermodynamics to them (if they are patient enough).

~~~
whiddershins
""(in reference to the tribal organization of Native American tribes, where in
fact there was exactly one Chief who was the final arbiter)""

AFAIK absolutely false. It is also a gross generalization about a diverse
group of people with differing sociopolitical structures.

I would suggest reading "Empire of the Summer Moon" for an example of a famous
and incredibly egalitarian American construct, or just read about Iroquois
political structures via Googling, for two examples.

[http://www.cokesbury.com/forms/ProductDetail.aspx?pid=939760...](http://www.cokesbury.com/forms/ProductDetail.aspx?pid=939760&vsl=0001)

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois)

~~~
LekkoscPiwa
omg, secret political correctness police, please go away!

~~~
psycr
Whiddershins' comment has nothing to do with _political_ correctness, but
rather with actual _historical_ correctness. The comment is polite, sincere,
and provides a further source of information for those who seek it.

~~~
001sky
_actual historical correctness_

This is silly and trivial. Two reasons:

[1] The phrase is the analog of an idiom. It is shorthand for "hierarchy" and
used as such. The parent is explaining its use.

[2] There are many tribal organizations. This cuts both ways. Provided there
is a single one that was historically rank-hierachical, the data is not even a
counterfactual.

[3] Provided [2] is ok, so is [1]. We know [2] is ok. Hence, the comment is
logically ~gratuitous.

See, for example:

[http://www.usingenglish.com/reference/idioms/too+many+chiefs...](http://www.usingenglish.com/reference/idioms/too+many+chiefs+and+not+enough+indians.html)

~~~
kibibu
Besides, my Grandma used to say it all the time! I'm bringing it back!

\---

I don't think the correct response when called out the use of a racist
stereotype is to claim it's silly and trivial.

------
j45
A partnership is more work and harder than marriage because you have to:

\- get on and stay on the same page

\- agree on both of your live's direction and commitment to a path has to be
the same for the next 2-3 years

\- have the ability to defer to each other in your area of competence

\- have to be skilled at learning and getting anything done, whether its
business or tech.

\- know that your entry and exit goals have to be compatible. Some people want
to get rich quick, others are happy with organic growth that scales as well.

\- be able to have a disagreement and move on for what's best.

\- remember it's not about who's right, but what's right. Have a overarching
vision, mission and values that you agree with so you can test any idea
against them to see "does it fit how we're trying to do?"

\- understand that it's about creating value for your customers, not making
your own lives easier through the latest technology that makes something
easier for you in development

\- remember building channel to a market is more important than anything you
build.

\- building a financial engine early is the biggest indicator of whether your
partnership will last

\- building a partnership that grows in to friendship is easier than the other
way around. Build things with people who you have experience building things
with, and if you're new to each other, see if you can build something small
together before taking the plunge.

~~~
hnal943
Almost all of these things apply to marriage as well, minus the bits about
exit strategy. If you think committing to the same direction for 2-3 years is
difficult, it's not time to get married yet!

~~~
steveklabnik
A couple doesn't need to have the _same_ direction, they just need to have
compatible ones.

For example, a programmer married to a doctor. They have two different
directions, but if the only real compatibility requirement is that they live
in the same city, then seems fine.

~~~
hnal943
I think what you're describing is exactly the same situation in which start up
founders find themselves. The couple needs to agree on the direction and
organization of their family, just like the founders need to agree on the
direction and organization of their company.

For example, a couple needs to agree on:

* How to divide up responsibilities at home

* Expectations of income (who works? how much?)

* Whether or not to combine their income or keep it separate (and how will they spend it)

* Whether or not to have kids (and who will raise them)

* How to negotiate extended family commitments on both sides

I think your example of the programmer and the doctor underlines the need for
more agreement than physical proximity. What if the programmer wants to quit
her job and work full time on a start up idea, taking no salary for the next 3
years? The doctor will have to make adjustments in his lifestyle to
accommodate that decision. If they are not headed the same direction, that
would bring enormous pressure to the marriage.

~~~
steveklabnik
Absolutely. I only used physical proximity because it's a clear example; even
relationships don't even need physical proximity at all times. I myself have
spent most of the year away from my long(est)-term partner, because we
explicitly agreed to pursue other goals over proximity.

------
jmngomes
I'm a single founder and can only say the experience is rather grinding.

I'm all up for the "If you don't help, at least don't get in the way" motto. I
decided to pursue my current venture without a cofounder precisaly because I
didn't find enough people that had both the skills and (understandably) the
willingness to quit their nice paying jobs.

For me, it doesn't really make sense to have people aboard unless they add
some real value to the two core functions of what a startup needs to do:
building something and sell it. It's fine if you can't build it, but you
better be damn good at selling it. Photo ops and "vision, mission and values"
statements don't really justify a position on a bootstrapped startup that's
trying to get a product out (this obviously varies, having well connected co-
founders may make a lot of difference, some people are well worth their pay
just because of their business karma).

The big problem of a solo venture, IMO, is that you find yourself doing these
two roles simultaneously, which can be exhausting. It is for me, at least. I
can do both rather well, but after a while I start finding it difficult to
focus on designing a system for scalability, designing its database,
reflecting on security, writing and testing Android code, building prospects
lists and getting their contacts, getting meetings and attending them, fine-
tuning your sales pitch and getting the man to write out a check. And I left
out all the menial work that still has to be done.

By the end of the day, you're in agony not only because of that feature that
is taking too long to build, but also for not getting enough customer
meetings, because of not having enough positive answers and, mostly, because
launch is (or should be) just around the corner and there's still a lot of
stuff to be done and no one except you to take responsibility for it.

It's an emotional rollercoaster, so having the right partner seems like a good
move.

