Hi defties,
with Whit Monday being a public holiday in some European countries, it means there’s a long and hopefully relaxing weekend ahead for some of you and how could I send you off without some proper reading material? Right? You’re welcome :)
Reading the title again, you’re probably thinking:
What on earth is she talking about?
Dating? This is a community of European tech founders after all. And anyway, what could be harder than dating?!?
Well, I thought it would be obvious, but seems like you need a little bit a help with straightforward thinking so here you go, the solution of the puzzle served on a silver platter. I’m refering to:
The co-founder search!
Maybe you wanna grab another cup of coffee or better yet an energy drink, because I need you to be sharp & sparkly for the next few paragraphs! Ready?
Now that your brain is working at double the speed, you’re asking: Why would I need a co-founder in the first place?
Okay. You wanna go there? Then let’s go there 🤿
Truth is, you can certainly start working on an idea alone. Though very soon, it can become quite lonely and then you start thinking about how things would get done that much faster with another person there. And be honest: You can have advisors all you want but having a dedicated person with you every day on the founding journey (a.k.a. rollercoaster) is a completely different story.
Plus a complementary skill set (that also takes a pay cut in the beginning 😉) and the additional network that comes along with that person definitely help with building a business. Moreover, what we call the bus factor in software development, investors refer to as Key Person Risk: When the loss of one person could sink your business. Which in case of a single founder is extremely high.
Alright, all these arguments point us to: We should get a co-founder!
BUT: A study in 2012 found that 65% of start-ups fail due to co-founder conflict in terms of their money management styles, personality styles, and conflict resolution approaches.
Ouch! 😕
You’ve probably heard several times already that founding a startup together is like a marriage. (And what comes before a marriage? Dating, exactly. Hence the reference in the title. Phew, maybe try two energy shots next time…)
If the average marriage duration in Germany of 14.8 years (2019) is anything to go by, you’re in it for the long haul. You will spend many more hours with your co-founder(s) than with your partner or friends and most vesting schemes are set up for 3-4 years and get renewed with every new investment round. You will need to take a lot of decisions under uncertainty, times will get rough and on top of that, usually there’s a lot of money involved, which has never made things any easier.
Now that we have the full picture of what it means to have a co-founder, all that is missing is your decision: To marry or not to marry.
If you decide that you do want to have a co-founder on board, then there are two basic questions:
How do you find potential co-founders?
How do you decide on the final candidate?
With regards to question #1, I can recommend Twitter in general and this thread in particular:
There’s also a LinkedIn group for finding female co-founders, a co-founder matching platform by a Berlin university and the YCombinator Startup School’s co-founder matching platform.
Regarding question #2, I’ve come across a very helpful and detailed article called The Founder Dating Playbook and in it, Gloria Lin talks about the process she used to find her co-founder, including a co-founder questionnaire you can download.
For all German-speaking folks, I can also recommend this podcast episode, where Varena Junge, the founder of Yook, is talking in detail about the co-founder search for her second startup starting at 10:39 min until around 16:20.
Yes, finding your co-founder will take real work and several weeks if not months until you’ve found “the one”. And sometimes you just get lucky like Valerie and Rebecca of Remi because their co-founder was a actually one of the pilot customers who fell in love with their idea 🥳
And these two co-founders are an excellent reminder that while building your startup together, you also need have a little bit of fun 😎
#defty pad
Patricia recently launched Ovini 🎉 The idea was born during the pandemic due to an urgent need for healthy snacks. You can shop the delicious, plant-based olive snacks here (and they are spectacularly low calories too!). Check them out on Insta @ovinisnacks or read more about the Ovini journey from sourcing to product design and pricing on their blog 👏
Inspiration 😍
Here’s the direct link to the list of now nearly 200 women partners in European VC: https://sifted.eu/articles/female-vc-partners-europe-list/
Events, Awards & More
Find your co-founder and build a strong team
A panel & break-out sessions organized by Female Founders and Antler on Wednesday, May 26th!
Register here!
Co-Founder Match Vol.6
A matchmaking event for founders and startup enthusiasts organized by the German Entrepreneurship GmbH in cooperation with CDTM + Werk1 on Tuesday, June 8th!
Register here!
Female Co-Founders
They regularly organize Female Co-Founder Pitch Nights, which they announce on their Instagram and you can also join their LinkedIn group.
[German] KfW Award Gründen 2021
For companies founded in 2016 and later.
Deadline: July 1st, 2021
Apply here!
German Startup Monitor survey is open
Spend 15 minutes to make your startup visible :)
Participate now!
Image credits: Preview picture