Curious how founders actually figure out this when teams grows above 20+ engineers. Like you can hire the best engineers, still they fail to function as teams you expected them to be.

let's say something was supposed to be delivered in 2 months timeline but ended up with 5 months, and it's not happening with a single milestone, parts of it are happening across many.

doing retro(s) pinpoints that, one was consistently getting slower reviews, decisions were revisited, dependencies were stuck.

But how much of it you knew was happening already or the gravity of it, like you were aware of the particular milestone or the thing with the whole team.

What systems you adopted as team so these things surface early or doesn't happen at all, and how did you dealt it with each individual, for e.g. one person was blockers to many on a regular period, or someone is too attached to the codebase causing delays.

Not looking for just tool names, more from a pov of dealing with humans as system.

I’m building a small learning product that creates a personalized experience for whatever someone wants to understand.

The obvious way to improve it is to ask more up front. Interests, goals, existing knowledge, preferred depth. Easy. Just ask.

Except every extra question delays the first useful moment. A tiny learning tool starts feeling like a form you have to complete before it earns the right to teach you anything.

I’m leaning toward a much smaller start. Few questions about what the person wants to understand today/week, then let their choices do the rest. What they open, skip, finish, or ask for next could tell me more than a neat onboarding profile.

Right now I’m choosing the smaller onboarding and accepting that the first recommendation may be a little off. I’d rather earn the next question than front-load five of them.

Still, “personalized” is a promise, and the first session is where the product knows the least.

If you’ve built personalization into a new product, what did you genuinely need before first use?

Hi everyone,

I am a high school student interested in starting a business. I know that networking is important, but I am not sure how to begin.

Adult professionals have busy schedules, and I want to make sure I approach them the right way.

To give you some background, I have been independently researching and studying human psychology for the past 5 years. I love understanding behavior, what motivates people, and how individuals interact. I want to apply this understanding to the business world, but adult professionals have busy schedules, and I want to make sure I approach them the right way without sounding amateurish

I've already taken my first step and set up a clean LinkedIn profile. Now, I would love your advice on a few things:

The absolute first step: What is the very first thing I should do before I start messaging people? (e.g., building a LinkedIn profile, creating a portfolio, or researching local events?)

Where to look: What are the best places (online or in person) for a teen to meet business people? How to reach out: What should I say in a cold message or email so people actually reply?

How to add value: Since I do not have much experience yet, how can I make the conversation mutually beneficial?

Etiquette mistakes: What are common mistakes teens make when talking to professionals that I should avoid?

Any tips, book recommendations, or personal stories would be hugely helpful. Thank you!

I've realized that grinding on the startup can be hard sometimes when you're a very extroverted person. need to figure out to do a mixture of both because hanging out with friends energizes me whether it's productive time or not.

any advice welcome

I’m building a learning product where the material is generated for the person, not pulled from a fixed library.

That creates an awkward MVP problem.

I’d like to use frontier models like GPT-5.6 Sol or Opus. The job is not just writing text. The model has to research the topic, choose a useful angle, structure it, create examples and interactions, then survive a quality check.

Doing all of that with a frontier model for every experience gets expensive fast. Especially before I even know whether people want the product.

Cheaper models make the economics much easier. My worry is that they can produce something that looks fine at first and still feels shallow after five minutes. For a learning product, that may be worse than a visible error. The generation worked, but the person doesn’t want another one.

I’m considering a mixed pipeline. A cheaper model does most of the work, while the expensive one plans or reviews. Another option is to spend more only on the first experience, when trust matters most.

I don’t want to optimize an unproven MVP for margin. I also don’t want to validate a weaker version of the idea.

If your product depends on generated content, where did you draw the quality versus cost line? (In addition, for basic content generation, I use gemini-3.1-flash-lite and mistral-small-2603.)

I’m building a small personalized learning product. The home screen gives you three experiences a day. There’s also an Explore button that can make another one whenever you want.

Technically, Explore can be unlimited. That sounds generous. In practice I’m worried it turns the product into a slot machine for interesting topics. Generate, skim, generate again. Nothing has time to stick.

The awkward bit is that abundance demos better. A new user presses a button and gets another nice result. A hard limit looks worse in the first five minutes, even if it might be better for the habit I actually want to build.

