It's been six weeks since I left my job to start a company with my friend Kevin. We worked together at Galvanize. He was a technical product manager (called product designer at Galvanize) and I was the guy who crushed his dreams down into reality so I could actually build them (aka the developer). We have the same roles in our new company skwirl... or at least we're supposed to. Those of you who have read Kevin's blog may already know how things have deviated. Those of you who have started your own software companies probably already know that everyone has every role. So what's life been like so far?
I've never work so much in my life
I don't actually track my hours but if I had to guess, I'm probably working 80+ hours a week. It's 3AM right now and I'm not sure if I'm going to bed before the sun rises. I've pulled all-nighters several times already. But why am I working so much? Have I gone nuts? Is Kevin forcing me to work crazy hours? Nope, it's because...
I've never had so much fun in my life
Seriously! Working for ourselves and chasing our dreams is amazing. I've never felt so good in my life. Perhaps it's working with a someone I really trust and synergize with. Perhaps it's working in a domain I have a passion for. Perhaps it's taking taking control of our future. Perhaps this is just the honeymoon phase. It's probably all of the above and more.
Weird things I didn't see coming
I'm a CFO
It was pretty obvious that I would be in charge of integrating a payment processes (Paypal, Stripe, Square, etc) and managing that account. It turns out I'm also better with money than Kevin is. Next thing I know, I'm opening a business bank account.
Kevin is my UX dev intern
When I picked Next.js and TailwindCSS for the front end, I knew it was simple enough for Kevin to set up locally to tweak the UI. He is in charge of UX design until we get a real designer. My original plan was to build out the pages and components with most of the styling already done. I knew Kevin would want to tweak the styling once he had the pages rendered in his browser. He took it to the next level. The guy who was supposed to the technical product manager is making his own components and making them look good (with some supervision from me). This lead something unexpected...
The technical product manager suggested refactoring
What the f**k? In what world does a product manager (or any non-coder) suggest we refactor code? Before we even launch the product?! About two weeks in, our form components were getting messy and he actually said it.
Now you understand why devs want to refactor! But Kevin isn't the only one acting weird...
The developer (me) has suggested and is totally open to scope creep and moving the deadline earlier
Turns out when the product you're building is your (virtual) baby, scope creep ain't so bad. We've added some extra features that weren't part of our original plan and we're still somehow ahead of schedule. It might have something to do with the lack of meetings, customer requests/complaints, JIRA tickets to fill out, writing tests, and the unhealthy amount of red bull I've consumed.
What's coming?
If you're reading this blog post, chances are we've already launched our landing page. Over the next few weeks I'll be publishing some more blog posts going over the nuts and bolts of skwirl:
How can you help?
It's a two skwirl show here. We quit our jobs to chase our dream. If you are interested in what we are doing or share our vision there are a number of ways you can show your support. You can help us spread the word by sharing this post, or any other ones with your network and friends. You can support us on Buy Me a Coffee which unlocks different perks and rewards such as early access. You can come join the conversation on discord, facebook, twitter or wherever you feel most comfortable.
We cannot wait to share skwirl with the world. Until then, happy collecting 👋
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