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Cofounders in Your Corner
Cofounder connections in my network who are ready to help you
Tim He
October 28, 2024 • Est. Reading Time: 4 minutes
TL;DR
Hey, I’m Tim! ☕
I've stumbled my way into some amazing career opportunities thanks to the magic of “Oh, you’ve gotta meet this person!” intros with fellow founders.
Sometimes we ended up as each other’s customers or teamed up on projects. Other times, our businesses were totally unrelated but we still became good friends.
Here are introductions to cofounders in my network whose companies specifically serve other cofounders/startups.
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DEEP DIVE
“You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” — Zig Ziglar, one of the most quotable motivational speakers ever.
Startup Spotlight
Most of my time is spent learning about cofounderships. In doing so, I also gain exposure to a ton of different companies.
Mintlify (Hahnbee Lee & Han Wang)
Modern standard for public-facing documentation. The #1 most popular YC product used by other YC companies in the past four years.
Jetson (Will Rush & Natalie Young)
AI powered cofounder for entrepreneurs. The #1 Entrepreneurship app on the App Store and Google Play Store.
NUMI (Harrison Telyan & Agree Ahmed)
Design department for startups. Subscription to a guild of world-class designers, ready to embed on your team today.
Nowadays (Anna Sun & Amy (Sun) Yan)
AI copilot for corporate events. Acts as your in-house event planner, taking away the hassles of organizing.
Modus (Lin Ling & Chris McCaw)
Headcount management to prevent companies from over-hiring as they scale. Finance, HR, and hiring managers in one unified workflow.
What makes these companies stand out?
TIM’S TAKE
Bonding Builds Businesses
There’s a point to this beyond promoting my friends.
I’ve had in-depth conversations with several of those cofounders, specifically about their cofoundership. One thing is clear: a solid cofoundership is the foundation for a solid company.
You don’t sustain the wave of growth these companies have without a strong cofoundership. But when I say that, it sounds a bit abstract, a bit wishy-washy.
What does that really mean in practice?
Start with cofounder chats. They’re exactly what they sound like: dedicated time to talk about the heart of your cofoundership.
It’s easy to get sidetracked and start talking about product development or marketing or recruiting because they monopolize your attention anyway. But that’s the point. You already talk about those things constantly.
These meetings aren’t just for getting mushy with your emotions but also to put existential threats in priority order and hold each other accountable.
Try really hard not to focus solely on individual performance but to talk about the cofoundership. For instance, don’t just evaluate whether a decision was “right” or “wrong.”
Instead, explore how the entire discussion process felt: Was each person heard? Was there tension, and if so, did it lead to clarity or friction?
These kinds of reflections will tell you if you’re ignorant or ignoring.
As Paul Graham puts it, “Startups do to the relationship between the founders what a dog does to a sock: if it can be pulled apart, it will be.”
Don’t give that dog a reason to.