Writted by fellow startup founders and advisors.
This handbook will cover everything you need to know from A-Z on finding and forming the perfect founding team for your startup.
Here's the Table of Contents
- What is a Co-founder
- Why a Team
- Outsourcing/Contracting vs. Hiring/Founding Teams
- What Makes a Good, Balanced Team?
- How many people should be in a founding team?
- Diversity
- Compatibility
- Questions that founding members should discuss together.
- Assessments that team members should do and share.
- Trust & Respect
- What are characteristics of an ideal founding team?
- The Hustler
- The Hacker
- The Hipster
- Other qualities you must have:
- Where’s the best place to find co-founders?
- Hackathons
- Your own network
- Common Interest Groups (LinkedIn, Meetup, Facebook etc.)
- Schools/Universities – Recruiting Volunteers or Interns
- Founder matching platforms
- What if I can’t find them!
- How should I approach them?
- Building the relationship
- Defining early company Values & Culture
- Company Values Exercise
- Compensating co-founders
- Monetary
- Equity/Shares
- Commission
- Revenue share/Royalties
- Strategic partnership/in-kind exchange
- Retaining talent
- Communication
- Co-founder Breakups
- Indicators of a bad co-founder relationship
- Why do they happen?
- Different Work Ethics
- Different Values
- Misaligned Vision
- Equity conflicts
- Decision making challenges
- Unable to address the elephant(s) in the room
