Hey Jon! Thank you so much for doing this. Could you speak to developing the open core business model, and how you worked with the founders to set expectations and execute with the engineering teams?
I can’t say for certain what compelled the founders to choose this business model, but in my experience when you start something as a side project to scratch an itch, it feels like a default choice as an engineer to start with something open source, so that others can benefit. Incidentally, it turns out it’s a great way to initially build a community around a project and grow it organically both in terms of its capabilities as well as its usage.
I don’t think it was much different from how you’d do this in any other instance. Set meaningful and ambitious goals, iterate and test hypotheses. A slightly controversial perspective I might hold is to not focus so much on whether you hit a goal you set some time ago, but whether or not you had the impact you’d hoped for. Sometimes the goals you set at the beginning of a quarter lose relevance shortly after you start building or get customer feedback!
Hey Jon! Thank you so much for doing this. Could you speak to developing the open core business model, and how you worked with the founders to set expectations and execute with the engineering teams?
Hi Liana, happy to be here!
I can’t say for certain what compelled the founders to choose this business model, but in my experience when you start something as a side project to scratch an itch, it feels like a default choice as an engineer to start with something open source, so that others can benefit. Incidentally, it turns out it’s a great way to initially build a community around a project and grow it organically both in terms of its capabilities as well as its usage.
I don’t think it was much different from how you’d do this in any other instance. Set meaningful and ambitious goals, iterate and test hypotheses. A slightly controversial perspective I might hold is to not focus so much on whether you hit a goal you set some time ago, but whether or not you had the impact you’d hoped for. Sometimes the goals you set at the beginning of a quarter lose relevance shortly after you start building or get customer feedback!
Awesome - thanks for the answer and insight!