Co-founding isn’t a one-night stand
Truth be said, co-founder is a catchy and fancy designation that can be attached to a person’s name. It’ll sure look good on the infographic of a zoom meetup.
However, co-founding is an enormous responsibility designed for people who fully understand these responsibilities and are willing to commit to them.
Why do we have co-founders?
Because someone somewhere has been developing an idea and are willing to turn it into a business or any other form of establishment, and they think; “Oh my, I can’t do this alone. I’ll need someone to work on this with me.” In some cases though, work might have started and maybe there’s even one co-founder on board, but yet there’s still a void that needs to be filled, so someone who is deemed capable and responsible is brought on board. Co-founders compliment each other in the aspect of technical knowhow, skills and competences.
Do co-founders need to be a perfect match?
More than the competence and mastery they bring to the table, co-founders are expected to do more than what’s on their job description. Co-founders are needed to carry out totally unrelated activities that are important for the stability, growth and sustainability of what they’re building.
There’s a level of commitment and dedication that’s required from co-founders that’s greater than skills and mastery. If you’re not ready to give it, please don’t bother getting into it. You might become a burden to your co-founders which isn’t fair.
50/50 or 100/100?
Co-founding and building requires everyone involved to bring their ALL to the table. It’s much more than recording success in product and not caring what happens with marketing or sales, it’s about committing yourself to make sure everything is working. When a part of the building has cracks and is left unattended to, it’ll surely affect the whole building when it comes crashing down.
So there’ll be a need to cancel the “I don’t care what happens to the other person” mentality if you’re a co-founder or envisage becoming one.
Building and growing
Up-skilling and being intentional about your growth is important not just for you but for what you’re building. Whatever growth you experience would reflect on what you’re building and if you’re interested in the growth of what you’re building, then you’ll be intentional about building your human capital.
Making the pizza bigger
25% of a $1,000 dollar company is nowhere compared to 25% of a $1,000,000 company. Your job is to make sure the pizza gets bigger and that is in terms of the end result in sight. The bigger the pizza the bigger your pie gets.
You don’t jump at the opportunity of being a co-founder because of the butterflies in your belly that came as a result of how beautiful an idea is. You need to evaluate yourself and understand what you’re about to get into and also be willing to give your all towards making it work.
It’s also okay if after some time, you evaluate and realize that you’re not capable of giving your all to a cause and stepping back. It’s more honourable to step back rather than underperform and not give your all as you’ll love to.
