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Ask HN: Can I join a startup- advice for a non-coder?

17 points by olegious ↗ HN
Here’s my dilemma: I’m new to the tech industry and dream to work on an idea from its early stages. I’m not a coder (although I can understand code) but have great people skills- I communicate well, can make friends easily, have no problems networking, I can manage people, organize projects, have many business ideas (yeah, I know ideas are nothing without execution, but it’s still good to have them), have good marketing skills and a excellent business sense and can do a great job of selling products/ideas that I’m passionate about. While I know enough Java, PHP, SQL to be dangerous, I don’t really have a desire (or maybe ability?) to be a hotshot coder.

My educational background is an MS in IT, a conversion degree focused on project management, web development, DB management and similar subjects, with a BS in Finance and a year of law school. In February I got my first tech job, as a QA for a 100 person company- I chose a QA position for several reasons: 1. it was what was available and student loan payments were due and 2. It is a good way to see a tech company from many sides (I interact with devs, product and marketing on a daily basis). I’m doing well- learning quickly, receiving excellent reviews and taking on more and more responsibilities.

My strategy is focused on learning more about the industry while networking and launching my own non-tech business to get some entrepreneurial experience and hands on practice. I’ve been building a base of contacts by attending various Meetup events as well as co-organizing and hosting ad publisher’s meetup (meetup.com/sfadpub). I’m working with some friends to launch a t-shirt company; we’re about 2 months from going “live.” The hope is to build enough knowledge and contacts to be able to take advantage of an opportunity when one comes up.

Is there more that I should be doing? Should I bite the bullet and focus on improving my coding abilities (at the expense of my networking activities and the time I spend learning about marketing, business development and other areas that are my strengths)? Do ideas/companies in the very early stages even need someone like me?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

25 comments

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tehaaron
I am actually in a very similar position and would love to hear what the HN community thinks.
_b8r0
Ignore anyone telling you you're not going to be able to offer something unless you can code. Think about the type of business opportunity you want to get involved with and use your networking skills to get you there.

For example, I'm co-owner of a consulting firm that provides b2b services. The right person with the right connections in the right industries for us is infinitely more valuable than a coder. Had you popped up on day one with those qualities, you'd be in on the sales side.

You look like you may be well geared up to program/project management. That's not a day 0 job but certainly something that some people might want in order to move from minimum viable product to something more filled out. There was an excellent article here yesterday about scaling (sorry, can't find the link), maybe that's something you could look at being 'that guy' that helps take a company from 2 to 20.

lachyg
Hey man,

So I'd consider myself having a very similar skillset. Same sorts of interests, etc. What I basically do, is learn a few things to keep me going with money (I launched iPadCaseFinder.com, sold that 2 months later for $x,xxx -- and I've done this with a few different products).

I'm basically just using that to fund my ideas, like you, I have a lot of ideas. Find a designer, find a programmer, map it all out, get your informal marketing plan done. Talk to people, get them fired up, have a basecamp going to track everything.

You can be a single founder, you can get something so great, that techies WANT too be a part of.

But hey, maybe not the path you want to take ;-)

thinkcomp
It sounds like you could do well in sales (software companies typically only have two substantial departments: engineering and sales), or if you come up with a good enough idea, you could probably run your own startup.

Feel free to send me an e-mail (see my profile) if you'd like to talk more.

onwardly
It sounds like you want to get in early on a startup, and if you're not a developer the only guaranteed way is to be a founder.

If you can handle the risks, being a founder coincidentally also has benefit of increased responsibility, greater control, and more equity. Nice bonuses in my opinion.

Learn by doing!

hackerbe
I feel like you know this is the right game plan already.

I'm in a similar situation and look forward to the HN responses.

Good luck!

BTBurke
This site tilts heavily towards the devs, but there are definitely skills that you can develop to make yourself valuable for a startup without being a technical guy. #1 -- pick an industry you are passionate about and network, get a job in a major company in the space, learn the ins/outs of the industry, etc. Then you can either start your own biz or you'll be a valuable resource for a tech company looking to break in and needs domain knowledge and contacts.
JeffL
Sure. I know I certainly need someone like you for my start up to help launch version 2 when it's finished. I admit, I've been too passive in searching out the right person because I fear it's too easy to get someone who isn't good. While I think I can tell pretty well who is a good programmer, I really have no confidence in determining if someone is a good marketing/bizdev guy.
hackerbe
Just be sure they know and love what they're selling. The rest will fall into place.
il
Haha, let's interview each other's candidates. I can easily determine whether someone is talented at marketing or just BSing but I have trouble identifying the truly excellent programmers vs talentless hacks who are just regurgitating what they learned in intro CS.

