Agree how the team will work

Check commitments before assigning work

State hours, skills, goals, reward expectations and exit constraints. Use a bounded joint task to observe delivery, communication and disagreement. Technical strength alone does not establish cofounder fit. Record who decides, executes, reviews and needs information.

Handle contribution and disagreement

Specify delivery, dependencies, delay reporting and review. Coding, synthesis, interviews and customer work can all contribute; attribution follows records. Equity, IP, employment and payment need separate formal arrangements; a task board is not a complete legal agreement.

Worked example · fictional

From a problem to inspectable work

Fictional: three students agree to join but have 2, 8 and 12 hours available weekly.

1. Adjust scope and dependencies instead of assuming equal capacity.
2. Assign an owner, reviewer and missed-commitment response.

The two-hour member owns a bounded interview synthesis while others build the prototype; review collaboration after a week.

Failure case and repair

Promise equal equity before discussing commitments.

Expectations diverge and contribution becomes disputed.

Clarify commitments and roles before formal rights arrangements.