Absolutely, DO NOT, get a co-founder!

[BitGeek]

An oft lamented consern is the difficulty in finding a co-founder. Next to this is the regular discussion of what kind of founder to get, how to know you've got a good one... and all the possible problems that can happen when founders don't agree.

Well, I'm am old man at almost 40 and I've spent the last 18 years working for startups of less than 100 people, many of them successful, and almost all of them founded by more than one person-- and in almost all situations I knew at least one of the founders very well.

The number one thing that caused the unsuccessful companies to fail was fights between the co-founders. And the successful ones-- were ones where the co-founders were very harmonious, because they had worked together for years before founding the company (multiple instances of this.) Of course, there were also instances where co-founders had worked before and they still fought all the time.

A co-founder is not what you need, unless you already have one, and you have as good a relationship with them as the best relationship you've ever had with anyone in your life. If you KNOW you're not going to have a problem, then great.

But for most of you-- those who don't know others who are as entreprenurial or don't already know someone - and have known for quite awhile that they would be a good co-founder-- you should not get a cofounder.

I know that PG says you need a co-founder, but while his intentions are good he's slightly off the mark. Sure, its better to have more than one person in the company... and feel free to call your second thru fourth employees "co-founders" or give them "founders stock"... whatever.

But at the end of the day, if its your idea and you are the one who has decided to dedicate the next several years of your life to this project, then found the company and make everyone else who joins you an employee.

Employees can have good chunks of stock. But you gotta have the authority question out of the way. You have to be a good leader to run a company... and getting people in you don't know too well works much better when you both know they are employees (Even if they are called founders or whatever, how about "founding team" or "founding employees".)

Its better for you to have the ultimate say and make a few wrong decisions, than for you and your co-founders to be fighting.

Nobody will ever have as much passion for the idea than the originator, and genuinely visionary people understand their idea on a level and in a context that nobody else will ever... thus you have to lead.

Next to Venture Capitalist (who force companies to misallocate funds or go after longshots and abandon sure things), co-founders are the biggest reason companies fail. And actually its even worse- when you have co-founders VCs like to get involved and start manipulating things.

Every time I've seen one founder pushed out or marginalized in favor of other founders by the VC firm, the company has not lasted 9 months after that.

For an example of the success of a single founder with founderr employees--look at Amazon.com. Bezos is clearly the founder, and he got engineers in early, they got good stock, but they knew what they were. The company would be much different if these employees had thought they were equal with the guy who had the vision.

So, those who are desperately seeking a co-founder.... stop... employees are much easier to find anyway. And you can find ones who will take stock as compensation. (Just don't be stingy-- I once was in talks with a company who was building out the founding team and offered me %1 stock plus a serious pay cut... I turned them down-- why take the real risk of a pay cut when there's no equity upside?)

Anyway... think about it-- and don't be held up waiting for that founder... start pressing forward without one and when you need to build your team, bring people on who are ready to follow you... and when their egos are not involved, things will go much better.

[pg]

The fact that most plane crashes are due to engine failure doesn't mean planes shouldn't have engines.

All you have to do is look at the empirical evidence. Successful single-founder startups are so rare that they're famous on that account.

I'm not saying that having a cofounder is so important that you should take someone lame, or someone you don't know well. Maybe if you can't find a cofounder you're just screwed; I don't have enough data yet to say for sure. But someone going into a startup as a single founder should be aware they're doing something that, for whatever reason, rarely works.

[BitGeek]

The plane analogy doesn't work because dual engine planes are more reliable than single engine planes... unlike founding teams, engine can't decide that they want to go in different directions and engines are not insecure, ego driven, or prone to misunderstanding each other. Nor do engines have investors coming in sowing dissent between them.

If you look at the empirical evidence, you will see that most successful companies are started by an individual. Now, of course, a successful company needs more than one person to be involved-- they need employees. And early employees can be very well rewarded and significant contributors to shaping the idea.

But leadership by consensus does not work, as anyone who has belonged to a high school club or organization knows. In a business environment, it is death- the founders never reach consensus and generally they constantly pull against each other, undermining each other and ultimately undermining the company.

Leadership by consensus is quite literally the absence of leadership.

When there is a leader, and that leader is capable, the company succeeds.

