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Ask HN: How can a non-technical/non-CS graduate enter the high tech business?

7 points by pascalchristian ↗ HN
Hi, since almost all of HN population are coders that are involved in high tech ventures, it seems to be the perfect place to ask this question.

I am a college student on my final premed semester, and I have several startup ideas tickling. I'm thinking of taking a time off from school after graduation (before taking MD) to pursue my idea.

The question arises when I figured out that it seems that tech startup founders are expected to be coders and CS grads. I am a hobbyist coder myself (have been programming since my IS class on highschool) and I have developed a (very) rough prototype of several of my ideas but certainly it ain't as pretty when compared to a code written by a guy that wrote their own kernel on assembly for CS class.

So what do you think about this situation? Should I just continue and deal with the non-technical founder dilemma? Or is going back to college for a CS/engineering degree worth it?

Ohh and even on the non-startup field, I still wonder how many non-coder are in the high tech industry. Guy Kawasaki took psychology, Tom Anderson took literature, and of course Ray Muzka from Bioware is an MD.

6 comments

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djb_hackernews
You have to ask yourself what a CS degree would make different. You have an idea, you have a prototype. That should be enough for angel funding or recruiting a more technical co-founder.

Also, a pet peeve of mine is when people call their programming code "a code". My poem isn't as pretty when compared to a words written by a guy that is related to Shakespeare.

pascalchristian
That's what I wanted to know myself. I don't live in the bay area, although I have plans to move there if I started my venture. The problem is that from what I read in YC, angels and VCs such as PG seems to hate non-tech founder with passion.
djb_hackernews
hate is a strong word. You could also say they strongly prefer multiple founders, so if you are concerned with pleasing PG et al then you'd best find a co-founder, and why not one that has the technical skills that would also alleviate any possible concerns VC's might have.

I think at this point you are getting ahead of yourself. Keep iterating on your prototype and when your technical skills are maxed out, find a co-founder with the skills you need.

fjabre
Definitely not.. I have a CS degree myself but some of the best coders/entrepreneurs I know did not get a CS degree.. I might add that it's more important to understand what the technology is capable of than how to make it work. You can always find someone to help you make it work later on after you've fleshed out your idea.

Excessive education seems to be at odds with a lot of successful entrepreneurs.. If anything, going back to school to get a CS degree will just slow you down. I'd dive in head first. I think the best entrepreneurs are doers and not passive learners.

Build to learn, don't learn to build as the saying goes.

samratjp
It helps to have a CS background, but you can still thrive. I was in your position a few years ago, but I had enough time in college left to get a CS degree.

Some thoughts: 1) You develop a deeper appreciation for the "simple" stuff. It's like this: you turn a wheel around slowly to study its intricacies, appreciate its design, see the structure of the spokes, etc. Now, when that wheel is in high motion, you can thoroughly appreciate the motion and the wheel. So, yes, a CS/engg degree may help you in this respect.

2) Pair/peer programming. You can learn so much from observing a good coder at work. Even more importantly, get a big picture idea of data structures and algorithms even if you don't understand it completely. Ask your CS friends to explain it to you. Now, explain what you learned to your non-CS friends. Teaching someone else forces you to get to the core of a problem/question.

3) Funny thing about code prettiness. Share your code on Git Hub and ask your friends for comments. Or pick a simple open source project and write your own code. Then, compare it with the source and see how you could have refactored it.

4) Repeat 1-3.

Well, it seems as if you are comfortable enough with yourself to admit your true capacity. So, go out there and find yourself a technical co-founder someone smarter than you. Chances are very likely that you don't necessarily need to know how to write a kernel, nor does your co-founder. The only thing that matters is that you are smart enough to figure things out and aren't afraid of reaching out to people who do AND can point you in the right direction.

Well, if nothing works from above, sometimes it's just better to stick with something you are working on and iterate. Whether that sticking to maybe your startup software framework or improving your prototype, just start with the fundamentals and iterate!

ig1
How pretty your code is has little to no impact on how successful you will be.

All of my early projects were horrendous code-wise. Nevertheless they included a game with a decent number of installs (>250k) and one of the biggest social networking app websites (this was pre-facebook era so only ~300k users). The later was a huge mess hacked together in php full of global variables and flat files.

Keep coding, keep learning and find a co-founder.