~~~
doobius
I agree that it is exhausting. I'm 2 months into a solo founded startup and
the mental fatigue is not what I expected. Reflecting on it now, it certainly
makes sense, but I just didn't know that it can be so taxing.

I've told myself that if I make it to a next round of funding I need to find a
partner stat.

~~~
beat
Two months? Just wait. I'm 9 months in solo, and day-jobbing to pay for the
bootstrap. It's incredibly exhausting.

If I could find a co-founder or two, I'd be thrilled. But finding someone
really worth their weight hasn't happened yet. And I'm not going to just sit
there and ignore this opportunity just because I can't find someone to hold my
hand while I'm doing it. I'm _going_ to get it out the door, even if I have to
do every little thing myself.

Having a co-founder is great. But not having one is no excuse to not work.

~~~
w0rd-driven
I'd suspect there are a number of people in your shoes and in the shoes of
this entire thread.

I read these responses and thought "Hmm I wonder what it is they're doing.
Maybe I could help or at least offer some brain power?" then realized clicking
usernames revealed dick-all about any one of you.

I had a thought "Why hasn't there been a matchmaking service for
entrepreneurs?" A quick Google search gave me the answer: some already exist.
You could try one of those. Alternatively you could use HN to help solicit
help by using the about section or use posts like this to give some modicum of
detail.

When I see nothing in your about section and nothing in these messages that
seem to explain the "what" you're trying to accomplish, I have a hard time
believing you're really serious about your search.

It's more likely that you have your own system of who you deal with or you're
just _passively searching, severely_. That's all perfectly fine, just not
something I would be doing in either of your shoes.

~~~
doobius
It might be a poor idea, but I've planned to hold off on actively searching
until I get more funding

~~~
w0rd-driven
I took comments on a post to mean "I'm ready for" when I should've realized a
lot of what we do as people is talk ourselves up to something.

I wouldn't consider it to be a poor idea at all. I was primarily trying to
offer suggestions to help with passively searching when the need arose but I
couldn't get around being specific, realizing it could partially sound mean or
negative when that wasn't what I was going for at all.

------
jmathai
I co-founded a startup that lasted for 4 years. Once we wound that down I
began doing side projects on my own or with another friend of mine.

In the end I decided that I'm better off going at it alone. Mainly because I
had a hard time finding someone else to join me at the same commitment level
(and that's with a side project).

So I quit my job and started to bootstrap as a solo founder (this time with a
wife, two kids and single income --- mine). I brought on a co-founder about 6
months in to fill out a few gaps that I didn't have the experience or time to
do myself. Not having enough revenue to pay them meant equity was the only
collateral I could offer.

Fast forward 2 years and I can say that without a doubt, if I was a single
founder I'd probably have thrown in the towel by now.

And my co-founder is remote! 1/2 way around the world. So as the post
suggests, it's harder but I don't think it's impossible.

Obviously it depends on the individual and the business. All I can say is that
the value my co-founder brought to the table was different than what I
originally thought. The emotional support greatly outweighed what I thought I
was bringing him on board for.

If I had picked the wrong co-founder it would have been much worse than not
having one at all.

------
ghc
If you're not good at building a founding team, how will you excel at building
a company? Technology and design are great, but companies are the people that
they are comprised of.

There's nothing wrong with being a solo founder because being one doesn't mean
you can't build a good team. But you obviously have issues with team building,
so I'd work on that first or found a company with someone who is actually good
at it.

~~~
choxi
Recruiting employees requires different skills from recruiting cofounders.
They have different incentives, different roles, and it happens at different
stages in your company.

~~~
ghc
Recruiting is an entirely separate issue. Building a team begins where
recruiting ends.

In this talent market (in Boston in my case) we have a difficult time with
recruiting, but our experiences with team building have been far more painful
(as growing pains go).

------
amberes
I allready decided to be a single founder. It's damn hard to find someone
interested in starting a venture together, it's even harder finding someone on
the same wavelength. I could grow a beard (omg I have!) waiting for this to
happen.

I burned out working my ass off nights and weekends because my previous
partner was absolutely sure he'd be able to sell our product. Which
unfortunately turned out different (but that venture still makes money... Too
much to let it die... Too less for it not to be a pita)

'your startup chances increase with a partner'. Yes, but I'm not interested in
a startup that makes me filthy rich, I'm just looking for something to replace
they daytime job where I don't have to be at an office 5 days a week and where
the office can be wherever my laptop is.

