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Interesting post to see how this solution is accomplished, but how is this a one-person company, if there are contractors? How are the contractors utilized and

by cudgy 5y ago

Interesting post to see how this solution is accomplished, but how is this a one-person company, if there are contractors? How are the contractors utilized and how much do they cost on average? Are the contractors needed or could this be done by a single engineer?

npsimons 5y ago
Would you consider someone delegating tasks to a personal assistant on a billable hours basis a multi-person company? How about paying a freelancer once for the initial design of the website? Both these tactics are discussed in "Start Small, Stay Small" a book aimed at single developer software product "startups." It's pretty clear that if you want to shorten time to market, you leverage existing assets - when it's people using React or FLOSS databases, no one bats an eye, but farming out tasks here and there that aren't worth your burn rate (pay someone cheaper who can do it faster), how is that different? When the government hires contractors they're not considered part of the government workforce (ie, civil servants).
- cudgy 5y ago
  A single engineer owner with multiple contractors is different from multiple employees under a single engineer owner in what way? It is dishonest to claim that one is “one-person” while another is not when they are organizationally the same. Reminds me of people that call themselves “retired early” when they are effectively entrepreneurs with their own businesses and side hustles. Kudos to the original poster though for making a business that they own by themselves I assume. However, taking all the credit for themselves despite using contractors to build their company is disingenuous.
  - npsimons 5y ago
    "Hey, look at this guy over here, claiming to be a 'one-person company', when he pays for a VPS instead of constructing a server from hardware, then self-hosting it himself. Pfft, I'll bet he doesn't even personally service the AC that is used to cool the building the server is in either! Probably pays an ISP too, instead of creating his own Internet from scratch."
    - cjaybo 5y ago
      I think comparing the use of contractors to the use of cloud services is pretty disingenuous in this context. The reason that "one-person company" is emphasized in the title is because people will expect to find a list of technologies that make developing and maintaining all of the tech required to run a company do-able for a single person. Advice about which cloud services to use is exactly what I would expect to find on such a list. Hiring external developers is exactly the opposite of what I would expect to see, and kind of undermines the premise.
      - RNCTX 5y ago
        What about artwork? UI design is for an artist, not a developer. I can build whatever someone wants with the same stack that the OP is using (Django, Postgres, Lucene-ish search db, etc), but I will freely admit to people that I suck at website design in the way that they think of website design (what it looks like). Bootstrap was made for dolts like me who don't know what buttons and forms are supposed to look like. Is it cheating to hire an artist to design the front facing site components?
rwalling 5y ago
It depends. If the contractors are working ad-hoc or part-time, IMO it's reasonable to say there is one person working full-time on this company, therefore it's a one-person company. I think of it this way: if I'm solo and I hire a CPA to do my taxes or a bookkeeper to balance the books, does that make me a two-person company? That doesn't feel like an accurate description from my perspective. I ran my company as a single founder with nine contractors working from a few hours a month to maybe 15 hours a week. All little task-based projects like loading up new content from a repo or answer support emails. Technically, letter of the law, we were 10 people. But from a cost/profit perspective (which I would posit is the most important aspect) it was very much a one-person company.
alistairSH 5y ago
It sounds like he's using contractors for "surge" capacity. Normally, he's the only employee. But, if he has a major set of features to build/release, he'll contract out some of the work. Assuming they're all short-term jobs, I think it's fair to continue claiming it's a one-man company. But, if there's a steady flow of contractors that roughly adds up to a single FTE, the he's stretching the truth.

by cudgy 5y ago

npsimons 5y ago

Would you consider someone delegating tasks to a personal assistant on a billable hours basis a multi-person company? How about paying a freelancer once for the initial design of the website? Both these tactics are discussed in "Start Small, Stay Small" a book aimed at single developer software product "startups." It's pretty clear that if you want to shorten time to market, you leverage existing assets - when it's people using React or FLOSS databases, no one bats an eye, but farming out tasks here and there that aren't worth your burn rate (pay someone cheaper who can do it faster), how is that different? When the government hires contractors they're not considered part of the government workforce (ie, civil servants).

cudgy 5y ago
A single engineer owner with multiple contractors is different from multiple employees under a single engineer owner in what way? It is dishonest to claim that one is “one-person” while another is not when they are organizationally the same. Reminds me of people that call themselves “retired early” when they are effectively entrepreneurs with their own businesses and side hustles. Kudos to the original poster though for making a business that they own by themselves I assume. However, taking all the credit for themselves despite using contractors to build their company is disingenuous.
- npsimons 5y ago
  "Hey, look at this guy over here, claiming to be a 'one-person company', when he pays for a VPS instead of constructing a server from hardware, then self-hosting it himself. Pfft, I'll bet he doesn't even personally service the AC that is used to cool the building the server is in either! Probably pays an ISP too, instead of creating his own Internet from scratch."
  - cjaybo 5y ago
    I think comparing the use of contractors to the use of cloud services is pretty disingenuous in this context. The reason that "one-person company" is emphasized in the title is because people will expect to find a list of technologies that make developing and maintaining all of the tech required to run a company do-able for a single person. Advice about which cloud services to use is exactly what I would expect to find on such a list. Hiring external developers is exactly the opposite of what I would expect to see, and kind of undermines the premise.
    - RNCTX 5y ago
      What about artwork? UI design is for an artist, not a developer. I can build whatever someone wants with the same stack that the OP is using (Django, Postgres, Lucene-ish search db, etc), but I will freely admit to people that I suck at website design in the way that they think of website design (what it looks like). Bootstrap was made for dolts like me who don't know what buttons and forms are supposed to look like. Is it cheating to hire an artist to design the front facing site components?

rwalling 5y ago

It depends. If the contractors are working ad-hoc or part-time, IMO it's reasonable to say there is one person working full-time on this company, therefore it's a one-person company. I think of it this way: if I'm solo and I hire a CPA to do my taxes or a bookkeeper to balance the books, does that make me a two-person company? That doesn't feel like an accurate description from my perspective. I ran my company as a single founder with nine contractors working from a few hours a month to maybe 15 hours a week. All little task-based projects like loading up new content from a repo or answer support emails. Technically, letter of the law, we were 10 people. But from a cost/profit perspective (which I would posit is the most important aspect) it was very much a one-person company.

alistairSH 5y ago

It sounds like he's using contractors for "surge" capacity. Normally, he's the only employee. But, if he has a major set of features to build/release, he'll contract out some of the work. Assuming they're all short-term jobs, I think it's fair to continue claiming it's a one-man company. But, if there's a steady flow of contractors that roughly adds up to a single FTE, the he's stretching the truth.