Peer Mentor | FAQ
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FAQ

if your queries are not addressed here, feel free to call or drop us an email

What Do I need to startup?

Just this one thing
Do these words describe you? Then you are on. You have all that it takes.
General questions
What is co-founder as a service?

If you want to start, and do not know how to, then on signing up with us, we will be your co-founder. We work as a co-founder till your start up come to a point where it can scale. Post that, we will be a mentor.

In a sense this is similar to partnership. In India, it is common to have partnership firms. Many of these have a concept called working partner and sleeping partner. Working partner works, contributes with sweat equity. Sleeping partner invests money initially. Based on the understanding between people, this percentage can be 50-50, 60-40, 30-70 etc. Finally, when working partner takes money from company in the form of salary or benefits then sleeping partner gets it too in their agreed share.

In our case, it will be a 95-5 partnership. I get 5%. Initially, while you are having your full time job, and are working on the startup part time, then both of us will be working partners though I have only 5%. After we generate enough profits, that is typically 12-18 months, when the startup can pay you a minimum salary, from then on, I will be mentor and a sleeping partner.

While as a working partner, I will take up all the “unknowns”, “manage fire” and “complement your skills”. Typically, if there is an “unknown” i.e there is a task that you don’t know how to do, then I do it for the first time, enable you so that from next time onward, you can do it on your own.

In the working-partner, sleeping-partner model, the sleeping partner invests cash where as I invest time in the first 12–18 months. Here in this time, using our XP model, we will generate revenues and profits that will be equivalent of investing cash by the sleeping partner.

As a co-founder what will be your responsibilities?
On signing up with peer-mentor, you will be working part-time on your start-up. You will be moon lighting.
  1. So our primary responsibility is to do whatever it takes from us to make your start-up profitable. Your start-up should earn enough so you can take home a salary. This should happen in 12-18 months time.
  2. As a peer/co-founder, we will take up tasks that you do not know how to do. We will execute this task the first time so that you can handle this task next time around. When we start, there will be lots of things that you do not know. So we will be doing a lot of work. Our contribution will be as high as 50%. As we go on, our work load reduces. You will be learning how to do on your own. By the time we are in step 13 of Peer-Mentor execution model, our effort should be down to 5% or less.  Post this stage, linearly scaling should help you quit your job/take home an industry average salary
  3. When ever there is a fire, we step in and extinguish the fire.
How much do you charge for your services?

Zilch. Nothing. We do not charge you anything upfront. Peer-Mentor is structured in such a way that we earn when you earn.

  • We take 5% of equity. You hold the 95% of the start-up.
  • When you take a salary from the profits of start-up, we take a salary that is 5% of your salary.
  • When the profits from the startup are distributed as dividends, we get 5% as we own 5% of equity.

So, you do not pay anything from your pocket. We earn exactly 5% of what you earn from this start-up.

I don't have money to invest. Can I still startup?
Don’t worry. Unlike regular startups, you are not expected to “invest”. This is a low-cost lean startup. At the max, you have to spare a couple of thousands. To begin with, you do not have to invest anything. Once we start servicing customers, we will have to invest this couple of thousands.
 
Exactly how much to invest?
 
Well, that depends on the type of start-up. However, we will invest only when there is a paying customer ready. Or, after a customer has already paid.
 
In that sense, we will be sure to recover the amount that we invest.
 
PS: As a 5% partner, we will chip in 5% of the investment.
I don't know so many aspects. Can I sign up?

Yes, you can sign up and start. What ever you do not know, we will do it for you until you can manage on your own.

This is the situation most of the time. Either people know the business and do not know how to build technology or vice-versa. In either case, fret not. We will fill in the blanks and help you until you can run the show on your own.

I am clueless about technology? Can I sign up?

In our model, we use pretotypes and prototypes to pitch to clients. Do read about them in “Our Approach“. So we do not build anything until we have paying customers ready. So no worries. We will need tech only after sometime. By then, we will build it.

I am clueless about business... can you help me?
When people say business, it is two important basic aspects. Sales and Operations. If you are passionate about your startup then selling is all about showing up to clients. And, if you have basic IQ then Operations then you have operations ingrained in you.
If we are sincere, we will push through all odds and deliver. This is operations : ) You will learn and grow this skill as we scale up.
I know this domain very well. But, I do not have any ideas.