I have built several succesful applications over the years (for others) where
I used my UI/UX skills (and really just common sense and thinking before
code/design). I can make the tech side of a project from A to Z (and in my
current daytime role also doing sales and marketing as I'm the sole manager of
a very small but very profitable company).

And next time I'm taking on a co-founder, I want proof that he has commercial
skills because it seems anyone thinks they can do marketing and sales or that
it will happen by itself or something.

~~~
johnrob
_I 'm just looking for something to replace the daytime job where I don't have
to be at an office 5 days a week_

Wouldn't it be easier to simply find a job that lets you work remotely? Not
every employer would allow that, but I have to think if you put a startup
level of effort into such a job search you would find and land such a job in a
month or two. I could be wrong (maybe you've already tried), but it from an
outside perspective it seems to be the case.

~~~
amberes
Hmmm... That was just my 1st annoyance with a 'normal' job. And which company
is going to pay me when during summer time I work 1-2 hours or only the really
necessary/urgent stuff from a campsite somewhere? I'd rather have the
flexibility to work like crazy when I want to and relax when I need
it.,working for someone else is just too rigid.

What also bothers me: -working my ass off might mean I get a bonus, but this
is only a 1 time thing. No boss is happy to give a raise (maybe I'm already
earning above market). Slackers (laggards? English isn't my mother tongue)
often earn slightly less compared to people working their ass off.

-I can put my blood and sweat into the company, but from one day to the next they can fire me (ok, they'll,have to pay a hefty fee for breaking the contract). I've got a couple of ongoing projects at the daytime job right now, and I'd worry more about the projects if they'd fire me than about getting a new job... Which is probably an unhealthy attitude.

------
mbesto
I have yet to find a single formulaic way for founders of a business to
succeed.

That being said, these are my own findings/thoughts:

\- Companies with 1 + n cofounders tend to be more successful

\- Working (in a commercial manner) previously to the startup helps massively.
You learn a lot about people's business behaviors when you actually work with
them (business and personal relationships can be very different)

\- Finding a good co-founding experience on your first time is extremely
difficult

\- Experience with project management (and more specifically stakeholder
management) is very valuable

\- No more how much you read about startup stories, nothing can prepare you
for the experience of a business partner relationship. It's just like dating -
it's all about communication and compromise.

\- I like the Hustler (CEO), Hacker (CTO), Hippie (CXO) setup for internet
based startups. It also helps when each one has a experience with each other
roles.

~~~
GotAnyMegadeth
n ∈ ℤ, n > 0

------
DanielBMarkham
I spent a few months a few years ago looking for a good cofounder.

Let me tell you, it was a waste of time. The odds of running into somebody
where everything initially meshes are astronomical. And you're already facing
long odds as a startup, why add to the stress with all that other stuff?
Failure to co-locate alone is a show-stopper, much less issues about flipping
versus growing, or financing versus bootstrapping, or where your real passion
is, or whether passion alone is enough...

I'm glad it works for so many successful folks, although I note that many
times these are college buddies who have spent a lot of time together _before_
their startup.

This is one of those things that looks different depending on where you sit.
If you're an investor, teams do better than solo founders. If you're a founder
who's worked alone for many years, my conclusion was don't kill yourself
trying to find a partner that probably isn't there. This is much the same as
my conclusion on Venture Capital: some things are not worth chasing.

~~~
w0rd-driven
From my personal experience and from all the information I have on the
sidelines, I see 2 camps arising.

1) Build a perfect product. Rally everyone around this perfection. 2) Build a
perfect team. That person or people you know of where if you could just work
with them on what you want to do, you could accomplish _anything_.

I've been in camp 2 with a friend of mine for a few months now and it's
extremely difficult. It's difficult because we've yet to find an idea we can
agree on implementing for the long term.

Camp #1 seems really difficult too because you have to sell a small group of
people on your vision. A vision living entirely in your head.

I have no clue what's worse but I think it'll be subjective anyway. I would
much rather be people in search of product than product in search of people
but that's how I roll.

------
7Figures2Commas
I think it's important to be honest with oneself about the motivations for
starting a business with somebody else. From what I see, some entrepreneurs
don't want to go it alone because they believe there's safety in numbers. If
you're leaving a good job, have a family to take care of, etc., it can be
easier to convince yourself that you're doing the right thing if someone else
is taking the plunge with you.

This is a really bad excuse for bringing on a co-founder. In my opinion, it's
a primary reason you often see bloated founding teams comprised of individuals
who have similar skills, not complementary skills.

~~~
ch4ch4
Completely agree with what you said, but I think you mean "complementary", not
"complimentary".

~~~
7Figures2Commas
Good catch. Although in line with my comment, some entrepreneurs _are_ looking
for complimentary co-founders. :)

------
jmaskell
I believe that being a solo founder contributed to the failure of my startup.
In short, it puts a lot of pressure on yourself, that can't be split with
other members of the team. If the ship is sinking, you have to go down with
it. Other friends and mentors can offer support, but they're not in the same
boat as you. When times are tough, founders can help pull each other through.

