rsedmak

I get asked this question often: “What is the appropriate amount of time for my co-founder to be working on our startup?”  There’s a lot that can be written on this topic, but here are a few thoughts on some things to consider when first starting out:

I think people often substitute time with metrics that more accurately measure their desired outcomes.  Most likely, your desired outcomes are to have a partner who is achieving his/her milestones (short term and long term), and who has dedicated mind share (the company has his/her foremost mental and emotional attention).  If this is the case, then the task becomes finding metrics that fairly and accurately measure these objectives.

The first objective is best measured by mutual agreement and understanding of personal milestones and how they are tied to various forms of compensation.  In my opinion, almost all founder compensation in a startup should be tied to, or at least contingent upon, the achievement of performance milestones, and time dispersed in such a way that incentivizes long term alignment with the company and real value building.

The second objective, mind share, becomes more complicated in circumstances in which the co-founder requires income sources beyond what the company can presently provide.  Regardless of the financial arrangements, it’s important for you to feel that your co-founder is committed.  Having a detailed understanding of your co-founder’s other commitments, and contingencies under which those commitments would require additional time is crucial.  In this way, I don’t think it’s unfair that you ask a co-founder to resign from certain activities which could lead to excessive distraction.  You want someone who is focused on building long-term real value with you, not someone taking a “wait and see” approach.  This focus is a must.  When the sacrifice endured by co-founders is asymmetric, resentment will quickly build because of the disparity of risk (I call this Asymmetric Risk Resentment, or ARR, as in the noise you make when you experience this).

Regarding your co-founder’s work within your company, establishing metrics that measure his/her response time to issues that are both time sensitive AND important is one way in which, over time, patterns will emerge about his/her mindshare.  I want to stress that the issues you measure need to be both time sensitive AND important – one of the easiest ways to scare away co-founders (especially technical co-founders) is to demand their immediate attention for time sensitive, unimportant issues – an unfair metrics by which to measure anyone. As best as you can, define upfront with your co-founder what types of situations could be both time sensitive and important, so that you both know it when you see it.