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Software development for an original product is one of the highest-risk activities that you can do in business. (It's like buying a bar without permits and expe

Software development for an original product is one of the highest-risk activities that you can do in business. (It's like buying a bar without permits and expecting to open in a month.) The best way to reduce that risk is to ask business owners you know, "Who wrote your prototype?" You need 2 things: 1) Somebody who has, and can, deliver a working product. 2) Somebody you can communicate with when differences arise.

RyanShook 8y ago
If it’s a first hire should I be looking for someone really good at the specific stack/language or a generalist who can solve problems and connect with the right talent?
- afarrell 8y ago
  If your company focused on building a specific technology that you will then apply to lots of industries, or on taking an existing technology and applying it to a specific business problem? If the former, then its unlikely you are asking this question since you should be talking with the grad student who is already your cofounder. So I’m going to assume you are building a startup like zipcar, taking mostly-known technologies and applying them to solve a business problem. In this case, you want someone who knows their particular stack very well (can debug their own package management issues, can choose good libraries, can navigate the docs quickly). You don’t need someone who has contributed to developing the language itself. > and connect with the right talent I’m not sure there is a large category of person who simultaneously doesn’t know their tools well but is well-respected among their contacts in the way that would draw other engineers to want to work with them. Maybe this refers to an engineering manager who hasn’t really been doing much programming in the past 3 years? EDIT: actually yes, someone with engineering management experience who is a bit rusty with programming to any particular stack is probably a good choice—-as long as they previously have been efficient they can pick it back up again.

RyanShook 8y ago

If it’s a first hire should I be looking for someone really good at the specific stack/language or a generalist who can solve problems and connect with the right talent?

afarrell 8y ago
If your company focused on building a specific technology that you will then apply to lots of industries, or on taking an existing technology and applying it to a specific business problem? If the former, then its unlikely you are asking this question since you should be talking with the grad student who is already your cofounder. So I’m going to assume you are building a startup like zipcar, taking mostly-known technologies and applying them to solve a business problem. In this case, you want someone who knows their particular stack very well (can debug their own package management issues, can choose good libraries, can navigate the docs quickly). You don’t need someone who has contributed to developing the language itself. > and connect with the right talent I’m not sure there is a large category of person who simultaneously doesn’t know their tools well but is well-respected among their contacts in the way that would draw other engineers to want to work with them. Maybe this refers to an engineering manager who hasn’t really been doing much programming in the past 3 years? EDIT: actually yes, someone with engineering management experience who is a bit rusty with programming to any particular stack is probably a good choice—-as long as they previously have been efficient they can pick it back up again.