I think the reasons described in the OP are more about having the wrong
founding team. This is also why we have things like vesting - if someone
decides not to work full time, consult elsewhere then they should lose part of
their shareholding.

~~~
7Figures2Commas
Don't take this the wrong way, but your entire rationale for having co-
founders seems to be based on fear and negativity. Your comment implies that
you're most interested in providing yourself with the comfort that somebody
else is taking risk too and will be there to drown with you when the ship
sinks.

Per my other comment, this is simply the wrong reason to bring on a co-
founder. If you truly aren't confident in the opportunity you've identified
and don't feel comfortable owning your pursuit of it, convincing two or three
other people to come along for the ride isn't going to prevent failure. In
fact, it's probably only going to make the process of failing even _more_
stressful.

~~~
jmaskell
It's not about fear of failing. I wouldn't do it again unless I was convinced
the venture would be successful (and I think there's a significantly increased
chance of that, based on what I learnt during the failed startup and since).

What I'm saying is that having equal co-founders gives you the ability to
share the workload, emotional strain and get through the pain barrier.

It's obviously not impossible to build a huge business as a single co-founder,
but it's unlikely that I'd want to do it again!

------
beat
What I'm learning as an early stage solo founder...

1\. Not having co-founders is no excuse to not work. I _want_ to turn this
idea in my head into a working product. Saying you can't do it because you
don't have a co-founder is an excuse, not a reason. It's not impossible,
merely harder.

2\. The critical problem is bandwidth. I'm day-jobbing to make ends meet,
which bites even more into my time. My primary challenge now is finding a way
to go full time, either with funding or with a revenue-generating subset of
the functionality.

3\. I'm the visionary. If I can find a technical co-founder to take over the
coding work, great - better, even, because coding is bad for my big-picture
focus. But ultimately, it's my product and my vision. If I find "co-founders"
at this point, it will likely be just a label to make investors happy. In
practice, they will be early employees.

4\. Team-building, on the other hand, is going well. I'm a social person, an
extrovert, and I can generate a pretty decent reality distortion field. I've
been able to get help so far as I've needed it, and I think this will
continue. Part of this comes from not asking too much of people, which is what
the usual co-founder issue seems to be.

~~~
w0rd-driven
An extrovert is typically better at marketing and sales, namely for the social
aspect. For someone like me that's an introvert and extremely shy around new
people, I gain XP by tackling technical problems.

That doesn't mean technical people can't be a visionary too because you'll
definitely need it. Someone that can get a complete grasp of the scope to tell
you when a decision will lead you into more or less technical debt. You can
make all the right business decisions and still fail miserably if you make
wrong technical ones.

I'm likely not telling you anything you don't already know but I just wanted
to make sure you weren't compartmentalizing things too much.

~~~
beat
I think I'm a visionary technical person. The problem I'm addressing is based
on two decades of experience in enterprise configuration management - solving
the forest/trees problem of seeing small technical changes in the context of
bigger business changes, and/or drilling down from the big business tasks to
the technical details that implement them. It's a boundary-crossing technical
issue that's near and dear to my heart.

A good CTO could devise their own implementation path rather than following
mine, but that's not really "vision". That's about _how_ it works, not _why_
it needs to exist. I can do the "how" myself, but I don't think it's a good
use of my time and focus.

~~~
pnathan
Hey, configuration management is something really interesting to me. I don't
suppose you'd mind emailing me with a link to your startup (email in profile)?

------
jhuckestein
It sounds like your previous endeavors failed before the stages in which you'd
wish you had one or more great co-founders. What if you raise a lot of money
and want to share the responsibility with someone? What if something urgently
needs to be done during Christmas? Who else could you ask to cancel their
vacation? (unless Ron Conway is amongst your investors ;)).

In my experience it's easier to start something alone, especially if it's not
technologically difficult (i.e. most webapps). Down the line it's important
for me to have wingmen, though. Even if you can carry the load intellectually,
it's nice to have somebody with skin in the game for moral support when shit
hits the fan. Of course anything is better than having co-founders that don't
work out for whatever reason.

~~~
dennybritz
Yep, you're right. Both of my previous two startups failed in the early
stages. I think down the road there's no way around hiring a great team if you
want to scale..

------
austenallred
I think most people recognize that the team is the most important aspect of a
startup - from Paul Graham allowing people to apply to YCombinator without an
idea, to investors my co-founder and I have talked to being much more
interested in who we are, what we know, how we get along, and why we do what
we do than product or traction, I think it's safe to say that the team is the
most important aspect of a company.

I wouldn't, however, decide to "go solo" next time; that may even be a worse
option. You'll never find someone who you work with 100%, but you _need_ a co-
founder. Keep "shopping," find someone you click with, and have another go.

~~~
7Figures2Commas
Building a solid team does _not_ require one or more co-founders. It is
entirely possible to start a company on your own, hire employees/contractors
and then recruit for key leadership positions.

Mark Suster's Co-Founder Mythology
([http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/05/09/the-co-
founder...](http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2011/05/09/the-co-founder-
mythology/)) and comments at Startup Grind earlier this year
([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHgGUFjK3c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHgGUFjK3c))
are well worth reading/watching.

Of course, if your goal is to have a great team on paper so that an investor
will feel comfortable writing you a check, let's call the exercise what it is:
building a team that might build a business once it has funding. That's _not_
building a business.

