I had an idea for a software application and hired a programmer from one of the freelance programming websites. Towards the end he bailed. I even gave him extra money because the project ran over the time he said it would take. I ended up with useless software. He had excellent reviews, and was established on the freelance website
I know what I want the software to do but it seems I almost need to know programming to convey it or a wireframe or something. I had written down what I wanted it to do. But even the basic function ended up broken
Along the way as problems presented themselves i had to brainstorm solutions for the problems. As an example there could be two things named the same thing, this caused the software to crash. I would have thought the programmer would have already thought of this being a potential problem based on how I explained it would function. He then fixed it but in my mind this should have been a non issue from the get go.
So in essence my question is how do I explain what I want and should a programmer be asking me any questions ? Or do I have to have everything spelled out even if I am not a programmer because its seemed like I need to know programming to explain how I want the software to function. And where / how do I find a good one ?
You absolutely shouldn’t have to brainstorm how to fix your programmer’s bugs.
It sounds like you two weren’t a good fit. Maybe he was unethical, or maybe there were other issues. You wrote that you were eventually telling him “how” to do things; that’s not a level of interaction you should have to take or that most programmers I know would be comfortable with. A non-technical boss should just be telling developers the requirements and ideally the “why”, not the “how”.
You might want a technical cofounder, or an engineer who’d be willing to walk you through best practices in working with them. This will help you learn and set expectations for leading programming teams in the future.
Freelance sites are often for cheap-skates. The good reviews are often because they solved a lot of really simple problems. Like “I need a powerBI script” or something.
You get what you pay for. You probably do want to pay for it and get an NDA to protect your idea too, at least in the early stages.
It can be hard to find a programmer co-founder as an entrepreneur, because, all us programmers have heard about a billion pitches by non-technical entrepreneurs, and they’re usually a really bad idea or not lucrative enough to bother.
Like no, you’re not going to make a successful, breakthrough social media company anymore. Ship has sailed bro.
Like no, I won’t accept 100 dollars for 40 hours of work that YOU OWN afterwards when I’m making 60+ an hour at my day job.
In any case, I don’t have a lot of advice for you there other than you should try to befriend some programmers. You can keep trying some others on those freelance sites but you might want to contact the higher $ ones with lots of feedback because they’ll take it more seriously.
Thank you for the advice. This isn’t a billion dollar idea more niche specific. I have no dreams of lambos and all that but I am hoping to make 150k or more per year. It really depends on the number of subscribers and the monthly subscription cost the market is willing to pay for the service.
Well you can try to find a local programing company/agency with good reviews as they usually do not bail out and are quite legit. keap in mind the will be more expensive.
Welcome to the world of software engineering. Good programmers are rare. Even well-written software has bugs. One of the most important things in software is getting your ideas crystal clear. Make wireframes. Draw scenarios. Write out all the requirements. You’ll probably see that you have lot of blind spots.
It’s likely your fault as you didn’t communicate properly or know what you’re actually asking for. Happy to try and lend a hand
Rarely is what you ask for in the beginning what you will need in the end.
Eventually, it will need to be changed to increase traffic or as you find out you need more things.If its just you and them, they should be able to do it for you without the need to write out complex requirements, just send an email, they’ll implement, you look, point out what you want changed, they change it and the process continues.
That’s kind of the hard part about this stuff. Your best best is to spend as little money as possible to get an MVP that you can demo to customers and investors, and either get capital from revenue for a better product or capital from investors.
You may want to consider a no-code solution like Bubble (web) or Adalo (mobile + web) for an MVP. Gives you a lot of flexibility in terms of costs and bug-hunting and could help you launch much faster and more efficiently than traditional dev. Ping me if this sounds interesting, I’m a product design engineer with loads of experience launching MVPs via these platforms
Steal a guy from a small company like me lol. Guys who work with huge teams rarely know wtf they are doing. Meanwhile, I work with a team of 4 other dudes, we all do the work of like 30 guys no problem. We get paid accordingly though.
A word of advice
If you’re going to outsource a programming project, then you have got to divorce yourself from what you think the coding should be like. Infact don’t try to say what should be done and what should not be done.
All you should have is a barebone blueprint. I want this to do that…simple.
Your coder is the guy who brainstorms the solution. If you don’t have coding skills, you shouldn’t be conceptualizing.
That’s the problem you’re having.
You don’t need a programmer you need a technical cofounder
Ideally that person should be experienced at creating startups and go from “0 to 1”
If you pick another programmer you will just get taken for a ride again
You need a technical cofounder who shares your vision and will create whatever it is you want either short term demo that will be scrapped later and remade (MVP) or something that will last a little longer (or a lot longer)
What’s to stop the technical cofounder from doing all the work, getting sick of the inequality in effort then usurp the whole idea?
That seems to happen a lot when one person is a programmer and one person isn’t because the programmer is the only one who can really execute the idea
There’s more to just making it. There’s knowing what to make (Product or Research), and designing what to make (UI/UX) and then selling or pushing what you make. You got the 3 H’s (hacker, hustler, hipster) and each would bring unique skills. 99% of programmers cannot design or sell worth a cent.
You can use slicing pie model https://slicingpie.com/learn-slicing-pie-model/ to turn everything into a “slice” and calculate fair market value. Time, relationships, money even ideas all have fair market value. You can have real time calculation of equity. In most primitive way you have time based vesting but more advanced tracking like slicing pie has no fixed equity chunks. If someone was lazy and did nothing and got fired, the treatment of their “slices” would be different than if someone walked away for either bad or good reasons. When the startup gets funding, slicing pie model ends and you can accurately price and hire. People’s “slices” (equity) is paid off then and you move into salaries and normal compensation.
The builder can try to “usurp” the whole idea but then they would need another person to do the selling and the designing. The sales guy can walk away too and so can the designer. The risk is the same.
With any product you have 2 parallel streams going on -
- Product Development
- Customer Development
Product Development doesn’t just involve “building it”, there is also tons of UI / UX work, and the most important job of a Product Owner of figuring out what features to prioritize and what is the go to market strategy.
Then there is Customer Development, where you actively talk to customers to figure out their pain points and try to deeply understand the problem, and how you could potentially solve it.
There is also marketing and sales, which is related to Customer Development but is it’s own thing.
The idea is that everyone contributes to all these parts of the company, while the technical founder manages how to build it, and with what quality requirements. But the other founders are involved in every other part of the company.
In many startups, the early work can be heavily tilted towards the business side. You have to figure out what you’re building before you want to actually start building. This means talking to customers, building a landing page, ad campaign, etc. Some companies may need more early technical development, but you’ve got problems if the business-side cofounder isn’t doing this.
I’m a software dev. Let me know if you still need help
you need a good product manager (or at least a project manager). A good product manager can get the best out of a dev.
It takes many, many, years to get good at managing devs. If you are managing your own project, I recommend taking some courses.
You post a detailed job description with a high salary and they’ll come find you. You hire the top 5 applicants to work on your project. In 6 months do 360 reviews of their work. Cut the non-performers and replace them with new programmers. Eventually you’ll have a good team of programmers so long as the salary remains high and the benefits remain great.
Or you can do what you’re doing now which is hunting and pecking and hoping and begging and praying that you’ll find some nibwit to do a half-assed job.
I’m a software engineer, hit me up I’m looking for a side project
Hey man, not the OP, but I’d be keen to have a chat I’d you’re open to it? I may need an extra set of hands for a project we have coming up
Proper engagement, paid etc
Shoot me a dm!
I can help. What tech stack are you working on and what do you need from my side?
What’s your rate?
not OP but I am a web dev as well, and my rate is $3k/month. I can share more details if needed