What would be the right team to select for your startup?

Lisa Cook Technology Enthusiast | Lead Generation | Email Marketing

June 10th, 2016

I found this interesting post on who the right team members should be for your startup project. They mention product managers, developers, QA testers etc… But I think you might need more than just the guys mentioned in the post? What do you guys think?

Here’s a link to the original post in case you’re interested in reading:

https://www.tkxel.com/blog/how-to-select-a-startup-squad-finish-a-project/

Klemen Stibilj ★ Accelerating Your Sales and Reach with an Explainer and Viral Social Media Video Production ★ PAY IT FORWARD VIDEO ★

June 10th, 2016

A minimum required to start testing the waters: marketer, designer, developer, copy/content writer, (project manager).

Martin Omansky Independent Venture Capital & Private Equity Professional

June 10th, 2016

Pick the best securities lawyer and patent lawyer you can find. Get a part-time CFO. Recruit a small number of industry-specific grey beards for your Board of Directors. Find and recruits good General Manager so you that he/she can run the company and you, the founder, can concentrate on product development. Sent from my iPhone

Kirsten Minshall Founder of UVD and CTO at Limpid Markets

June 10th, 2016

I'm afraid I find the description of 'right team members' to be a) far too prescriptive and b) far to generalised. It almost looks as if the article is some sort of advertisement.

Kirsten Minshall Founder of UVD and CTO at Limpid Markets

June 10th, 2016

@Klemen

Define test first. Then understand who / what is needed to run experiment. Could be one person. Might not need development / copywriting / designer.

Context is everything.

Greg Miller CEO and Founder at Greg Miller and Associates

June 10th, 2016

The team described is a product/project team, not a start up venture team. Don't confuse the two.

Joe Albano, PhD Using the business of entrepreneurialism to turn ideas into products and products into sustainable businesses.

June 10th, 2016

This seems like a formula for a potentially adequate team to turn an idea into a product. The challenge is that your startup team needs to build a business. At a minimum that means that you need to discover and build your market and manage your cashflow. It may mean that you need to raise funds (in potentially many different ways and many different rounds).

The startup landscape is littered with the husks of "businesses" that started as a compelling idea (at least compelling to the cofounders) developed a well-engineered solution to a problem that no one wanted to pay to solve, then ran out of money.

Full disclosure: I coach/consult entrepreneurs as they start, stabilize, and scale their businesses - so it's easy to dismiss what I'm about to say as a sales pitch. That said, whether you've stared 0 businesses or 500 businesses before - HIRE AN INDEPENDENT COACH. You don't know what your biases are - but you have them and they will bite you every time. Google is a great resource - but the forms and contracts and plans you can download from Google are input data, not complete solutions. (end of rant)

Kirsten Minshall Founder of UVD and CTO at Limpid Markets

June 10th, 2016

What Greg said

Martin Omansky Independent Venture Capital & Private Equity Professional

June 10th, 2016

A follow-up to my previous response. Founders often make the error of not providing for the business part of a start-up. I suggest you set up an appropriate business structure before you do product development. If you don't, you might regret it later. If you are not familiar with the issues involved, hire a securities lawyer and a CPA to educate and advise you.

John Joseph President /COO OptiPulse Communications

June 10th, 2016

Hi Lisa, Depends on your idea or product, and how hard it is getting funds. If it is a fantastic idea, there will still be headaches getting money to pay the big team mentioned in the link. Do you have the resources to pay a team like this? For how long (runway) The plane has to lift off before it crashes with no money. I am consolidating all of that work with 1-3 people doing all of it mostly me. I am not depending on investor dollars and looking for NRE (non recurring engineering funds) to go slower but own more of the company. If you tell me more about your product I may have a better suited opinion. Hope this helped. Best Regards, John John Joseph President /CEO- OptiPulse 801 University Blvd. Ste 102 Albuquerque, NM 87106 Cell- 480-652-0717 jjoseph@optipulse.com

Adam Pressman I've helped make a number of people millionaires. I'd like to do it a few more times.

June 10th, 2016

We're the "airbags for crowdfunding" folks. (Our Crowdfund Guarantee repays the investors in the event of a startup failure) As such, we see a lot of such questions. While the exact composition of those who will occupy the seats in your venture is different for each business and dynamic in each stage, the source of such people is easier to pin down. Leverage your connections to identify 150 people as committed to your venture as you are. This is your tribe. From them you can gain ideas, validation, funds, customers and, yes, members of your founding team. Our FundMonth program is an aggressive response we developed for those who asked your question. We spend 30 days, no more, doing all that's required to fill the gaps between your venture and those that, 97% of the time, have raised their goals.

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