Ask a potential cofounder about motives, time commitment, roles, decision rights, ownership, money, working style, conflict, intellectual property, and exit scenarios. Write your answers separately, compare them directly, and test the relationship through a bounded project. A polished conversation does not prove that you can build together.
These questions help you expose assumptions. They do not replace legal, tax, or financial advice.
motives and definition of success
- Why do you want to build a company now?
- Which problem or market do you want to work on for several years?
- Which ideas or industries will you not work on?
- What outcome would make this worth doing if the company never becomes large?
- Which personal, creative and professional goals matter most?
- What would make you stop?
Do not accept “I want impact” or “I want freedom” without examples. Ask what each phrase changes in a real decision.
time, location and pace
- How many hours can you commit now, and on which days?
- What must happen before you work full time?
- Where do you expect to live and work during the next two years?
- Which meetings or shared hours do you need?
- How quickly do you expect us to ship, sell, hire and raise money?
- Which family, health, study or employment constraints should we plan around?
You do not need identical schedules. You need an agreement that makes dependencies visible.
roles and decision rights
- Which work do you want to own every week?
- Which work can you do but do not want to own long term?
- Who speaks for product, customers, technology, hiring and finance today?
- How will we change roles when evidence changes?
- Who makes the final call when we cannot agree?
- What does the CEO role mean in this company?
Y Combinator's cofounder questions also put roles, titles, responsibility, CEO ownership, location and commitment near the start of the conversation. Use those topics before you negotiate titles for status.
money, equity and risk
- How will we fund the first stage?
- Which expenses require both people to approve?
- How much personal financial risk can each person accept?
- How should equity reflect the long-term relationship?
- Which vesting and departure terms should counsel prepare?
- What compensation does each person need, and when?
Do not ask someone to disclose private numbers they do not need to share. Discuss boundaries, commitments, and conditions. Before you sign anything, each founder should receive qualified legal and tax advice for the relevant jurisdiction.
product, customers and evidence
- Which customer problem do we believe exists?
- What evidence would change our mind?
- Which customer conversations can we run together this month?
- What will we build manually before we automate it?
- Which claims will we refuse to make without evidence?
- How will we decide that an experiment failed?
Watch how both people respond when customer evidence challenges the original idea. Attachment to one solution can become a partnership problem.
conflict and communication
- How do you want someone to raise a problem with your work?
- What happened during the last serious professional disagreement you handled?
- Which decisions should we document?
- How long can a disagreement stay unresolved?
- Who can help us mediate a deadlock?
- What behavior would end the relationship immediately?
Ask for a real example, not a description of an ideal personality.
add the questions most lists avoid
Cover these scenarios explicitly:
- one founder performs less work than agreed;
- one founder wants to sell and the other does not;
- one founder receives another job offer;
- the product needs a complete pivot;
- the company cannot pay compensation;
- a founder becomes ill or unavailable;
- either person wants to start another project;
- one founder leaves before vesting;
- you need to assign existing code, designs, domains, or data;
- a relationship between team members creates a conflict.
You do not need to predict every event. You need a process for making and documenting the decision.
turn the conversation into a trial project
Choose a two- to four-week project that resembles the actual company work. You might interview customers, deliver a small manual service, test a landing page, or build one prototype path.
Write:
- the goal and evidence;
- each person's responsibilities;
- meeting and response expectations;
- ownership of work created during the trial;
- costs and approvals;
- the end date;
- the decision you will make afterward.
Review not only the output, but how you surfaced delay, uncertainty, disagreement, and changing evidence.
use founderhub for a real working conversation
founderhub lets you explore nearby founders and public coworking tables, join a table, or organize one. Choose a public work session, bring your written answers, and complete one small project task together. You decide what you share and whether you meet again.
founderhub can create a place for the conversation. It cannot verify compatibility, promise a match, or decide that someone should become your cofounder.
score alignment without fake precision
After the conversation, mark each topic:
| Mark | Meaning | Next action |
|---|---|---|
| Aligned | Answers support the same decision | Document the agreement |
| Workable difference | Different preferences can coexist | Define ownership and boundary |
| Unknown | You lack evidence | Test it during the trial |
| Conflict | Both positions cannot operate together | Resolve directly or stop |
Do not add the marks into a compatibility score. One unresolved conflict about honesty, ownership, commitment, or conduct can matter more than ten aligned preferences.
Read how to find a cofounder before you build the candidate list, and use the cofounder trial project to design the working test.
before you commit
Confirm the trial evidence, references when appropriate, legal structure, equity documents, vesting, intellectual-property assignments, decision process, and exit terms. Let each founder review the documents independently.
The right outcome can be yes, no, or not yet. A direct no after a useful trial costs less than an unclear yes after a great coffee.