Yes, I'm Seeking a Technical Cofounder

I've been working tirelessly to develop an idea for the past several months and have finally decided that it is time for me to begin seeking out a technical cofounder who can help take it to the next level. Before I get the inevitable eyerolls (too late?) allow me to explain what I'm trying to do and what I've already accomplished.

The site is a platform that allows business contacts to connect and share information with each other privately, a sort of "Path for professionals" if you will. The idea came out of a direct need I have as an account manager for a large multinational with dozens of outside contacts to manage. I've spoken about it with several people I work with and all have told me that it's something that they would find useful in their work.

So what have I done? I completely mocked up the site in Adobe Illustrator, down to the last link, modal, error message, etc. and think I did a decent job. This took several months of nights and weekends (I still work full time) at which point I began seeking a freelance developer to build the product for me. During my search, I couldn't stand not moving the project forward so I began teaching myself HTML and CSS, which I immediately fell in love with. After a couple months of learning and practice, I was converting my Illustrator mockups into HTML and CSS markup.

I eventually found a local freelance developer and we started building the app in Rails. I'm about 40 hours (and a few thousand dollars) into our work so far and have already learned an immense amount more about the development process. I'm working with Git, Github, using Pivotal Tracker to break the project into stories and track progress, have gotten my feet wet with Heroku, have learned a little Ruby, and am starting to learn a little Javascript and jQuery. I have tremendous respect for the development process and understand how much care has to be put into each decision when building an application such as this.

So what am I looking for? -Proficient in Ruby and Rails

-Work with HTML, CSS, Javascript, jQuery, AJAX

-UI/UX proficiency a plus

-Preferably located in Portland, OR (at least initially)

I'm not looking for a code monkey. I'm looking for someone who will have a contributing voice for the direction of the product and the company. Why would you want to work with me? I'm a business guy, but I'm learning everything I can about the development process and understand the value of a developer's time. I bust my ass to get what needs to be done, done, and if I don't know how to do something I will find a way and JFDI. I can talk to anyone and have experience working with customers and doing deals. I outperform people in my day job who have ten times the experience I have. I can churn out copy, work the legal end, handle customer service, do graphic design and all the other "business stuff"; heck, I can even hammer out code alongside you through the night if that's what needs to be done. I've already sacrificed almost a year of my mid-twenties and am prepared to sacrifice them all to pursue building this company.

What's the offer? Since committing to become a technical cofounder is a huge decision for either of us, I'm offering a combination of cash and equity to start, with the opportunity to increase the equity stake if we turn out to be a good fit for each other (all of which are negotiable). This helps mitigate the downside risk for both parties in case things don't work out.

Interested? I'd love to grab a coffee or beer (your choice, my treat) if you're in the Portland area, or touch base via phone/email if you're not. Shoot me an email at claydani [at] gmail.com and let's chat.

Cheers!