Almost as many start-ups are founded by engineers as MBA-types, yet designer founders are rare, and when they do it's more often a consulting company. Any theories why?
2 reasons why designers shy away from product startup?
1) Designers are mostly trained to serve. We are a service profession.
2) The startup community has stacked up the deck against designers. Unless you can produce or manage/fundraise as well as design, you are a useless commodity in the startup economy.
The reality is that designer led startups happen, but usually by people w/ cross-functional talents and experiences. Most "designer" startups though are partnerships with either tech or biz (usually tech).
But the main reason why designers DO start things up is they believe in what they're starting. The passion works as energy to drive them past the impediments noted above. So unless you've got THAT what's the point.
Christina Wodtke added Mustefa Jo'shen.
Not greedy enough. Not smart enough.
Reverberating what Dave is saying:
MBA's have the resourcing abilities to hire engineers, and engineers can build something and attract investment.
Designers can create a vision and design a product but need either the MBA-type or the engineer to get things built.
Though there's nothing wrong with that. Though it's easier said than done to invite others into 'your' project and give up some control, something the other two don't necessarily have to do.
"it's easier said than done to invite others into 'your' project and give up some control"
yeah, I think that's the flip side of 'not greedy enough'. We're so damn emotionally empathetically concerned with doing good for our audience there's little profit motive. It takes a special brain to balance those two inside the same head. Is there a Rashmi Sinha biography yet?
While I love Rashmi. She's actually not a sole designer startup person. She did it w/ a seasoned technologist in toe (well her husband). As noted above, that really sets the difference. There are few examples in web/software of a designer going it alone out of the gates w/o their own tech skills or tech person as a partner with them. Production rules the tech space, even more than an MBA does.
I've been tech co-founder hunting for a while and DAMN! it's hard. finding someone to fall in love w/ your idea is tough. And then they also have to love YOU as a person AND they have to have the right background to be a good startup technologist at your stage. Then there is often geography and finance issues on top of that. ... Let's just say it's been the hard road and I sometimes wish I didn't start it. The pre-pivot idea we could have done ourselves so much more easily.
Lesson of the month ... don't outsource/offshore your tech. It's a lose/lose.
Dave I've faced a similar dilemma lately. Though I have enough skills in order to be fairly proficient in building an application in Django/Rails, it would require a couple of months of full hard work. That's just simply not enough time to do both Product Design / Marketing + Development. It's really one or the other.
Though I'm not of the perspective that we need technical co-founders, or that engineers need design co-founders. Start small, make some money, hire a developer, and grow.
Rashmi's in the book designerfounders.com and honestly, even design cofounders are rare.
I disagree with the statement that designers don't found companies. Maybe we *perceive* designers don't start companies because when they do, we forget they are designers since they have to wear many hats. Luke Wroblewski founded BagCheck and is now working on Polar. Chad Hurley started his career as a graphic designer. Caterina Fake was a designer too. And Rashmi! What about Fab? Path? Designer founders abound!
This is an interesting site pointing to designers as co-founders:
@Irene, to Christina's original point, a lot of these people had access to capital or engineers.
@Mustefa, that may be the case, but that doesn't negate the fact that there are plenty of examples of successful designer founders. Perhaps proportionally there are fewer of them because there are simply fewer designers in the universe than MBAs and engineers. And, I believe most designers prefer to spend their time designing, and enjoy a wide range of projects. Consulting allows many designers to more freely focus on what they enjoy doing most.
@Irene: I think we're saying much of the same thing. It's interesting to think that there are fewer designers in the startup universe then MBA's. There's a real saturation of "non-technical" co-founders. If that's really true, it's amazing to see all of the designer founded startups that make it through. We create very high quality stuff.
For the consulting part of it, a lot of the designer founded startups in Toronto are just that, consultancies / agencies, and it's *very* interesting that some launched bootstrapped product based startups from there with the capital they have.
From the links in this entire conversation that there are a lot of designer founded startups / companies... though they're almost always paired with investment capital / engineer co-founders.
I think what Dave was getting at is that it's rare for Designers to 'Bill Gates' or 'Instagram' a product from their garage.
