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Can I ask what kind of work do you usually do for startups? Are these companies that have minimal funding and no or very few full-time engineers, and you're bu
by dcosson 8y ago
Can I ask what kind of work do you usually do for startups?
Are these companies that have minimal funding and no or very few full-time engineers, and you're building them a prototype to help them get off the ground? Or are you doing something very specialized, like setting up a Kubernetes cluster or something and training the team to maintain it after you leave?
Or, are these companies that have existing well-functioning engineering teams, and you basically join the team building product features alongside them but as a consultant?
Just asking because I've worked at a lot of startups but haven't ever been in a situation where we've hired a consultant. So I'm curious what the working relationship is like, I feel like there might be some friction between full-time employees who are often super committed, working long hours, maybe taking a pay cut to work there, and a consultant who's just in for a few months.
- theli0nheart 8y agoMost of my clients are non-technical founders. My role is generally that of an early stage CTO. I do pretty much everything on the technical side to get the product off the ground and scale it, from wireframing, to writing the code, and ultimately helping build the team or onboarding a FT CTO or VP Eng. My period of involvement varies from about 6 months (generally takes at least this long to find a good CTO candidate) to 4-5 years, at which point I'm usually leading the tech team.
- irremediable 8y agoDo you do this for several companies at once? And how do they pay you, if not with equity to offset low co-founder salary? Really intrigued to know; I wasn't aware this was a model that worked.