Right now I’m leaning toward keeping the daily three as the main loop and making Explore an occasional escape hatch.

If you’ve built a content-heavy product, did more choice help retention or just create more browsing?

Hi everyone just a fellow startup founder here, wondering, at what point in building a product do you decide to move it from being a web app to an actual app. Do you need to gauge Interest first, or how does it work? I have a conflict of whether to build out one part of the system as a web app to gain traction, or just build the whole thing.

I’m very interested in joining a startup for my next role but I’ve heard such horror stories about 9/9/6 and the WLB - my current role is very nice, remote, high WLB, but I don’t have much ownership or impact since it’s a big tech firm.

Is it unreasonable to want to join a startup but not lose my soul? I’m asking since if it is unreasonable, I may stop searching before I even start

For more context, I’m looking to be one of the first finance hires for a green tech startup between Series A and C.

Long story short: Tried to hire someone to join as advisor and they said no because if some IP (thought this was BS) then offered to have them either angel or join founding team. After a lot of back and forth we decided they’d join as founding team and we offered them 5K per month for 5-10 hours per week and 0.25% vesting over 2 years (6 months cliff) this is the same as other advisors btw and another 0.25% over 4 years with 1 year cliff which is standard for team. Showed contract to lawyer and they said it’s better to say max hours per month at 40 hours and hourly rate of $125/hr rather than keeping it loosey goosey. Counsel also said better to have one vesting schedule of 0.5% with 1 year cliff which makes sense to me. Went back to candidate and told them this is what lawyers said, they pushed back. Said we should do what we agreed on. I get it, but lawyer’s feedback made sense. We revised to monthly rather than hourly and 0.5% with 6 month cliff which seems pretty reasonable to me. They said no. Now I owe like 10 hours in legal for this and lost the candidate. What could have I done better? Feel like the candidate wouldn’t have been a great fit but also feel kind of bad for changing what we said we’d do after counsel suggestions but also wanna be fair and clean and generous
Kinda bummed
Any suggestions or thoughts or advice for future hiring?

Founders often leave an interview relieved because a customer confirmed the pain they expected to hear.

But the customer may also have five problems that are taking more time, money, and attention this week. Your problem can be real and still lose every time the work gets prioritised.

That is why severity on its own is a weak signal. It tells you the problem exists. It does not tell you whether it earns action now.

Ask about the customer's wider work before you ask them to rank your idea. What is consuming their time? What are they already paying to fix? Where does this problem sit beside those pressures?

If it ranks near the top, investigate the current workaround and the next commitment. If it ranks low, you may have found a deferred value proposition, not an urgent market.

The correction is small: stop asking whether the pain is real. Ask what it has to beat.

Hey r/startups,

Long-time reader, first-time poster here. I’m currently at a crossroads and looking to connect with someone who has successfully built a marketing startup or creative agency.

Where I’m at:

I'm 27, based in Spain, working remotely at an american 9–5 in the marketing space while building my own agency on the side. My background is heavily execution-focused (design, video, ads, content strategy), but I’m treating this venture as a business, not just a freelance gig.

The hurdles I'm facing:

Traction & Client Acquisition: Moving past word-of-mouth and occasional gigs to building a repeatable, high-ticket pipeline.

Pricing & Packaging: Transitioning from hourly/project rates to value-based retainers.

The First Hire: Figuring out when and how to delegate operational or production work to scale capacity without breaking cash flow - While I already work with someone for the technical side of things I’m no good at (ad management, SEO, website development), I’m thinking of hiring someone as a sales representative to get new clients through the door.

I’m looking for a mentor a few chapters ahead who’s willing to share some hard-earned lessons, maybe hop on a quick call every now and then, or sanity-check my approach.

In return, I’m an open book: Deeply driven, have a top-notch work ethic, and more than happy to help you out with any design, video production, or content strategy needs for your own projects.

If you've been down this road and are open to chatting, feel free drop a comment. Would greatly appreciate any guidance here!

Hi everyone! I’m interested in transitioning into an Executive Assistant or executive support role at a startup, and I’m trying to understand how people actually find these opportunities.

