10 questions to discuss with a potential co-founder

The best way to go through this is for each founder to copy this document, write answers independently, then share your answers and discuss.

1. Why do you want to do this startup?  What are your personal goals here, both financial and non-financial?

2. What will our roles and titles be? How will we divide responsibilities? Who will be CEO?
   Roles inevitably change a lot over time, but you should have a plan for what you’ll each work on for the first 6-12 months, and decide on who will be the CEO (and what the CEO’s responsibilities are).

3. How will we split up equity?
   It’s important to resolve this one early. This section of the co-founder matching manual may help.

4. Where will the company be based? Where will we each live? Will we work together in-person or remotely?

5. What idea will we work on? If that idea doesn’t work out, are you willing to change the idea? Are you only interested in working on ideas in certain areas?

6. What needs to happen for each of us to go full-time (quit other jobs or school commitments)?
   I.e., We’d have to raise at least $xx from investors, we’d need to validate the idea with a paying customer, we’ll do it if we’re enjoying working together in two months. Obviously, this is N/A if you are both full-time already.

7. What is your personal financial situation? Are you willing to work for free and live on your savings? For how long? If you'll need a salary to work on this full-time (either now or at some point), how much do you need to feel comfortable?  Will either of us put money into the company?

8. What will our typical working schedule be (what days we work, what hours / day, etc)?  How long do we want to keep that up?  Are there any things outside of work that are important to you to make time for?

9. If we are successful enough to get to build a team of employees, are there things that are important to you about how we do that?  I.e., building an in-person vs remote company, having certain cultural values, having a particular approach to hiring or managing people?
   It’s fine if you don’t have strong opinions on this yet.

10. What will we do if we’re having trouble agreeing on an important decision?  What will happen if we decide we don’t want to work together anymore?