~~~
austenallred
I can only speak for my own experience; I would be dead in the water without a
co-founder, and I would never try to do it alone, nor would I recommend
someone else try alone.

~~~
7Figures2Commas
Fair enough, but translating your experience into such absolutist advice is
sort of like saying "I wouldn't be able to drive without an automatic
transmission therefore I recommend that everyone avoid manual transmissions."

------
robomartin
You really have to make a distinction between who the subject of a lot of
these studies are. It is mostly young fresh-out-of-school (or still in school)
guys (and gals). They generally have very little life and business experience.
They are full of ideas and passion. But few have had to endure difficult
situations in their lives --personal or business.

If you take that profile and suggest that success as a solo founder is
possible, well, you would be wrong. The road to success is actually a mine
field for most. And these young entrepreneurs, for the most part, are simply
not prepared to have a steady hand at the tiller in a storm. So, yeah, that
the probability for success goes up exponentially for teams is no surprise. So
long as everyone is pushing in the same direction reasonably well things move
forward. Add to that guidance and adult supervision (I don't mean that in a
derogatory sense at all) and it could and does work well.

Of course, there are lots of examples of teams that self-destructed as things
got difficult. I watched a documentary on indie game developers a while ago
and that seemed to be a common theme: As they started to get stuck in the mud
that can be a never-ending project partners started to become enemies and
things went from bad to ugly fast.

It is my firm conviction that a well-rounded, experienced solo founder does
not need a co-founder in order to succeed. You still have to hire good people
to work with you, which is a fact regardless of how many founders might be at
the top.

Outside of the tight-knit university-centric circles of places like SV,
finding suitable co-founders is hard and fraught with problems. And this is
particularly true as you get older. Everyone can get excited about launching a
new business. Few are willing to put it all on the line to make it go. I've
experienced this first-hand with friends. When you finally say "OK, let's do
it" and start to discuss the reality of what's expected from each founder
things slow down very quickly. That's when "we should do this together" turns
into "Well, let me check with my wife" or "I don't think I can put in the
time". The co-founder pool is smaller and smaller as you get older and/or
accumulate responsibilities.

I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of businesses in the world are
started and run by solo founders. I know a bunch of them. I am talking about
everything, from a mechanic's shop to a software company. Partnerships are far
more difficult than marriages to get right and the consequences of failure can
be just as dire, if not more.

A lot of these discussions on HN tend to be software-startup-centric. There's
far more to the world than web and mobile software startups. By comparison
software startups are easy. That's why people can write these really amazing
zen sounding introspective pieces with revelations on how they did this or
that, failed and then did this or that, learned, pivoted, raised some money
and eventually succeeded. Try doing that with a self-funded (from savings,
loans, credit cards, second mortgages or all of the above) hardware startup, a
restaurant or a dry cleaning business. The phrase "I'm all in" comes to mind.
Most businesses cannot be built sipping latte's at Starbucks while listening
to cool tunes. Be sure to consider context before reaching some of these
conclusions.

~~~
skrish
Great points. Somedays I do tend to wonder what makes founders stick through
rough times and as you rightly pointed out having been through life
experiences where they stick it out is a definite advantage. You tend to see
through the period instead of knee jerk reactions.

I come from a family where both my grand parents & uncles used to run a small
restaurant as a family business, starting all the way from the bottom. And
they used to do it together for 35+ years through various family situations,
sticking together. I just can't complain having seen what they went through
and accomplished.

For a lot of people out there that is just life. Only in software startup
world we plan for compatibility in lots of different ways. Example, there are
lot of people who want to know the plan for an 'exit' even before starting up.
Not wrong. Just different.

------
kposehn
> In particular, don’t found a startup with people that ... have newborn kids

As a startup founder with a newborn (well, 14-month-old) I would say that this
shouldn't be a global condition. There are plenty like me that I know who can
put forth their full commitment - because we have supportive spouses that are
completely on board with our entrepreneurial ambitions.

~~~
w0rd-driven
I'll agree and raise another important point: With enough money, almost
nothing is a barrier.

I wouldn't found a startup with no income and looking to leverage that success
early or your family will starve. If you have an adequate enough padding
though, and yes a supportive family, you can easily be solo.

~~~
jsemrau
As a father and sole-founder I would most certainly agree and say that a
family helps you focus and re-balance while lack of money is putting pressure
on both. So bottom-line lack of money is a bigger problem than having a family
(which should not be a problem at all)

------
wikiburner
I just figured I'd throw this out there to see if anyone has any insight on
it: Do you think certain personality types are probably _better off_ being
solo founders? Maybe loners, or people who aren't people persons. Or maybe
ADHD types who have trouble keeping relationships on an even keel? Or maybe
the Steve Jobs egomaniac, force-of-will types (although, I know he started w/
a co-founder).

Obviously, it could depend on the nature of the startup, in that it could be
strategically important to compensate for one of those "weaknesses".

~~~
dennybritz
I think it depends on what business you're in. Almost all businesses require a
combination of "hustling" (sales/marketing) and "hacking (tech skills). This
may be a stereotype, but I think most hackers aren't good hustlers. I'm not a
good salesperson, wich is my biggest problem, but I'm trying to learn...