If you have a pair of people who work well together, then as you concede generally one of them will be the clear leader. Dividing the work and having each lead sections of the company is fine- if you know the person who you can do that with. But such people are generally quite rare.

Unfortunately, the advice that you must find a founder in order to start a company is bad advice-- in most cases this will lead to the company failing. There are, of course, examples of pairs of people who co-founded companies together and they are well known because they are the exception. But the vast majority of successful american enterprises are started by an individual with an idea and the dedication to pursue that idea.

Forming a company takes vision. It takes dedication and it takes certainty that there is something there- and opportunity to add value that has not already been seen and seized by other entities.

This is why leaders who start companies are far more likely to success than friends who decide to "do a startup" and "manage by consensus."

If you don't have a cofounder already- you shouldn't be looking for one. Hire some employees.

But you're far from screwed-- simply looking at the history of startups in America and you'll see that single men with vision are most often the ones who succeed.

[neilk]

The OP is saying that there should be a single person who has final authority. Is this incompatible with having multiple founders?

I can imagine a Kirk-Spock sort of startup, where one person excels at making decisions and doing the legwork, and another at providing information and skills.

I suppose, in practice, few people can trust someone else to make all the decisions, especially if it's their future on the line. What's your experience been?

[electric]

"Successful single-founder startups are so rare that they're famous on that account."

Doesn't the same argument apply to successful_ startups founded by 20-somethings? I.e. they are famous because they are so rare.

_My definition of successful is taking the company public.

[robg]

The two opinions aren't mutually exclusive. I simply read you to say that co-founders are a trait of successful "startups". While here the opinion is that's a fine trait, but it isn't always necessary. To me, it's just an disagreement about necessary and sufficient conditions.

Paul, would you agree that a co-founder makes many things easier, but the right single founder can find that support structure through other means (e.g., spouse and a few core employees with significant stock)?

[Shorel]

The answer is obvious: you need to find your Wozniak to help you start your company.

Anything short of a Wozniak will not do it.

Anyone in disagreement can go and ask Jobs.

[amichail]

What about for Facebook apps?

[BrandonM]

I like the case you're making here, which mainly seems to be that if you're waiting around on a cofounder, you're trying to solve the wrong problem. Unless you already have a potential cofounder in mind, you may be opening yourself to other problems by trying to find one (delaying the project, working with someone who turns out to be not as good as hoped, etc.). So I have to agree that your advice to just start working anyways seems quite good.

That said, just tonight I was able to see what value a cofounder can have in a simple programming project for a class. I had an idea for a project, and he already had some ideas for how we could go about doing it (various machine vision algorithms). We then bounced various ideas off each other, came up with a good interface, argued a little bit about some small details, and came up with a good, shared-effort approach to tackle the problem at hand.

Having a "cofounder" in this case already has proven to have a few worthwhile benefits:

1. Shared knowledge leads to less time necessary in research

2. Ability to think out loud to someone besides yourself or a pet

3. Having to work with someone forces you to come up with decent interfaces for the pieces of code, leading to more modular, maintainable code than if you just jumped in single-handedly.

4. The work is shared (duh :-)

5. If I don't feel like working on the code the day before our planned meeting, that's too bad. I'm still going to have to do it or look like an ass the next day.

Maybe point number 5 is the biggest one. Inevitably, there will be stupid little stuff which is part of the project that you just don't want to do. Having someone to face at the end of the day may just be that little bit of extra motivation you need.

Of course, it's still possible to do much of this stuff on your own. Being able to leverage open source libraries helps with 1 and 4, so if you can handle 2 3 and 5 on your own, then you can probably do it without a cofounder.

[BitGeek]

Hey there- That's what happens when you have creative collaboration with someone.

Every employee you hire should be sharp enough to be able to do so, and the good ones will be bringing ideas to you unbiden.

If you've got a co-founder, great. Nothing wrong with that... its just that the idea that you need one is in error, and if you ever have to present to someone who thinks that way, your first couple of employees you can call the "Founding team" or "cofounders" or whatever you want.

Its just that in order for the company to function- you need a vision and a direction.

Startups too often find themselves going in circles wasting time because everyone's second-guessing everyone else... and this is more likely to happen when you have cofounders trying to reach consensus rather than a founding team with a clear leader

[copenja]

Getting along with a co-founder is nothing like getting along with a partner in a class project.

