
Ask HN: (Startup School 2019) Advice for cofounders about to work on MVP? - elamje
Background: I(technical) have an idea&#x2F;product that I&#x27;ve been looking for help with. I met a person(non-technical) in the startup school directory with a similar product&#x2F;vision. We have talked and will be working together during Startup School (10 weeks) on our MVP. I want to do things the right&#x2F;healthy way, so we can maximize value from working together.<p>Is there any advice you have for us on cofounding, or working together generally?<p><pre><code>  Topics that come to mind are:
  - Expectations
  - Healthy relationship if we continue working together after MVP phase
  - Agreements
  - Communication
  - General early stage do&#x27;s and dont&#x27;s</code></pre>
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mtmail
If you're both motivated I'm sure the communication, at least which channel,
will the fine.

A simple one-page agreement helps. List what each brings into the projects
(other than working hours), for example one might have a logo designed or pays
for web hosting. Agree who own this in the future, and who owns what one
person purchases for the company during the project, again I'm using logo
design and webhosting as example. Or twitter handle. When you part ways one
way or another you want to avoid a situation where one person can walk away
with major parts that could hurt the project. What if one person doesn't want
to share the passwort for the twitter handle? With a one-pager you'd at least
have some legal standing. I've also seen one person trying to sell the project
on a startup website behind the other's person back.

Try not to sign long contracts, e.g. if you can rent a service (or SaaS)
monthly that's better than a year-long lock-in, even if you pay extra in the
short-term. One beauty of startups compared to bigger companies is they can
scale down their costs if needed.