Though that being said, a lot of engineers and "MBA's" are looking at either bringing designers in as co-founders, or first hires.
Here are two designer co-founded Products that I saw recently:
@irene I agree, there are examples, but they are like women in tech; just because you can name some doesn't mean there are a lot. When I go to startup events, I am doubly unusual. Design founders are rare... becoming less so, but still rare. So I wondered out loud why.
I plan to encourage more designers to found startups up in Vancouver at an event, and I'm hoping to help them overcome whatever fears or indifference slows them down. Because I believe in the power of the design founder!
And for the record, a design cofounder is still a design founder. It's having the courage to join a company when it's an idea without promise of a regular paycheck, but with the hope of changing the world.
The difference between women in tech vs. designers is that there are plenty of hidden biases that work against women in tech, starting from early education. In contrast, designers don't endure the same kind of hidden biases. If anything, designers who aspire to start their own startups might actually have the upper hand these days in terms of getting access to capital; most VCs I know are eager to connect with talented designers with great ideas. (Moreover, spend time on Kickstarter and you'll find a lot of designer founders there.)
Most designers I know don't aspire to start their own companies; they are happiest focusing on design. Founding one's own company is not really the ultimate mark of success, but finding one's happiness is.
@Irene Really? Please send them my way. My experience here on the E. Coast is that investors are very shy of designer-only startups that haven't executed. So I'm relieved to hear that it is changing.
I do agree w/ you that designers like designing more than starting businesses. Thus my initial "service" comment. But I also agree with @christina that designers have a lot to offer the startup world.
But I've also noticed that young designers who haven't been indoctrinated into service life fully, have a ton of great ideas, passion, and not always the means to execute. How can we do a better job of supporting them, fairly.
@dave I am not disagreeing with @christina. Of course I believe designers have a lot to offer to the world and are capable of starting companies.
Investors are gun-shy to invest in entrepreneurs who haven't executed? Shocking! Seriously, that is true for entrepreneurs of any background. I spent the summer hanging out with VCs and they wouldn't fund *anyone* who hasn't executed.
Engineers have an edge because they can actually build stuff. So to answer your question, how to do a better job of supporting designer founders, two thoughts: (1) teach them how to build/code, and/or (2) make it easier for them to connect with developers.
I also wonder if it's less a bias against that makes them relatively rare, and more something in their nature or worldview.
a) theory: if you don't see design founders, it doesn't occur to you to do it. This is being addressed by the Designer Fund book.
b) AIGA drilled into designers heads to never work for free. Could this have gotten mixed up in some folks heads as "don't work for free even when no one else is pulling a paycheck either?" There is a big difference between spec work and building your own things, but sometimes I wonder if everyone sees it that way.
c) Dave's service training idea. After WWII many butlers and other service folks opened pubs and inns... is this like the designers becoming consultants?
@irene plenty of biz guys starting up companies without coding skills or a tech partners... yet. Just a lot of hustle. I asked this question when I was looking for entrepreneurial designers in Vancouver and having a tough time of it.
I've noticed a lot of folks discount ppl like Rashmi or Caterina as not "real" designers, which is super weird. It is true they had to take on skills beyond design to execute a company. But that's startups for you!
I *love* the idea of connecting designers with engineers, since engineers want the same thing. More "design eye for the startup guy" events!
@irene I like #2. #1 is a bit too long term for me. ;-)
@christina I think you touched on another reason why there disproportionately fewer designer founders: too much "prima donna" design snob attitude!
Just catching up with the conversations:
@dave/@Irene: "Most designers I know don't aspire to start their own companies; they are happiest focusing on design."
^^ I think that's a really broad generalization. Most **Engineers** I know aren't starting their own companies either. The *majority* of them are just working 9-5.
Some that I know locally that did start their own company: state.io & 4ormat.com are/were both engineer startup consultancies. 4ormat bootstrapped that product from their Rails shop.
Some design consultancies like jetcooper.com supported an in-house startup rocketr.com founded 'design' people.
About teaching Designers how to build code, I'll use myself as an example. I know how MVC's work, I can whip up a front-end interface, I can hack something in Rails or Django. But it'll take me a fairly long time. Learning to code isn't trivial, it's something engineers do 10 hours a day every day for years to learn how to build solid products.