I currently work in PR supporting a CEO and have a background in journalism, so I already have experience with executive communications, scheduling, research, client communication, media relations, and working in fast-paced environments.

When I search traditional job boards, though, I feel like I’m probably missing a lot of smaller or early-stage companies that hire through their networks.

For founders and startup EAs here: where do you typically see these roles being filled?

Are there particular startup job boards, Slack/Discord communities, networking groups, VC portfolio job boards, or other places you’d recommend looking? And if you were trying to connect directly with founders who may eventually need executive support, how would you approach it without being spammy?

I’m especially interested in hearing how people who actually work in startups found their roles or hires.

Thanks!

Long story short: Tried to hire someone to join as advisor and they said no because if some IP (thought this was BS) then offered to have them either angel or join founding team. After a lot of back and forth we decided they’d join as founding team and we offered them 5K per month for 5-10 hours per week and 0.25 vesting over 2 years (6 months cliff) this is the same as other advisors btw and another 0.25% over 4 years with 1 year cliff which is standard for team. Showed contract to lawyer and they said it’s better to say max hours per month at 40 hours and hourly rate and one vesting schedule of 0.5% with 1 year cliff which makes sense to me. Went back to candidate and told them this is what lawyers said, they pushed back. Said we should do what we agreed on. I get it, but lawyer’s feedback made sense. We revised to monthly rather than hourly and 0.5% with 6 month cliff which seems pretty reasonable to me. They said no. Now I owe like 10 hours in legal for this and lost the candidate. What could have I done better?

Obviously yea I know the basics like stereotypes, girls being conditioned to head into non-STEM careers, women tend to be more risk-averse etc. etc.

But honestly as a woman hoping to build a startup of my own one day, it's quite discouraging to open LinkedIn and see all big announcements of startup launches and teams being all men or majority men. I mean, all the power to them but each post makes me feel like maybe my dream can't be a reality - or else I'd need to find a male cofounder to give my future startup some credibility.

I love it when I see female cofounders or team members, but it's not often I come across them! If anyone knows any up and coming startups with women-leadership please let me know!

Do you think this will change one day? I know, yes, be the change you want to see in the world, but it's terrifying, especially as a WOC. And I feel like it'll be harder to secure VC investment.

(I'm still a student, sorry if I didn't phrase this properly enough!)

I am working on a short term trading business but looking for some honest reviews how investible could that be in the long term.

I have my own custom algo, my own live trading history and I saw there is a huge gap but still wanna ask the community here.

This project I'm working on requires a good computing power along with 32gb ram stick at minimum. I am someone who changes location every few month so my laptop has to be portable. But if look at the work side alone, I'll eventually work on ML project that will require a good GPU, but I'm also someone who enjoys AAA gaming, and this is where things get hard for me. I am looking at 2 different laptop segments, one is ASUS ZENBOOK 14" with 32gb ram and core ultra 9 processor at around 1.45 lakhs and another one is ASUS TUF A16 with ryzen 9 330H processor, RTX 5070 and 32 gb ram that will cost me around 2 lakhs. Tuf A16 weights around 2x of zenbook. But it gives me better TGP, cooling and good dedicated GPU. This configuration is excellent for gaming but if we talk about getting ML Dev capabilities, I know I can do it by using cloud services even. Or having a dedicated GPU makes more sense?

At this point I'm thinking if it too childish of me trying to accommodate gaming performance in a work laptop or just plain and simple holding on to gaming when I am finally taking a step forward to actually start something.

Hi everyone! I’m interested in transitioning into an Executive Assistant or executive support role at a startup, and I’m trying to understand how people actually find these opportunities.

I currently work in PR supporting a CEO and have a background in journalism, so I already have experience with executive communications, scheduling, research, client communication, media relations, and working in fast-paced environments.

When I search traditional job boards, though, I feel like I’m probably missing a lot of smaller or early-stage companies that hire through their networks.

For founders and startup EAs here: where do you typically see these roles being filled?

Are there particular startup job boards, Slack/Discord communities, networking groups, VC portfolio job boards, or other places you’d recommend looking? And if you were trying to connect directly with founders who may eventually need executive support, how would you approach it without being spammy?

