Ask HN: Solo founders, how do you overcome isolation?

[alessiosantocs]

Hi all, I've been working on my own for some years now on a saas business now generating around 5k/MRR.

I've enjoyed being able to work by myself in the past few years and didn't really feel the need of a co-founder or a pal in my team with whom to talk about the business you know (I have a couple of contractors on the team).

Since the pandemic hit, I've started feeling more and more isolated and I've realized how I'm actually needing someone to talk to on a daily basis about the struggle of the business, discuss ideas about the product and so on...

How do you go about finding someone like that in a moment like this?

[RemingtonLak]

Hard problem. If someone else out there is in the same boat. How would that person find you?

If you can answer that, then you've found your answer and on your way of solving one of the biggest issue straight men are facing.

I'm in the same boat as you thus scoping out HN right now ;-), but also do Reddit and Indiehackers.com. I'm finding it's harder to find someone to befriend than it was finding my soulmate! Seriously.

Other places due to my interests are arduino/ESP8266/IoT forums. As for late, I'm been active on Hubitat forums since I'm trying to hobble together a worthy home automation and security. Lot of great people but hard to "connect" as a friend in forums. They are there to find solutions, not friends or at least I think they are?

It's almost as if one needs to "invent" match.com for for friends ;-) FriendFinder site start with that mantra where the founder started out looking for golf buddies only to find out most men that are looking are looking for one thing....

Incidentally, great podcast on this subject: https://www.npr.org/2018/03/19/594719471/guys-we-have-a-prob...

I've been looking long and hard to try to find a solution to this problem. Women simply do NOT have this problem. Only men and it's becoming an epidemic of sorts. My father died "lonely", while my mother thrived with friends and same as for my in-law's. Men just do not want to talk, approach or converse with other men unless forced to. Stigma men seem to unwilling to let go.

Sorry, rambling since I got tired of coding and was looking for a break by reading HN ;-)

[alessiosantocs]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts!

This is an interesting point of view that I haven't thought about before. I agree with the fact that men are generally less inclined to speak openly about their feelings, worries and such.

I realized I haven't shared my gender in my post so it's interesting to see how other people relate to my question.

Does anyone know any groups or communities we lonely guys could join to find like-minded solopreneurs to support each other and create meaningful relationships?

[segmondy]

Just ask if someone with similar interest wants to buddy up and chat from time to time. Feel free to ping me, I up for occasional chat once or twice a week about running your own tech biz. You can also checkout indiehackers.com, you might find more solo tech entrepreneurs on there.

[alessiosantocs]

Hey segmondy, thanks for your comment and for sharing your ideas! I'll ping you up so we can connect.

[leandot]

HN and Indie Hackers are good communities for this, just reach out and I am sure there will be people who'd like to chat. Feel free to reach out to me too if you wish, I run a startup as well (not solo).

[alessiosantocs]

Hey leandot, thanks a bunch for the suggestion! And thanks for your availability, I'll reach out to you now ;)

[santa_boy]

I've been in a similar situation. Most of the aggravation is because of doing it all myself and not being a particularly social network communication type.

I've hired a few and improving on social outreach too. I think it is helpful because engagement creates a community by itself. And, delegation is extremely rewarding when done reasonably right.

Both of them inherently create a discussion board and a decent platform to express thoughts.

[alessiosantocs]

Thanks santa boy How hard was it for you to do social outreach and how did that work for you? Did you find any good friends? I am in the process of delegating stuff to another person in the team because a lot of the anxiety for me comes from those boring but important things like accounting and such.

[makeee]

Hey, I've been a solo-founder for the past decade and happy to chat anytime. Twitter/email in bio.

You may like https://startupschool.org, as they have weekly group sessions where you can talk about your struggles. I took part for two batches and met some other solo-founders that I've stayed in touch with.

[alessiosantocs]

So nice of you to comment. Thanks for the recommendation, I'll try to join startupschool.org. Connecting with you on twitter now :)

[dragosdev]

I felt the same way, until I found a friend who has been doing the same, so we vent to each other almost daily.

I'm still solo, but he built a team (and got to YC while I got rejected) so there is a lot to go at :)

[alessiosantocs]

Hey dragosdev, how did you find your friend? Did you go about in communities or did it happen at yc? Thanks a lot for sharing

[buffaloo]

If part of your question relates to loneliness, get a dog.

[greazy]

That's terrible advice.

[alessiosantocs]

lol I haven't added any context around my life in my post. I am very lucky as I do have a lot of company in the house: my wife and 4 little children and we live in Bali :) Still, I feel isolated in my work and I find it really hard to make friends that I can also talk to about anything you know.

[j45]

You might be interested the community around microconf.

[alessiosantocs]

Thanks j45, I didn't know about this. It looks like a great community of SaaS founders!