I have friends that I worked great with in college. They all remain my dear friends, but...

after years of hacking together, and literally hundreds of thousands of lines of code, sometimes you just don't see eye to eye..

I agree a co-founder is beneficial, but it is very different then just hacking a project out with a buddy.

[pius]

In my (truly) humble opinion, co-founders are overrated, especially by this crowd. The value of an inner circle of talented and trustworthy first employees, on the other hand, can't be overestimated.

[BitGeek]

My title gave a little bit the wrong impression-- it sounds like I'm saying that cofounders are bad. I'm not.

What I mean is, if you don't already have a cofounder, don't get one. You don't need one.

If you find someone, then maybe that's great... but understand the risks.

But you should never go get one because you think you need one... that's a recipe for failure.

[Lockheed]

Absolutely, DO NOT, get a co-founder for the sake of getting a co-founder.

[BitGeek]

And don't for a second think that getting a cofounder is a requirement for success.

[gigamon]

BitGeek:

Your post is simply amazing. I couldn't agree more. Having multiple co-Founders does not guarantee success but also does not guarantee failure. But if a startup with multiple co-Founders were to somehow become successful, it is still very difficult for it to grow beyond the bootstrapping stage. I actually have one chapter planned for my on-line book to be entitled "Middle Management Gone Wild" which is what happens to the later stage of a successful startup with multiple co-Founders. It is the same difficulty that a hunting party would have growing into a village.

Thanks again.

--Denny--

Denny K Miu

http://www.startupforless.com

[BrandonM]

It is the same difficulty that a hunting party would have growing into a village.

Maybe it's just me, but this analogy is not all that clear to me. What exactly prevents a hunting party from growing into a village? If the point is that a village would require people to fill support roles, I think that is what the employees of the company would be for. That would destroy the analogy, so I think I must be missing something.

[jetpack]

I'm really on the fence about this because both arguments have truth to them. If you look at many successful companies, they were often founded by two people. However you'll also find that usually one of the founders leaves eventually (usually after a short while compared to overall lifetime of the company), and the other stays to run the company.

I can give a whole bunch of examples. Apple: Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Microsoft: Bill Gates and Paul Allen. Valve: Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington. Id Software: John Carmack and John Romero. People split for various reasons, sometimes due to disagreements. Sometimes personal reasons or change of interests. In the end most companies seem to end up being run by one person whether or not they were founded by more than one.

There are also successful companies that were founded by one person, like Dell and Amazon. So to me it seems that statistically speaking eventually you'll split up and one of you will have to leave the company.

Ultimately it seems that the co-founder issue is mostly an issue of initial mutual support. It's tough to go through the early stages on your own, and having someone to share the workload with and get moral support from increases your chances of success. But it can only truly work in the long term if you decide at the beginning that one of you will be the president and have the final word in major decisions. Otherwise it's a recipe for trouble down the road.

[BitGeek]

Right, and that mutual support can come, in large part, from other employees. One company I worked at, due to the personality mix, was kinda rough, and we were in a tough time funding wize and market wise-- but the office manager, and older german woman with a strong will, took it upon herself to fix things and thru random help, negotiation and general positive attitude really made things a lot better- she was a one woman support organization for a 12 person startup.

Finding great people to be employees is very important, and I'd say more important than finding a co-founder. In a way your co-founder has to embody everything... but each employee can contribute a part to the whole.

[edw519]

Hey, don't forget that Paul Allen left Microsoft with cancer. Once he went into remission, he didn't go back to work, he decided to take care of himself and put his billions to use. Pretty easy decision, IMO.

Woz never wanted to run a company, he just wanted to build stuff. (Shameless plug for Chapter 3 of Jessica's book, Founders at Work).

For every example you cite, there's probably a new story line.

[sspencer]

I kind of wonder if there is a middle ground. There are two different posts on the front page right now: one deriding the idea of co-founders and one from someone desperately seeking a co-founder.

My (worthless) advice is to let it happen naturally. Neither seek out a co-founder nor refuse co-founders who approach you. Just try to make friends with similar people who are interested in startups. Talk about ideas. It definitely helps if you have known these people for a while before starting a business with one. I can't even imagine going in on a business venture with a total stranger.