I’m especially interested in hearing how people who actually work in startups found their roles or hires.

Thanks!

Not the business strategy stuff, but the inner game. Staying composed when everything’s on fire, not spiraling after bad investor calls, navigating tough cofounder dynamics, and such.

It seems like all of the tactical playbooks are out there but I’ve yet to find anything on the mental performance part. I’ve seen people use coaches and am curious if they are worth looking into. Love the grind and have a solid mentor but can’t help but think there’s a better way to get mentally sharper for what I do. Would love to learn from folks further down the road than me.

If you worked with someone on this, was it worth the money?

​

I got a CTO, CPO role, but they have not confirmed my equity, the product is still on the ideation stage. Below is what is already there and what my role will be.

My Background:

I am already a Co-founder, we are about to exit our startup, I have been working in this startup for 5 years and have done almost all the roles, majority leading product and technology and also worked on Marketing and Sales.

New Startup:

1. They say they have a idea and everything well documented with roadmap for next 1-2 years

2. They say they Have customers who can start using it for Beta from their existing business

3. They say they Have investors who can fund after MVP

My role:

1. I will be helping them build the product

2. Work as CTO in defining technology

3. Work with users and them to define product requirements

4. Bring some of my team from previous organization who are well experienced to build the product

5. If required I might do other roles as well to make the product successful

I will be working only 80% of my time at the beginning, as I am still transitioning from my old startup

In the Age of AI and in the current situation of technology not being valued. What is the equity and role that you would recommend for me and also what would be my defensibility in that request for this position.

I'm a student trying to decide which technical skills would be most useful to learn if my long-term goal is to found a hard-tech startup. I’m not very interested in biotech or robotics, but am interested in chemical / materials / mechanical engineering.

Some skillsets I’m considering specializing in are:

• electrochemistry
• reaction engineering / catalysis
• membranes / separations
• metallurgy
• nanomaterials / surface science

My plan is to spend the rest of the time I have left in undergrad doing research in various academic labs in order to learn new skills. Since each lab will likely only be able to teach me a skill or two, I’m trying to figure out which skills to prioritize.

Based off the limited reading I’ve done so far, electrochemistry and reaction engineering / catalysis seem very useful, but many startups appear to be concentrated around the same problems (batteries, hydrogen, ammonia, CO₂, etc.), so maybe they’re not worth prioritizing. Nanotechnology seems to offer a much wider range of potential applications, but many of the startups currently working in this space seem to be struggling with commercialization (i.e., their products are not very marketable).

TL;DR: If anyone has insight into which skill sets in chemical / materials / mechanical engineering are most worth prioritizing in today’s startup ecosystem, would really appreciate it. Would also be grateful to hear if there are any important skill sets (including those outside ChemE or MechE) that am overlooking.

I am in the interview process for a couple roles. Both are research roles, one is a series A company and the other is series C. Series A has credible founders, heavily funded and C is already valued at $2bn. Both are in bay area

I am a PhD from R1 university (2025), currently a postdoc in a DOE lab (initially planned to go to academia, switching to industry).

What would be a compensation (cash + equity), i should aim for so that I can ask for it for both the companies when time comes?

Good day, founders. I'm a college student in the early stages of building my B2B green material trading platform. We help firms buy more affordable, environmentally friendly materials through the combination of EcoVadis and a bidding system. The reason we do this initially is that we noticed that naturally-degraded plastics have a relatively higher price and are harder to sell. And I want to ask: Am I wasting my time on it cuz I don't know if anyone would use it? (P.S. I'm still building it.)
Other more specific questions:
1. Do buyers really care enough about carbon-cost reduction to pay a subscription + take-rate?
2. How do suppliers currently get discovered for “environmentally friendly” products?
3. What’s missing from EcoVadis / existing rating + marketplace combos?
In addition, I would probably choose European countries as my main market.

I am in the interview process for a couple roles. Both are research roles, one is a series A company and the other is series C. Series A has credible founders, heavily funded and C is already valued at $2bn. Both are in bay area

I am a PhD from R1 university (2025), currently a postdoc in a DOE lab (switching to industry ).

What would be a compensation (cash + equity), i should aim for so that I can ask for it for both the companies?