Even if I try to dedicate my time to that, who'se going to design the product, and do everything else that's needed to execute? How good of a job am I going to do at the coding? Maybe just to prove an MVP for investors? That's if I want the VC $?
@dave: The bottom line is that anyone that's not an engineer will need either $ or an developers. Connecting people is *definitely* the right thing to do.
Just as an edit to put the ^^ into context, I'm a designer.
"most VCs I know are eager to connect with talented designers:
@Irene: I really wanted to branch this comment (no account!). Could you share how VC's team up with designers and how that usually plays out if there's no 'engineers' involved yet?
This feels like asking fish why they don't read. I would ask non-designers who have worked with designers.
Christina Wodtke added Andrei Herasimchuk.
Designers aren't smart/greedy enough? @victor I was suprised by your earlier comment (esp since you don't typically troll) . Since this isn't twitter, enlighten us!
I would have said designers aren't crazy enough. Considering the odds of success in product vs success in consulting, I'd say product is roulette and consulting is blackjack... designers are playing the safe table.
Of course we're speaking in broad generalities here. When I think about the great managers and tech leads I know, I see a wide variety of skills including technical and people skills. I see hard technical skills like coding or financial modeling. When I think of the designers I know, *most* of them (not all) just don't have the intellectual capacity to do those things. We never talk about this because it's not PC, but in my experience it's true.
Have you ever met a dumb developer? I don't think they exist, real coding is just too hard.
Have you ever met a dumb designer? I have, plenty of them. Anyone can put pencil to paper and claim they designed something. And because it's fun and sexy lots of people do it.
To layer on more generalities, strategic thinking takes intelligence, and start-ups require strategic thinking, and you can connect the un-PC dots.
I just learned to ride a motorcycle and there's funny parallels there. Lots of folks who aren't space cadets ride. Then there's a vocal minority that are saying, "Hey, a bit of certification is good to keep us from killing each other. Safety gear is cool. Loud exhausts are just obnoxious." These points of view were anathema years ago and are taking a long time to catch on. A change in generation and demographics are making them more popular.
btw, I'm just finishing a book on experience design failure, in case you're wondering what the fuck is up with me :-)
The answer, imho, has more to do with timing and history than much else. If look at the culture of Silicon Valley, we can see the engineering culture got going in the 50s (maybe even earlier), got a lot of steam in the 60s, and and went through major innovations and growth in the 70s through the 00s. It was during those times engineers built a business culture in their tribe. It's only now starting to temper, but only just slightly.
The design culture of Silicon Valley really didn't get going until the late 80s or early 90s, so I think we're just time shifted back by about 2 or 3 decades. This means we're just now hitting our growth curve like engineers did back in the 70s.
It's rough being an early adopter, but it also means we're part a key inflection point in history. Why don't more designers start companies? Because we're just now learning how to.
Mapped to the history of Silicon Valley, we're probably right on time.
I am a firm believer in Sturgeon's law: 90% of everything is crap. I have met dumb everythings, including programmers and MBA's... yet they found. In fact, it could be argued that it's dumb TO found, not smart. The odds are against you, you often don't get paid, and you work every waking hour.
And yes, I think writing about failure might give you a bit of negative spin on things!
Perhaps a good question would be to ask designers what their biggest concern about founding/joining early stage start-ups is. I'm missing some data.
@andrei I love this answer! it's not a "no" it's a "not yet."
Like @christina I too love @andrei's answer. My next question to you Andrei is, is the path for designers to be successful founders going to be similar to that of engineers? and if no? what do you think designers need to fit into the startup eco-system?
There are some related questions, too. Which is how are designers already changing that eco-system to help them evolve? and how can we further accelerate, or enhance these changes to help the "early adopters"?
The other question is, and this might be related to @victor's POV, Will the designer > MBA need to become as commonplace as the engineer > MBA is? (And I don't mean design management. I mean real old fashion MBAs.)
@christina to answer your question. As a current design founder, my number one question has been, how am I going to find a co-founder to join my little party who has the technical capabilities to be both hands on and manage long term?
