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How to hire your first engineer: A guide for nontechnical founders

TechCrunch Free Intermediate

This is the other half of your answer: what to do once the thing works. It walks a non-technical founder through when and how to make that first technical hire, and when to keep outsourcing instead. Come back to it when your no-code build starts straining, not before.

  • Hire your first engineer once you know exactly what needs building.
  • Contractors fit the pre product-market fit stage; full-time hires fit after signals appear.
  • Judge candidates on clear communication as much as on technical skill.
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It answers 5 questions

  1. I'm non-technical, do I actually need a technical co-founder?
  2. Is no-code cheaper than hiring a developer?
  3. Is it a mistake to hire one developer to build my whole product alone?
  4. How do I hire a developer without a warm network or startup connections?
  5. When my technical hire and I disagree on the tech stack, whose call is it?

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