Hi there! Thanks for coming to my blog where I write about my entrepreneurial journey!
On Monday, I started the Antler program together with around 60 other founders. It’s amazing to see so many curious, driven people, that all want to build something great, all in one place. I’m very grateful to share this experience with them.
For the coming months, I’ll be writing about my progress at Antler, where my goal is to find one or two co-founders, explore an idea together, and build it up to a seed-stage company.
Before I jump in, a quick update on SquidGPT: last week I did a final push on this project, updating the landing page and submitting the app for review to the Slack Marketplace. Fingers crossed for a smooth approval
🅰️Antler program process and first observations
Overall, the first week was very exciting but also quite intense. Next week will be even more intense, but then the scheduled programming gets a lot lighter and it’s on participants to self organize.
The process so far
Antler has an interesting process for creating serendipity and inducing self-reflection. Roughly speaking, in the first two weeks there’s a full schedule, consisting of:
- Networking: speed networking and lunch roulette
- Educative presentations: AMAs with founders from previous cohorts, talks on how to match with cofounders, finding a good problem to solve, guided self-reflection
- Small group projects: Identifying personal skills and determining the split of responsibilities between founders, brainstorming and exploring topics of interest)
All these were super helpful to start honing in on the people I’d like to work with. It all starts with chemistry. I felt a very interesting boost in self awareness. From the first few interactions with a person, I can hear myself thinking whether I can work with them.
If the answer is yes (about 50% of the time, I made a spreadsheet), the next step is to compare commitment, working style, values and skills. Commitment (e.g. runway, other responsibilities), working style (e.g. communication, conflict resolution), and values need to be compatible. Ideally, skills need to be different.
As my skills are in strategy, operations and product, I’m searching for people strong in software engineers. Alternatively, if there’s really good chemistry and super-compatible values, style and interests I’d also be ok with more overlap in skills.
There’s a cool guide from 1st round, that suggests a bunch of good topics to align on, when dating a cofounder.
Some personal observations
Since the schedule is so packed, and the timeline is so tight, it does feels like a race. It’s interesting that it’s not a race against the other participants. On the contrary, people are super helpful. It’s a race against time.
You have to be really honest with yourself and each other. This includes sharing weaknesses and answering less comfortable questions.
That creates space for a lot of fun, and I already led me to some deep, connected conversations. I’m sure more are coming. These conversations are already valuable enough to return the investment of time into the program.
Finally, this feels a bit like a reality tv show (hence the title of this post). I wonder if there could be a business in organizing a similar program for romantic dating.
🗿Personal update: How’s it going, Stefan?
Although the first week of the program was very intense, I feel energized. Also, I’m very happy to have already identified a few people that I think I could work with.
Taking this weekend to recharge. If the weather’s good, I’d love to open the hiking season 🌄.
➡️Next steps
The priority for next week is to start discussing compatibility with the people with whom the chemistry seems to be there.