Dave Malouf added Ash Bhoopathy.
I'm not sure of the details of pain points engineers had learning how to build their business culture. That would make a great book probably. I'm lucky in that I got started with my craft in 1990, and I lived through much of the 90s and 00s watching all this happen, although I had no idea what I was experiencing at the time. It wasn't until recently that I've been able to reflect on it all.
I can tell you this: One of the things I'm hoping to do in 2013 is what I can to help the likes of Enrique Allen and others begin to build the design+business culture our engineering counterparts have. I've been lucky enough to have a front row seat to design history, and now I'm hopeful to be a part of moving it to the next stage. More on that later...
@andrei, you're such a tease.
I'll be able to discuss ideas and events I'm working soon, just not yet. Sorry... 8^(
@dave How does *anyone* find a cofounder? Designer founders are not the only ones who face this challenge. People network, or collaborate with former coworkers, or try FounderDating.com, or other similar avenues.
@Mustefa VCs don't "team up" with designers. VCs fund companies. Most responsible ones are not going to fund entrepreneurs who don't have an MVP (the few exceptions I've seen are cases where the entrepreneur, regardless of background, had a great track record and reputation).
If designer founders need funding prior to having an MVP, it's better to seek funding through angel investors (AngelList has made it more possible than ever to connect with angel investors), or start a Kickstarter campaign, or bootstrap off existing funds, than to seek funding from VCs.
Christina Wodtke added Shawna Hein.
In my experience of founding a company (a long time ago, (it failed)), what we would call experience design skills and the design perspective simply weren't relevant and useful tools for advancing the effort, and I was approaching the idea from a strategy and business view. I wasn't acting as a designer, but that's largely because the idea itself was not design / experience driven - or even dependent.
I'm not founding a company at the moment because I don't have the right idea for a product, and I'm not comfortable with the volatility of launching my own startup. You'll notice I'm not considering the path of creating a design services firm as founding a company - I consider that path to be "outside" the strongly product centric culture of technology entrepreneurship that it seems like Christina is focused on.
To be more honest, I'm not founding a company at the moment because I've been too lazy to go out find other people who are interested in seeing if the same set of ideas I have will work, which really means I don't want to do it alone. And I'm more focused on buying a house and enjoying my first child, so don't have the attention bandwidth to pursue an effort that
will inevitably require most of my waking time and attention.
I think a key point that no has mentioned is in the valuation systems that are used to assess companies. I'm thinking specifically here of the emphasis on and infrastructure for tech ology related intellectual property. The goal of creating and accumulating original IP is strongly knit into the engineering entrepreneurship perspective, the various funding mechanisms that are prevalent now, the business and management cultures that view a company as a container for assets, etc. In the business and tech perspectives there's little in the way of an effective evaluative toolkit for experiences, and they're further assumed to be largely disposable (compared to something like a cumulative code base of software product).
Just had to respond to @Victor a little, who said:
"Have you ever met a dumb developer? I don't think they exist, real coding is just too hard. Have you ever met a dumb designer? I have, plenty of them."
As someone who used to be a developer, and is now a ux designer & prototyper, I can tell you that there are incompetent people in both disciplines. It doesn't take a "smarter" person to be a developer. It's just that it's easier for people to critique designers. I've seen all kinds of code that "works" from the outside, but is ridiculous, clunky, and/or non-extensible. A non developer wouldn't realize that this person wasn't actually a very competent worker. Good design and good development both take a lot of smarts.
@victor I have to agree with @shawna on this one. There are stupid and smart people everywhere. Mediocrity is quite normal everywhere, except where there are strong systems for vetting such as in medicine (and even then).
After the month I had working with an offshore group on my MVP, I have to say there are definitely very STUPID developers.
I've hardly heard of a good experience working offshore for a lot of reasons... Though I get the gist of what everyones saying. There's a lot of factors involved.
Anyways, I'm suddenly more interested in this platform than the specific topic.
What now? We've had a fairly well facilitated conversation over Branch. It could go on and on with opinions and some some-what conclusions (with a dash of political/social correctness). Does this just fade away? Linked to twitter and disappearing into nothingness ... hm.
Or is it just what it is.