By the way, cool startup. Get in touch if you have any questions about marketing it, I used to do pretty decent volume promoting a browser-based space MMO.

il
I'm in a similar position. I know enough about coding to hack together basic scripts and manage a tech project, but my main interests and skills lie in marketing and business stuff.

If I were you, I would focus completely on marketing/sales. If you can demonstrate that you know how to drive traffic and convert it into customers, that can be an incredibly valuable asset to an early stage startup.

I've landed several lucrative consulting gigs working for cool startups who had lots of brilliant coders but had no idea how to get customers. Startups, especially those with only tech cofounders usually have no shortage of engineering talent, especially if the application they are building is relatively simple. But they have a huge shortage of marketing/bizdev talent, and that's where you come in.

Email me (email in profile) if you want to talk more, there are a lot of opportunities out there for people like you and me if you know where to look.

garrettgillas
I would say try to go with sales if you can. I'm one of those developers that believes that non-technical people don't belong anywhere near management in tech companies. This means that I'm biased, but definitely not alone in this belief. Also, by technical people, I mean people that are regularly actively involved in the development of the code.

Hoverer, if you feel that you have a decent "network" in the local tech community, I would also advise just asking people you trust there for advice. They would know you better than anyone here and could give you more personalized, in-depth feedback.

dmor
I definitely suggest you attend Startup Weekend, because you can use it to try on different roles without fully committing to a startup. The fact that you can understand code and technical issues, without being a developer yourself, positions you really well in my opinion. If you want to be really early, consider being founder. If not, a role like community manager (1st marketing person often) could be a great fit for you... that usually includes customer service, sales, marketing, and a lot of the non-technical jobs rolled into one. You can decide where to focus later.

I've done it 2x now (Pelago, Twilio) and it's possible. Like everyone in the startup, you mostly have to be crazy dedicated to working hard/smart as needed, and build amazing trust with your team.

olegious
Thanks for pointing me to Startup Weekend, sounds like a great event-it seems the SF Bay Area weekend was in August- how often do they hold these weekends?
olegious
Never mind, I see there is one coming up in LA! Thanks again!
garrettgillas
I've done two now (Redmond & Portland) and I would highly recommend going to one if your just starting to get involved in startups. I learned an incredible amount at my first one.
ronzensci
IMHO you don't need to actually do coding to build a great web-app anymore. These days with the kind of tools and frameworks (springsource.com, jquery.com) and CMSs (refinerycms.com, drupal.org, firerift.com) can allow you to build a fairly powerful web app in next to no time. Couple this with the advent of Google App Engine and other cloud based app servers, the whole pain of setting up a linux server and configuring an app server on it is gone.

Already, you don't need any operational skills any more to host a production grade web-app (think load balancing, failover, etc).

The key I have realized is to depend less and less on outside technical help and more and more on yourself and your own technical tinkering abilities.

Once you've deployed your first app and have managed to get at least a few repeat users you will be surprised how many developers will be ready to help you further.

Just dive in with the implementation.. you will be surprised how much can be executed in a day by just doing it.

DrJokepu
I disagree with that. We got really good tools today but writing software is still quite hard, not because of the imperfections of our tools but because the essence of software development is hard. If you're not good (yet) at coding, chances are that you will run into an insurmountable problem before you can release an initial version, unless your web app is doing something really trivial, in the technical sense.
ronzensci
great software is not (merely) built by writing code but by having a rock-solid ten-group co-founding team. But unless you'll were together in university, chances are a team would come together by looking at what each one has already done and not what each one has talked about. Not all insurmountable problems need to be solved by the founders - they can get a specialist on contract for that.

Since the OP can read and understand code, I still feel that is sufficient to get the first app out of the door.

dh
I would focus on the marketing and project management side and use your other skills to help you. While coders/developers are very valuable to tech startups there is just a valuable position in project and product management which requires a blend of skills. The ability to talk to developers, do some basic marketing and design and then manage a product from start to finish.