My notes from from YC Tips for technical co-founder — Diana Hu.
Ideating
- Build prototype ASAP in a matter of days.
- Create 90/10 solution.
- Focusing on a minimal viable product (MVP) that covers 90% of the essential features while leaving out the remaining 10% for future iterations.
- Choose tech for iteration speed.
The only tech choices that matter are the ones tied to your customer promises.
Prototype mistakes:
- Over-building.
- Not talking to users.
- Not letting go of bad ideas.
Launched stage
Launch in a few weeks.
Quickly iterate with hard & soft data.
- Make sure you have set up analytics before launch.
- Pick something simple: Google Analytics, Mixpanel, Amplitude, etc.
Continuously launch.
Balancing building vs fixing.
- Tech debt is fine. Balance it.
How the role evolves
Decide what engineering culture will look like.
- Evolve into leading a small team of engineers.
- First hires are likely friends.
- Start to have communication overhead.
- Your role is morphing
- 2-5 engineers: 70% time to code
- 5-10 engineers: coding <50%