[davidw]

This sounds like good advice to me. This YC requirement has led to something akin to "cargo cult cofounders" - getting someone else involved because it's "better that way". While I tend to think it is better to have one, it has to be the right person, not some random dude who you barely know. It's sort of a catch 22 in that it's got to be someone you've already known for a while when you start looking or discussing the idea of doing a company.

[BitGeek]

Right... somewhere "get a cofounder" became a blocking requirement for starting a company, and that's a mistake. Go forward, and make it happen, and don't worry if you don't have a cofounder.

[senthil]

RailsFactory is a Ruby on Rails development shop based in Chennai, India.

when you are a very small startup, and self funded, you just need to make 2-3 bad moves to go into bankruptcy and closure.

Startups have its Eureka moments and frustrating times

I consider myself more of a visionary than a implementer, I get into high energy mode in short bursts, but my partner keeps our company sane.

I find my co-Founder a great stress buster for me.

[BitGeek]

Well, I think it depends on what those 2-3 bad moves are... I don't think its that tenuous-- when you're self funded. ( When you take outside investment, at least in the US, its a situation where you take a lot more risk...)

I'm glad you and your co-founder have a good relationship. Nothing wrong with that at all!

[staunch]

Why is this post is at -3? It may be a little rough (non-native English presumably) but it's totally on topic and not spammy.

[german]

That's a good point but besides fighting, having at least one co-founder is a great deal (if he/she is a close friend). I'm telling this because a lot of startups change their business ideas several times, and sometimes your vision is not the right one.

There's one big issue here, if an employee tells you that your company will be better doing X instead of Y is totally your decision, it can be right or wrong but that employee will never talk to you about that idea again.

Sure, you can have a lot of discussions with your co-founders, but having a combined vision of the project helps a lot.

In my case, having one of my best friends as a co-founder is the best thing that ever happened to me.

[BitGeek]

IF you treat an employee with respect and take him seriously and explain why you are doing Y instead of X, that employee will tell you again when he has other ideas.

You can have as close a relationship with an employee as you do with a founder.

I think the problem is that people get stuck on labels here-- the idea that only cofounders can have an opinion or will have their opinions listened to is probably pretty accurate in reality, but it doesn't have to be that way.

In fact, one of the most valuable and rarest commodities in a high tech startup is humility. Always hire for humility along with confidence- they aren't contradictions!- and show it yourself.

I think that employees are generally pretty good about letting people know when they are doing the wrong thing... even if they think you're not listening. You don't have to listen very close to tell which way the wind is blowing.

The problem is that too many people are too arrogant to take the direction of the wind seriously, and this can actually be worse with co-founders because their grousing can drown out the employees.

[edw519]

I have been desperately looking for a co-founder who thinks just like me and now that I've read this post, my search is over!

<on knees>

BitGeek, will you be my co-founder?

</on knees>

[tlrobinson]

I mostly agree with this, except I also think it's pretty important to have at least one other co-founder... but it's even more important for you to be able to trust and work well with those co-founder(s).

Going out and finding some random dude that you don't know or trust to be a co-founder for the sake of having a co-founder seems like a huge gamble and just a bad idea.

[BitGeek]

If you've known someone for awhile and you know they would be a great person to start a company with (and you have the emotional maturity to be abel to tell that- I mean, how many people think they are going to get married to the person they are dating, 5, 8, 12 times before they meet the person they know they are going to marry and with whome it works out?) ... if you already have a cofounder, even if you don't have an idea for a company yet... then start a company with them. Nothing wrong with that.

My point is just that if you don't have this person... don't hesitate for a second. Just go forward and get employees or go without them.

If it means you don't get YC funding because of PG's bias, then you didn't want it anyway.

Just don't hesitate to start a company without a cofounder... most successful businesses are founded by individuals.

[brett]

http://blogger.com

[myoung8]

this wasn't started by just one person, though. granted evan finished it by himself, proving the point below about co-founders leaving.

[richi]

not having a cofounder can be used as an excuse for not starting anything at all. it's probably better to start and take action. that might be the best strategy to attract the right cofounder anyway.

[Mistone]

this is very well said, the single biggest determent of a startups success is product/market fit, not team (i.e co-founder)

(see:The Only thing that Matters: http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/06/the-pmarca-gu-2.html).

