Learn to code or find a technical co-founder?
Ryan
7 replies
I'm a non-technical person (College junior) who can build solid web app prototypes on Bubble.io (and I can convert them to native apps).
But most of the technical people I know aren't good co-founders / don't have great chemistry with me (even though I go to a very good school). If I know I want to do a startup within the next <4 years (one that will likely be consumer and have an app component), is my time better spent learning a language like Swift or finding a technical co-founder?
Let's say I have 300 hours of free time over the next 6 months, and I'm pretty sure that by the end of those 6 months, I'll want to have started working on a startup. Is that 300 hrs better spent on learning programming or finding a technical co-founder? What if it was 500-1,000 hours of free time over the course of a year?
Replies
Yassin Bouacherine@jack95
You need a precise goal before deciding on learning to code or finding a technical co-founder.
What are you seeking out of a possible great chemistry with a potential co-founder? What is your goal/vision for the startup/app you have in mind?
To take the right decision, you got to know what's ahead of you. The wisest action would be to work on your soft skills to produce a visual presentation built around of what you want to build in a near future.
Then depending on how ambitious you are on the size/complexity of your business plan/model, you will think easier about if it's more "efficient" to learn to code or find a technical co-founder.
There is a risk on both sides of the coin, one alternative is to get contractors, but it also includes risks. Of course, the best is when you can count on yourself to do the job, but that also gets into your capacity/potential to get there. Your dealing of <4 years may also work against you. You really got to develop everything you can through documentation, illustrations, etc. It will only require your time and energy to do so.
Nobody will know better than you do when it comes to those things!
I hope it helps you to see things better! ;D Cheers
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A general opinion:
- Marketing, sales, project management, accounting, ... are "easy" to learn. Buy books, read articles, enroll in courses... Or very easy to outsource.
- Developing a product it's a far more hard to achieve. You need to be passionated about this, work 80h+ per week.
If you can't develop yourself find the right developper is very hard. Very good developer are are and they are expensive.
Learning to code is the hard path now and the easy way when you create your startup. But dont underestimate the time for be a good developer.
Code is just a little part of knowledge you need for creating an modern app...
- Install and manage Linux in all aspect (Networking, security, web server)
- Create a docker container and deploy within Kubernetes cluster
- Secure access to all element
- Manage a database (create schema, backup, scale)
- Cache servers
- High availability architecture
- Stress-testing
- ...
With 300 hours available... take this time for found a co-founder.
With 1000+ hours available try to learn a language (javascript for example) and practice a lot. If you you are a fast learner and you enjoy coding ... be a full-time developer :)
Entirely up to you - If you see yourself building lots of apps/MVPs in the future taking the leap now to learn is not a bad decision
Yeah of course learn coding.
I think it’s better to focus on all other needs of a startup as a non-technical person if you are planning to start a business. While focusing on learning to code, you will probably not gonna spare enough time on other important roles that a founder has such as the lead of growth, fundraising, sales etc.
Finding a CTO would be way more useful