4 ms·

I'm not sure what the lesson learned here is. You didn't sign a contract with your friend, which led you later to be able to abandon the terms you mutually agr

• rahimnathwani 13y ago
  The act of putting together a contract would have forced them to think through the 'what if' scenarios (e.g. founder leaving etc.). They didn't do that work, so their expectations diverged, and it screwed up their friendship. Lesson: spend some up-front effort clarifying expectations, rights, obligations and walk-away provisions. Maybe write the stuff down and sign it.
• redthrowaway 13y ago
  In addition to the explicit agreement ("you own 30%"), each side has implicit terms that they believe the other side holds as well ("you keep working"). Unfortunately, these implicit expectations are often not shared between parties. It sounds like the author thought he was bringing his friend on as a late cofounder with all of the responsibilities that entails, whereas the friend thought it was payment for work he'd already done. The point of the contract is to make sure these implicit assumptions are made explicit, so both parties know where they stand before agreeing to a deal.