Do I Need a Co-Founder: The 90/50 Rule of Startup Founders
Do you wonder if your startup could benefit from having a co-founder? Some people are worried that adding a co-founder will slow them down, it will take too much time to discuss everything. They also think they can pretty much figure out everything on their own so why take the risk to add a co-founder? Statistics on the question are inconclusive.
The answer is to apply the 90/50 rule for co-founders. If you tend to agree 90% of the time with your potential co-founder, form a team. If you tend to agree about 50% of the time, keep off, it would kill your startup.
Why?
You are smart. You can figure most stuff on your own, most of the time. But just once in a while, you’ll go off and embark on some goofy plan. You need a second look, someone you trust, to tell you that you are wrong. The rest of the time, you need a co-founder who shares your vision. Hence, you should agree 90% of the time.
If you only agree 50% of the time, it means your co-founder doesn’t share your vision. Working together will be very painful. You basically don’t agree on the goals of the product, who your target customer is, or which technology to deploy to solve your problems. You’ll keep arguing. It will be destructive.
Remember: you need vision alignment, a co-founder who watches your back and who you completely trust. Anything below 90% is calling for failure at the first sign of trouble.
For a longer discussion on compatibility criteria, read this excellent post from venturehacks on the topic.
Do you like this kind of shorter blog post, not quite short enough for a tweet, but not quite the usual length either – do you want more details or is the format good enough?
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I think you need to distinguish between values conflicts, where you should have very high agreement, and disagreements over strategies or tactics to implement or sell your product. Two different perspectives (and a high degree of discussion/disagreement) is what makes a co-founder useful. It's disagreement over values and end objectives that break teams apart. But if you present your ideas or plans and your partner says “that's just what I would do” 90% of the time, or conversely if you cannot suggest ways to improve what your co-founder is contemplating, I would argue there isn't a lot of synergy or additional value being created by joining forces.
You are correct. I would argue that if there are value disagreements, then it would fall naturally in the 50% category. Basically, I'd expect a lot of disagreements.
Hi Alain, the post length was fine – some ideas require more space than others, and there's nothing worse than padding!
I would just add that for pre-funded startups, your co-founder's willingness to relocate can affect your funding options. This is more of an issue for people living outside of the main funding centres.
I tend to agree with the 90/50 rule as a good guideline for deciding if you can succeed with said potential co-founder. Before you have even begun you are discussing things such as end result and a vision on how to attain that. If these are not things you can agree on 90% of the time then you are likely to meet many roadblocks as you venture down that unknown path. I'm all for a good debate, don't get me wrong, but I'm not sure I want that from my business partner – 50% of the time. Too much added stress to an already stressful venture!
I agree with this comment. You need healthy debate in an organization at the executive level, especially in a startup, to keep things on track. If everyone is running in the same direction and nobody is checking in along the way (“Why are we doing this? Does this fall within our vision? Is there a better, more efficient way?”) you have the risk of going off-course. Just because you have a plan doesn't mean it's static. It's a moving target.
Obviously if you're arguing over paint colors for your office that's one thing, but having a debate among the founding team about strategic issues and even implementation is generally a healthy thing. If there is no disagreement and no debate then I would be very concerned.
I just don't think it can be quantified.
Right. If you can't agree in general with your co-founder you're probably not going to be good business partners.
I have to strongly agree with Sean here. I don't even like having coffee with people I agree 90% of the time with. It's boring.
Perhaps some distinction needs to be made though. There's a difference between additive agreement and a yes man. Your cofounder can agree with you all the time if the next word out of his/her mouth is “Yes…AND we can improve your idea by doing X.”
Of course if the only thing they ever say is “Yes, but…” then it's probably a disaster waiting to happen.
Cheers,
Tristan