Entrepreneur

0 readers

1 users here now

Rules

No Personal Attacks - criticism of ideas is allowed, attacking people is not.
Self Posts Only - links can only provide supplementary material. Your post must contain enough content to have a discussion.
No “How To Get Rich Quick” posts - This community is not about making a quick buck. Posts asking the community how to make $X, without making specific reference to a reasonable idea, are not tolerated.
Avoid unprofessional communication - Please treat fellow entrepreneurs like respected coworkers, label conversations if NSFW and avoid deliberate provocations.

Please feel free to provide evidence-based best practices, share a micro-victory, discuss strategy and concepts with a frame work, ask for feedback, and create professional conversation. Treat every post as if you're at work and representing the best version of yourself.

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

communick@indiehackers.space

Should non-technical founders learn to code? (alien.top)

submitted 11 months ago by Darryl-D@alien.top to c/entrepreneur@indiehackers.space

14 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I think not.

It's counterintuitive to ignore your strengths as a founder (ie: sales, marketing, etc)

The founders I speak with who want to learn to code assume it will help them understand their developers more. This is slightly true, but it's an opportunity cost against time spent selling/promoting the product.

Products fail more due to poor PMF, not because founders can't code.

Hiring developers who can communicate is a bigger force multiplier. (a hard requirement for me)

A technical project manager is even more ideal for providing the buffer between the founder and developers.

Curious how non-technical people on the fence of learning to code feel about this topic.

(if it's a passion you seek, that is a different argument. code away)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] ryantxr@alien.top 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Learn to code for what purpose? It’s useful to understand how it works and what’s involved.

You don’t just learn to code. You aren’t likely to teach some non-technical person to code to the point where they can contribute to a project. People who are good at code have spent tens of thousands of hours honing their craft. It can be very frustrating and time consuming. It requires extreme focus and concentration.

[–] Darryl-D@alien.top 1 points 11 months ago

It's also something to be said about "markers time" vs "managers time" (from Paul G.)

Coding takes up 4-5hr blocks of focus. As an owner of the company you need to communicate all day, which is operating in 1hr blocks.

Even the best devs who went to leadership I know struggle trying to balance (we all go through the motions of giving up the IDE 😅) and eventually realize it's not worth the context shifting and mental strain.