If you are a domain expert, then you already know the problems. It is just that you have not articulated them. So a little bit of teasing and using our thinking models ( read”Our Approach“) and you will soon be a fountain of ideas : )

I want to solve this problem. I do not know how to. Can I start up?
If you know that you do not know, then you are the best person to solve. You will not have any biases and you will bring in a fresh approach. The key criteria to solve a problem is the intent. You will not get it right the first time but it will not stop you. So dive in. You are all set.
Lot of people face this problem. But I am not from that domain...
Don’t worry. Sign up. It is outsiders who disrupt industries. It was Uber who disrupted Taxi cab services, AirBnB who disrupted hotel industry. And Ford was not into making horse buggies. So if you are passionate about solving this problem, we seek you.
I am working on this since some time. Very little to show : (
Absolutely. This is a common problem. A lot of passionate people get struck in this stage.
Once you sign up, you are on a roller coaster, there is no looking back. We have seen that people get better support from friends and family after signing up. This makes your endeavor informally formal. This little difference is enough to get the extra push. More over, we have methods and tools built specifically to address this.
If you have sunk time and effort into this, you will succeed faster with PeerMentor.
I am alone. I do not have any co-founders. How can I go about?
In a sense, you are lucky. More starts up implode because of co-founder issues.
However, having a co-founder helps in many ways. So, this is were we chip in. We have tools to address and nip the co-founder issues between us. And, we get the benefits of working as a team. So this like eating the cake and having it to. So go ahead and sign up. We will use our approach and get you off the ground.
I am still a student? I want to start something. What can I do?
Start : ) Start something that you are passionate about. Start something that is in line with your course. If it is an intersection of passion and course, then you are lucky. Go through the “Our approach“. If this interests you sign-up. We will get you going in no time. Starting while studying is the best time to start. 
Did you know, in FutureReadyKids, one of our start-up’s school kids invent? We are selling their products on Amazon. School kids are earning.  So if school kids can, you can too.
I am very busy. I am not getting the time. Will you help me?
Yes, of-course. If you committed, we are happy to help.
Good to know
More about 5% equity
As a peer-mentor, my equity share will be 5% from now till series B funding. Exiting or diluting before series B will be my sole discretion.
  • We want to build businesses for the long run. We are not looking for an exit. Secondly, we will focus on profitability and not on funding. In this regards, we should not be looking at funding at all. In the ideal case, this series B clause would be a moot point.
  • In funding, there are lots of rounds. The 1st round may be from friends and family. 2nd round would be seed stage. Until this stage, the company valuation is not well defined. Series A investors are the serious investor. They assure the right value in series B. Hence, I prefer not to dilute my equity till series B.

As 5% owner of the company, I will take 5% of losses, 5% of profits and 5% of your take home/salary. 

We are evolving. So if you have better thoughts on how to go about it or if you have any queries, then please give us a call.

Priority and Promise matrix

You will decide on the tasks that you want to pick up. You will also decide on the milestones.

  • You will also decide on a monetary fine that you will pay me if you miss the milestone/target.
    • This is to make sure that you have the motivation to complete the tasks and grow your company. Else if you are dropping and not making any progress then what I get for my time and involvement is these fines : )
  • if there are tasks that I take up, then I will add a date and the fine. I will pay you if I miss these deadlines.
  • We will mutually agree upon a culture that will be necessary for this company. If we break it, we will pay the other a fine. This fine, unlike the previous fine, will be in terms of % of equity.
    • Different businesses have to build different cultures. So it is important not to lose the culture once we build it. Also, it is very difficult to get set right the culture after we break it. Hence, here the fine is in terms of % of equity.
  • If you drop/abandon the entire journey then you will pay me 100 times the total amount of the “fine for missing the deadline” column.  All the assets will be transferred to PeerMentor
    • This is to make sure that you take this project only if you are committed to this idea and will continue.
Liabilities

Either of the parties will  not be liable to any damages caused directly or indirectly by each other, each others company/this venture, vendors or partners to each other, each others company/this venture, others customers, consumers, vendors or partners or anybody directly or indirectly associated with this venture

Related party transactions

When getting into related party transaction, we will let each other know, and get a go-ahead in writing.

Additional clauses

If we have to add any more clause, we will discuss, concur and add.

PeerMentor principles

We will follow the peer-mentor principles all through the life of this organization in spirit and word. These are listed in our approach section and here

   rohith@peer-mentor.com    +91-98800-13512