~~~
wikiburner
Whoops, sorry. Looks like we were typing at the same time. I just added the
last line, making a similar point.

------
icoder
I think most of the 'tips' and lessons learned make sense and are useful but I
don't agree with the overall message. This is like saying 'I went to two
restaurants and they were no good (for various reasons that can be avoided in
the future), now I'll always eat at home'

~~~
j45
I don't think entirely ruling out partnership, or thinking it's the only way
is right.

I've done both, and both offer interesting pros and cons. Namely if you have
the ability to fund a project yourself while building it, you can be in the
drivers seat more and some partners are okay with that.

Would you mind sharing your experiences?

------
woggg
"This is one of the reasons why young people often make for particularly good
founders. They don’t have a lot of other commitments."

Bleah. It's a balance of ability, interest, commitment, urgency and
experience. Interest and commitment are not the same thing and neither is
urgency. Experience does have value.

You limit yourself pretty badly if you follow this youth principle. Finding a
twenty-something willing to bang his/her head for 80 hours a week is about the
least useful thing a startup can do.

------
georgespencer
The article makes a fantastic argument... for investing a lot of time in
picking your founders. This is like a single person saying that they're going
to stay single forever because two previous relationships didn't work out.
Except instead of a marriage here, you're talking about something which
greatly increases the chances of success in an endeavour.

I'm the solo founder of a venture-backed startup in London. That's a bit like
being the single mother of a kid in the projects who ended up going to
Harvard. When we successfully make a 100x return on investment for our backers
it will be the equivalent of that kid becoming president. This is a tough
business and whilst I don't whinge because I knew what I was signing up for,
OP is misguided to think the sole-founder grass is greener. Sole founders
exist in a vacuum irrespective of how many great colleagues and mentors they
have.

------
joeblau
All of this stuff is spot on. I especially like the bit about lack of
commitment. Lack of commitment can even be expressed through things like
someone addicted to gaming or watching to much TV. A friend of mine called
those activities "Time-Stealers."

I also tried to co-found a company with someone that had all of the boxes
checked. At first I was part of the vision, but as the project grew I was
slowly removed from the project. Afterwards, I felt like I was trying to force
the co-founder issue because "PG said you need a co-founder." After that
experience, my formula is: bad cofounder < solo founder < good cofounder.

------
wrath
In my experience the bottom line is that you need good people around you in
order to succeed. It doesn't matter if that's a co-founder, a CEO, developers,
etc.. If you don't have good people around you helping you in your journey of
success you won't have any.

For example, in my first startup I had a very good co-founder but we were both
very young and inexperienced. We didn't hire the right people to surround us
and help us in our journey. As a consequence we had a great run but were out
maneuvered by other companies. In the startup I'm doing now, I started with
great co-founders and we then proceeded to hire more great people to surround
us. We haven't completed our journey yet but the driving force in the company
now is not only me (the other co-founder left to pursue other interests) but
many others that share my passion and goals.

Take your time and look for people that share your vision and passion. These
people are out there it just takes time. And remember, no one can do it by
themselves.

If you never read it, by a copy of Good To Great ([http://www.amazon.com/Good-
Great-Companies-Leap-Others/dp/00...](http://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-
Companies-Leap-
Others/dp/0066620996/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375746786&sr=1-1&keywords=good+to+great)).
There's a whole chapter devoted to how great companies need great entourages.

~~~
bobbles
This makes me wonder if two solo-founders working together (on their own
projects) but bouncing ideas off each other would be more successful than
going it alone.

------
lhnz
There is a correlation between startup success and "founding teams" therefore
investors often use the existence of a team as a proxy for a higher
probability of success.

Teams can have convexity or concavity effects - that is, they have the
opportunity to make you a lot more successful or a lot more unsuccessful.

Since it's hard to tell the difference between a good team and a bad team
there's a lot of room for people to to create inauthentic signals by bundling
together impressive-looking people that form bad teams. Therefore the
heuristic of "a founding team exists" is easily gamed [0] to the point that
it's losing its utility. However, since in a few cases it's exceedingly
important to the success of the startup, and because of information asymmetry
faced by investors it's one of the only good signals for success.

On a generalised individual startup level it was probably always more harmful
than it was profitable.

 _In practice ask yourself:_

Do you feel this person will help your company to succeed or are you just
adding them because you've been told that this makes a startup more
investable? If it's truly the former then take the risk; otherwise be careful,
work hard and increase your exposure to suitable co-founders.

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_Law](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_Law)

------
pasbesoin
You can either get stuff done, or you can't.

I'll take working solo any day, over working with those who can't. Been there,
done that.

P.S. Also applies after s/can't/won't/ . And corporate life is full of cases
that leave you wondering which apply and in what percentages. "Team" is not a
panacea -- not from my perspective.

P.P.S. I do not mean to ignore the roles and need for training and learning.
But there are people who hardly seem to benefit from, or even genuinely engage
in, these.