If you've got a solid idea you need to push it forward, not having a perfect co-founder right away is a lame "go or no go" decider.

Pitch constantly, get out of your apartment, and scour your networks for co-founder prospects, sooner or later you going to cross paths with someone that believes in your vision and has skills/experience/connections that will add significant value to your business.

To me, its go forward and keep things moving - and be aware that this needs to be bigger than you and teammates help you achieve that.

[BitGeek]

For instance, look at plentyoffish.com

Not only did this guy not get a cofounder, he has never gotten any employees. He's making millions by himself, a total solo effort.

In fact there area lot of examples out there of people doing this... many of them are of the professional blogging/seo/domainer variety. What people on here would deride as "lifestyle businesses" (Personally I don't think you get to deride someone's choices until you've done better than them.)

But further, there's a whole movement of "micro-isvs" - a poor term as it came from someone with a microsoft perspective-- but these are people who make software themselves and sell it. Many of these businesses are on their way to becoming large enterprises. Omni Group is an example of one that's had several years, but Delicious Monster is one that's only been at it a few years- very successful, good number of employees now, single founder. And of course there's scores more.

You know, what we really need is a version of TechCrunch- but one that covers these non-VC backed startups- the companies that won't get coverage in TechCrunch because they are not following the latest fad and burning money on lavish parties to invite Michael Arrington to. For all the little companies you never heard of on TecCrunch there are other little companies who are going to be more successful ... but are under the radar now. I think this is what leads to a distorted perspective of the startup landscape.

[pocketofposies]

Great post and I completely agree.

I am of the opinion that the ability to quickly make a decision and get everyone behind it is often more important than the decision itself. A "wrong" decision can be corrected if there is a concerted focus while even a "right" decision won't work if founders are hashing out an internal pecking order rather than implementation of said decision.

[myoung8]

Just because there's an example of a single co-founder company succeeding doesn't make your hypothesis true.

Statistically, it seems that multiple founders correlates more highly with success than single founders.

Perhaps there's an underlying reason that the companies you've worked with have failed when there were multiple founders (e.g. personality clashes, inability to resolve disputes, etc.).

[dood]

it seems that multiple founders correlates more highly with success than single founders

I keep hearing this stated, but I don't think I've ever seen the stats. Anyone got a cite?

However, assuming there is a correlation, this doesn't tell us much about causation. Perhaps a much larger percentage of single-founder startups aren't started seriously, and are therefore irrelevant to the numbers.

As a single-founder, what I want to know is: will adding a co-founder increase my probability of success? What if the co-founder is not a good friend? The simple correlations mentioned above aren't very useful in answering these sorts of questions. If there is any good evidence either way I'd very much like to see it.

[BitGeek]

Actually, the converse is true- most successful companies in the US are founded and lead by a single individual.

There is an underlying reason that those companies that failed failed- no two people are alike. When you take two people and give them equal say, you are sowing the seeds of conflict which will-- and this is a guarantee- end up resulting in someone leaving or the company failing.

[aceregen]

If you want to start something, and nobody is interested in your idea or you can't find anyone good enough - Just start it alone.

If you have an idea, and you know a fellow co-founder that's interested in starting up - Just start it with him and work together.

Bottom line: Instead of thinking about the non-essential stuff- Just get the first prototype up even if it might mean doing it yourself.

Any school of thoughts that places restrictions on an ideal founding team size is crap. The debate that advocates an optimum team size is no different from saying that man cannot complete a mile in under 4 minutes.

Work with what you have, not what you don't have.

[BitGeek]

Exactly. And be aware of the risks. As a solo founder you need people you can bounce ideas off of. (And in my opinion this is the purpose of an advisory board, or even friends who have no skin in the game)... and as a group of co-founders you have the serious risk of conflict among the group.

[ctkeene]

I think you are confusing founders with leaders. Companies do not need multiple leaders. Just like teams, however, they do need multiple players, each providing different skills.

[mikesabat]

Fighting with other founders is the absolute worst thing in the world.

Don't get a cofounder because you think he/she will do all the work that you don't want to do.

[staunch]

The title doesn't match the content. A more accurate title would be "Absolutely, DO NOT, get a bad co-founder!"