Remember a tech entrepreneur’s short-lived startup in 2018

At the end of August, 2018, I joined a full-time start-up, concrete do I temporarily not to say, I am, head of the products and technologies, the 50 w it at their own expense, big shareholders (T for short) under the CEO is ali was born in the early for sales, from November 2017 began to set up the company, after I become a shareholder, became the two shareholders, I didn’t get paid a cent and was responsible for products and technology independently. I resigned (or was adjusted) from my job with an annual salary of 100W + options. I thought I could do something great with my technical ability, product thinking and SALES ability of the CEO.

In the four months after joining the company, I put my heart and soul into it. I did not have dinner with my family during the Mid-Autumn Festival, but worked overtime to modify and reconstruct the code. In order to save costs, I even took a host computer and some network equipment at home to the company. In the last four months, I have done the following things:

1. Introduced communication tools: enterprise wechat and R&D management process TAPD; Set up customer technical support group; Served the only two customers;

2. Unified technical framework: Spring Boot2 + Mybaits + Dubbo + Redis; And migrate the system to Ali Cloud;

3. Established internal knowledge base; Internal wiki;

4. Reconstructed the cashier desk and permission system, and carried out a phase reconstruction of the purchase, sale and inventory (not online);

5. Talent introduction: reorganized the whole technical team, dismissed (3 people) and newly joined 7 people; I tried every means to balance salary and expectation to find more suitable and cost-effective talent to come in. This is the hardest part;

Why don’t you feel like you can keep going at this point

1. No progress in sales; Since the first time we talked about the project at the end of August, we have signed only one small order (tens of thousands of orders) in nearly four months.

During this period, I introduced a sales director of Ali Chengxin Tong as the sales director. As a result, there was basically no progress in the two months from October to November. The sales order signed above was signed by a girl transferred in the middle of the process instead of completed by the sales team.

2. No progress in financing; It was mainly T who made the talks. He said he talked with more than 30 companies, but few of them had substantial contacts and results.

3. The development direction is not clear, and the product is not focused enough (the small program of wechat e-commerce is added in the middle of the process, but the big data is added, which scatters the experience of the team)

1. The finance is not transparent. As the second largest shareholder, I still don’t know how much money there is on the company’s books. How much money is left?

2.T is too overbearing (of course, it can’t be said as a bad thing). He fired an old programmer directly in the customer technical support group, just because he contradicted him a little. Too fine a tube; When I first entered the company, he often directly directed the following products and technologies to do some things, bypassing me directly, and had a strong desire for control. Unfortunately, I also have a strong control, so often two people fight, private at least three times; At one time, BECAUSE of financing, T went out for a long time, and I presided over the product + technology team independently. At the peak, there were 18 people (product + technology).

I didn’t expect this, because they all thought that they were from Ali department with similar working style. But T actually left Ali in 2010, and I just joined ali in 2010, so the stage is different, and the education and cultivation are different.

3. Selective payment of social security. When I was about to withdraw, I realized that T did not pay social security for his employees during the probation period, even for some employees who had become regular employees in advance. (This is also my problem, not controlling my emotions; Then I also consulted other entrepreneurial partners. It seems that some companies have a common practice of not paying social security during the probation period, and will only pay after the probation period is over.)

The first two points in the above big problem make me see no hope, and T is responsible for all of them, which makes me seriously doubt T’s ability. And more doubt about whether the core team can go far;

I am under great economic pressure. I originally collected 50W in cash and reserved 20W for the monthly expenses of my family. The monthly expenses of my family are 3.5W (I have a child at home and my wife has no job). It should have lasted six months; Prior to the project and the team has more confidence, at the end of August to join, that should be able to get a financing before the end of October, after get financing began to pay, can give us a few shareholders results close to the end of December sales and financing basic no progress, look at there’s account, suddenly feel pressure good big; I think this is basically the last straw for me. After all, at the beginning of the discussion, there was one clause: after getting the financing, pay the salaries of several shareholders, especially the core positions like mine.

First: the problem of serving customers

To B is to provide service, which I know very well. Since I contacted this project at the end of August, how is the customer service done? How about the feedback from you and me, the staff below, and the customers, such as XXX Zheng?

I don’t think it is a dereliction of duty for a technical engineer to respond to customers’ problems in the wechat group at any time while having dinner on Sunday. As for how to solve the problem, whether it can be solved or not is a matter at another level. If you do not know the technical team, it is not recommended to make too much judgment.

Second: how do sales people view the product

If you have ever worked in huawei or Ali, you will know that system problems occur every day. Not long ago, Ali forced its product system to go online and hung up for several hours. Later, when working with the product technical team, I will have a more rational perspective on the layman’s advice.

Number three: Touch your personal bottom line

Social security is not paid during the probation period, and non-regular employees who leave within a week are not paid wages; These two points argued with T several times;

At that time, I directly said to T: For the technical team that does not pay social insurance and provident fund or pays selectively, it can achieve 996 in 3 months, and can respond to customers’ questions in wechat group at any time when having dinner on Sunday. It is not a bad team for any company that needs technical team. Please be kind to the follow-up; As for the ability of requirements, the start-up company can invite what kind of people it can give, and it needs better people to suggest the right return for its requirements and efforts. This is also a suggestion;

Let me give you my opinion: the most important thing is two things, one is to sell enough customers, the other is to get financing; Everything else is small;

What I want to know is.

1. Is financing hard to come by?

2. How long will the current cash flow last? Hope to give a clear figure by then;

If it is extremely difficult and financing is not available, I can personally consider downsizing and adjusting product strategy.

These several information basically have not obtained a clear conclusion, especially the lower point, the financial has never been disclosed;

1: Product technology needs manpower and time, not to say that overtime to eat a meal can solve, treat product technical personnel;

2. Any system is not perfect with one version and two versions, not a one-time deal; Early product focus, this is my problem, too spread out, trying to do too much; You need to stick to the MVP principles and stick to the bottom line; Minimum products, focus on the core value of reality, and then do addition, otherwise the stall is too small to hold;

3 for their own do not understand things to find professional appropriate people, suspect people do not, employing not suspect;

4. Entrepreneurship is a team operation. If you do not believe that the team is not suitable, adjust as soon as possible; Some people ability is good, but may not be suitable to join in this period, that resolutely remove;

1. If you want to start a business, you need to find people familiar with each other to cooperate, and have a certain understanding of each other’s abilities. Especially for technical personnel, if the partner has never cooperated, this should be cautious; The matching degree of all parties is very important. In fact, T and I are both strong people in a sense, so it is easy to cause friction in some places.

2. Stick to your own opinions and ideas when necessary;

3. If you think you have the ability of sales or operation, the technical staff is not as good as themselves;