------
mef
Heads up, your blog
([https://blog.cameralends.com/](https://blog.cameralends.com/)) gives me the
red screen of evil on Chrome:

You attempted to reach blog.cameralends.com, but instead you actually reached
a server identifying itself as *.herokuapp.com. This may be caused by a
misconfiguration on the server or by something more serious. An attacker on
your network could be trying to get you to visit a fake (and potentially
harmful) version of blog.cameralends.com.

------
mgaphysics
You deserve kudos for your efforts so far. Every failure will breed some type
of insight. The statement, "I believe that my previous two ventures failed
mainly because of the founding team (which I’m included in)." \- may be true,
but could probably just as easily be said of solo founders. Especially after
reading your list of deficiencies in the founding team members, they may be
the same short-comings as the person staring at a solo founder in the mirror!
It is sometimes harder (or impossible) to find that rare person who can wear
all hats.

My major concern about being a solo founder would be the possible loss of
productivity- how much more a team can accomplish over one person, and
collaboration. Also, and this may seem horrible, but if we crash and burn, we
can do it faster as a team, and pivot or move-on without the time equity that
one person will have invested.

To answer the questions you posed at the end of your article, my two cents is
that I have found it impossible to succeed at scale without an agile team (one
mans opinion). I hate to preach process and organization, but if a team
follows the resources available to start-ups, such as business model
generation, etc. You can identify holes in the team, or where someone needs
assistance. This leads to the second part of your question and the most
important attributes to look for in a co-founder. They should already have
expertise, but the two attributes that I would look for are Objectivity-
nothing ruins like the inability to be flexible, and Leadership- in the sense
that leaders tend to be people of action, they bring people along, and they
celebrate success wildly.

Not that you cannot achieve success alone, but it is definitely a lot tougher
to celebrate alone.

------
monopreneur
Best advice I ever got on partners/co-founders: "Before you take on a partner,
think about it long and hard, then don't".

------
acjohnson55
I think your (the author) ability to be a solo founder will probably be a
great deal more successful simply because you've been a founder before. That's
a huge leveling of the learning curve. I don't think I could recommend going
solo to a first-time founder though, unless it's someone who has capital on
hand to hire people to fill out the team.

 _Lack of skills: Don’t work with people that don’t bring unique skills
(applicable to a startup) to the table. Having someone like this in your team
will down the mood of the other teams members that are providing value. There
is one exception to this: Bring on smart people that are willing to learn
whatever it takes. Be particularly wary of people that have a certain
skillset, but are not motivated to learn new skills relevant to a startup
environment._

That's really great advice, but not really a reason to go solo. It's just a
reason to pick your partners carefully.

------
dnautics
"Co-founders can complement each other’s skillsets, provide psychological
support, and prevent you from chasing down a rabbit hole or losing sight of
the big picture."

I'm a solo founder of a nonprofit (we haven't launched yet). Of course the
rules are different, we don't have to "ship" anything, and there's almost no
time pressure, but I find that I can get those things from my board. They were
picked very carefully to get diverse domain experience and because I know I
can trust them to provide intelligent ideas (they're all wicked smart) and I
know I can trust them to provide moral guidance, very important for a
nonprofit.

I surmise that for a solo founder for-profit, finding people who can help you
with those very important assets is necessary, but you might be able to find
it outside of a "co-foundership".

------
rodolphoarruda
In my own experience, item #1 is by far the most critical of all reasons
listed. It's big enough to have pages and more pages written solely about it.
I was the technical lead of an "educational platform" being developed and most
of its products. As soon as two of the co-founders - out of 5 - found
themselves jobs and other full time activities things started to go downhill
very fast. One of the most annoying behaviors those then absent co-founders
started to display was a sense of: "Why are you asking me that? Isn't this
[feature/decision/scope] too obvious for you?". Hey, it's not a matter of
being obvious or not; but still current or valid according to project's
timeframe. I can't even elaborate on the amount of energy we lost.

------
adventured
"Because companies with almost identical products and value propositions
succeeded."

There's so much more that goes into a product and its success or failure than
what such a simple statement would imply. That's a very thin premise to launch
such a big position with.

One word rather sinks it in fact: luck

I've yet to run across an interview with a candid successful person that
didn't count dumb luck as an important part of the equation. Right place,
right time, right marketing, right people, right choices, right capital, and
dumb luck.

Also, no two products or companies offer identical products or value
propositions. That means the author isn't being objective about the situation
one way or another.

------
nlh
I'm sorry to sound pithy here, but it sounds like the lesson here isn't "be a
solo founder", it's "build the right team."

Either way, this is an interesting perspective - thank you for sharing your
experience!

------
petercooper
I like being a solo founder, only partly because I can't tolerate all the
things listed in other people too. The main, unforeseen, problem is that while
growth is not hard as a solo founder, you can quickly run out of time working
on the businesses' _present_ than anything for the businesses' _future_.
Having other founders who can be diverted to things like funding, hiring,
training, etc, is surely a huge boon, as being the day to day 'boss' but then
suddenly adding one of those activities in is quite stressful :-)

------
AznHisoka
I hear a lot of stories of people that have a tough time finding co-founders.
My tip would be to not just find any random Joe Schmoe in a tech meetup, or
even similarly minded people who want to be entrepreneurs. Rather I would find
people who already have done a Show HN with a similar idea, or someone who
launched a competitor product (by himself/herself), and ask if they want to
partner with you.

