【Lesson #1 - On picking co-founders】
Co-founder disputes are often the crux of any startup failure. You’ll likely be constantly relying on each other for tactical and emotional support for the better half of 10 years. That’s why picking the right one is paramount in building a successful startup. To help share some insights on this topic, I spoke with Alan Chan, the Co-founder and CEO of Omnichat (AW#16), an HK-based company that provides a chatbot plugin for e-commerce sites to automate marketing and improve customer conversions. Looking back on his excruciating decision to replace a co-founder previously, Alan shares his thoughts on what you should look for when seeking out a co-founder and how to properly vet for commitment and establish trust from the get-go.
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I started my company in early 2017 and released the MVP shortly thereafter. I handled all the BD efforts in the beginning, cold calling hundreds of what we in Hong Kong call “upstairs” stores (boutique retail shops located in high rise buildings) to test out my product, until I eventually got 200 users onboard. Despite the fact that the initial version was filled with bugs, 20% of the users still came back every month to use our product. So, I thought it was the right time to find a co-founder to accelerate our BD efforts and overall handle the business side of things while I hunkered down on the product.
I chose my best friend of 20 years as my first co-founder. But it ultimately didn’t work out. It was probably around the time of when we joined AppWorks Accelerator #16 in March 2018 where we kept butting heads and it became evident that our expectations for the business and overall commitment were misaligned. Ending our working relationship was one of the most difficult decisions that I’ve had to make in my life. In retrospect, I missed some things. I was the one who convinced him to quit his job, but I also failed to adequately evaluate whether or not he’d be suitable for the startup lifestyle and the commitment that he was willing to make. It’s not normal work that we do; we don’t have set hours or a salary, and we need to grow very fast and constantly go knocking on people’s doors for money or business while failing a thousand times in the process.
Being a founder can be incredibly frustrating and disheartening for anyone without a strong resolve. I was of course quite naive back then. I had already generated some traction and painted a very rosy picture. I thought it would be easy to scale up once we got some investor money—little did I know haha. But at the end of the day, even beyond complementary skill sets, the most important thing between co-founders is trust. It’s better to have some sort of working relationship before, as only then will you see how they behave under stress and react to criticism and setbacks. If you don’t have a prior working relationship, then go through some sort of trial period or co-work on a few projects to properly understand each other’s working and communication styles. Just like in dating, you’ll need to go on a few dates to properly align on a few fundamental things such as shared values, interests, and commitment before tying the knot.
Applications for AW#22 are now open to founders targeting SEA, AI/IoT, or Blockchain/Defi -> https://bit.ly/2Jy1br8
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