If your cofounder relationship wouldn’t survive sharing a hotel room, that’s a problem, according to one Anthropic cofounder.
Daniela Amodei left OpenAI with her brother, Dario, to launch Anthropic. The duo — along with their five other cofounders — built one of the most valuable AI businesses, one that investors are racing to get into.
In a talk at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Amodei offered advice on picking a cofounder. Interpersonal relationship dynamics “matter a lot more than you think,” she said.
“Dario and I have been fighting and getting over it for over forty years,” she said. “He’s my brother, and I used to steal his toys.”
One of Amodei’s tips for finding a good cofounder: “Instead of starting a company together, go on vacation together.”
Travel can reveal weaknesses in a relationship, from planning stops and booking flights to cohabitating. Cofounders should try sharing a room while vacationing, Amodei said.
After the trip, evaluate the relationship. If entrepreneurs still want to spend time with their cofounders, Amodei said that it was likely a good match.
“If you’re like, ‘Really going to need a vacation to recover from my vacation,’ it might be the wrong choice,” Amodei said.
Being on the same page as your cofounder is also crucial. Having different skills may be helpful — think of the visionary Steve Jobs versus the realist Steve Wozniak — but having different principles can crush a company.
Amodei gave the audience a challenge: Imagine you and your cofounder were locked in different rooms and asked to draw a picture of what the startup is doing. It’s important that you don’t end up drawing separate images, like a unicorn and a platypus, she said.
“That’s the type of situation where you think you’re doing the same thing, but I think it just doesn’t end well,” she said.
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