You'd be surprised because most of those people themselves want a cofounder as
well to take the product to the next level.

------
qwerta
Nice article but I disagree. I am very technical person and I really miss
cofounder who would take care of social/business side.

First heaving new born children gives me focus on work. Before I would
procrastinate a lot. Now I have to turn my idea into business, or there will
be serious trouble. Sure I can only give it 10 hours X 6 days a week, but that
is enough.

Secondly I disagree on remote location. It takes extra money (fast internet,
video conferencing gear) and effort. But it also gives more freedom to choose
best partner.

------
dshipper
"I believe that my previous two ventures failed mainly because of the founding
team (which I’m included in). How do I know? Because companies with almost
identical products and value propositions succeeded afterwards."

This is a dramatic and flawed oversimplification. There's no one reason why
one company fails while another succeeds. The founding team may be part of the
issue here, but I almost guarantee that there were probably plenty of other
things going on than just that.

------
highCs
Thanks to Paul Graham, I've understood why starting a company with one co-
founders is absolutely essential. This is because a startup idea is a vector
(see the _vector_ section):
[http://paulgraham.com/ds.html](http://paulgraham.com/ds.html)

Starting a company solo is worse than starting it with bad co-founders because
you don't know at start that your co-founders are bad and then you still have
a chance.

------
khenriks
"As a startup founder you’ll be working 48 hours a day" This is something I
hear founders claim all the time... Reality is they actually don't "work" that
much. I challenge any of you who disagree to measure yourself for 2 week.

[http://kevinhenrikson.com/2013/07/23/how-many-hours-do-
you-w...](http://kevinhenrikson.com/2013/07/23/how-many-hours-do-you-work/)

------
cocokr1sp
It seems like when things got tough you focused more on what your co-founders
weren't doing and less on what you could be doing yourself.

~~~
dennybritz
Yep, I definitely see that as an issue. Once you have someone that's
"responsible" for something it's easy to blame them instead of doing something
about it yourself. If you're a solo founder there's no one else you can blame
for the mistakes..

------
startupstella
I would agree with many of the other commenters but chime in with the
"correlation does not prove causation" there are many other factors why the
other startups could have failed: the other companies were better capitalized,
had better processes, founders that worked together better, etc.

------
jbscpa
When I visit with hot-blooded partners ready to set the world on fire I often
think of this line from the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969):

Butch Cassidy: [to Sundance] Kid, the next time I say, "Let's go someplace
like Bolivia," let's GO someplace like Bolivia.

Right, Next Time.

Easier said than done.

------
barce
"In particular, don’t found a startup with people that are busy with school,
have personal issues, are traveling, or are working a full-time job." I'd like
to know if there is anybody without personal issues, or what the author is
trying to say in this context.

------
ballard
OP: Business is hard, stop whining.

There's not much rhyme/reason for landing a hit, just don't fuck it up too
much.

Get your meta game together and fucking hustle. If you can't work with people
and (hack or hustle), you are better off doing something besides startups.

------
GoNB
I imagine one reason investors like co-founded start ups is because of the bus
factor:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor)

Or boiled down: less dependency on a single person.

------
d0m
Hey hey, what the author suggests is not that solo founder is better. It's
that temporarily solo founder is better than getting fucked by adding the
wrong co-founders.

------
pbreit
This is not a compelling reason to go solo but instead makes the case for
being careful when choosing people to work with.

------
m0skit0
Yes, like most successful software companies were built by one man: Microsoft,
Apple, Google... oh wait...

------
api
Isn't there a massive stigma against solo founders? I get that impression from
most of what I read.

------
andrewhillman
Or perhaps timing was a factor if they succeeded after. Timing plays a huge
role in success.

------
bayesianhorse
When it comes to business even scientists start judging too much and
perceiving too little.

------
tlarkworthy
Get a secretary.

------
seivan
The biggest advantage is that you won't have anyone slowing you down or
standing in your way.

Everything falls on you to succeed.

------
amerika_blog
Having done this wrong, how I look at it now:

You cannot expect anyone else to share your dream.

You can either hire them, or find commonality in a dream.

But at the end of the day, if it's your idea, it's going to have your name on
it and thus, will be what you work on the most out of all the people who touch
it.

------
wesleyd
The common factor in all your dysfunctional relationships is: you.

------
mcfunley
You will be a solo founder next time because anyone who Googles you will
realize you are the kind of moron who throws his former cofounders under the
bus.

~~~
dennybritz
Sorry if it came across like that. I myself was one of guys who wasn't
committed enough in a previous startup.

~~~
trustfundbaby
You don't have to be sorry, I thought it was clear you weren't throwing anyone
under the bus.

You're also quite the bigger person, I make it a rule not to respond to people
who feel the need to use a clear insult like "moron" in addressing someone
they don't know, especially here on HN. There was simply no need for that kind
of disrespectful language

