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Comment by ahmedsiddiqui | Hacker News Reader

Getting technical cofounders is pretty tough if you don't know much about tech. Too many non-technical founders are interested in technical cofounders to "Build their idea for them". I don't think this arrangement is a co-founder arrangement as much as it is a work-for-hire agreement. The key with getting a technical co-founder is that you actually "co-found" the idea together. It is just as much as his idea as it is yours. If you keep this in mind, finding the right technical co-founder will become easier.

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I completely agree. People need to approach with "What do you think about this idea" not "I've got an idea and now I just need someone to build it". Thats a quick way for me to decide rather there will be a follow-up conversation when I'm being "courted" by someone with an idea.

I like this approach, Josh. Lots of us non-designer non-dev. types need honest and brutal feedback on ideas/product more than anything else.

But you have to make sure to ask the right questions[1]! For examble, asking feel-good questions (questions that give positive answers and make you feel good about your idea, rather than questions that give you actionable feedback) doesn't add any value and at worst could even be harmful.

[1] http://hackfwd.tumblr.com/post/23669383330/rob-fitzpatrick-h...

That's a really good point. Adding this point into my next post.

Yep, that is typical. 90% of the time, I am approached by someone who says "We have 90% of that things done and ready to go, we just need you to come on board and make it your own."

The problem is that I cannot make "my own" something I had absolutely no part in, from its inception. I guess there could be some odd situation where someone comes up with something in the exact same manner I would have, but the chances of that are low.

The other typical behavior is business people who believe "the idea" is everything and that the building of "it" is a trivial task that a tech co-founder will want to tackle because they are unable to formulate ideas on their own. [The reality is that ideas are a dime a dozen and execution is 99% of success. And tech co-founder will be as much business-oriented as any entrepreneur must be.]

Okay there have been so many comments in here the echo this and I'm just fascinated by this point. I think somebody should write a "before you look for a technical co-founder, make sure you're not planning on making any of the following amateur mistakes."

Would anybody want to help contribute if I do a post on that?

Dude. It's like Open Source. If you've got an itch, scratch it. Write the post and submit to HN, you'll get contributions out the wazoo.

Haha well I just wrote this one today, but touche. I'll get to work.

My company did a pivot last year but before that, we did a survey on this topic.

http://www.launchbit.com/blog/why-you-cant-recruit-a-technic...

I apologize that in migrating our blog to Wordpress, things seem to have gotten a little mangled.

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