Fair points, but a note on AirBnB with the caveat that I only know the public information and never worked there. To me, their only moat is their brand and the network effects they built with that brand. The famous stories are them fundraising by selling Obama themed cheerios, and going to apartments helping hosts take better pictures. Neither of those things are the “cranking out iPhone mocks” you’d expect from a freelance designer but seem like stories fundamentally linked to their design backgrounds and ability to tell stories in the visual world. Strong design probably matters more for something like Snapchat than Coinbase so I’m sure it depends. You’re probably right in your explanation for why Eng skills are more in demand but I still suspect you’re understating the impact of a great designer.
In my opinion empathy for users (doubly important in a multi sided marketplace e.g. hosts and guests) helped Airbnb succeed. They no doubt removed friction, and prioritized that internally, and that helped them become an aggregator for their new market but unclear if it was due to being designers that provided this insight.
I think for an early stage startup you need to make tradeoffs. What skills can we get with our founding team's overlap, and what skills can we easily fill? Of course, the person matters so much more than these checkboxes, and I don't think anyone would suggest not working with a designer, but I think it does explain why so many are looking for technical founders.
But I was complaining about the exact opposite- I have a hard time finding potential design cofounders as an engineer, and every hackathon and similar events seems to be filled with engineers , but short on designers even though designers win pitches more than engineers (you can fake implementation for a demo but can’t fake design).
The fact that it’s harder to find designers than engineers for founders despite the opposite dynamic in the job market is what I was saying was surprising.
The platform does not have many designers looking for technical founders. As I said, it’s filled with MBAs. When pressed what skills they would contribute, they say things like “backend finance.” Usually either they have no money but need you to build a complex project before you can think about raising money (raising the question why not just build it and pitch VCs yourself), or they already raised money but want to give you some absurdly low percentage (you’re not really cofounder).
Are there people in there that would be able to raise money /sell the product if you built it? Maybe but others have discussed why that’s the hardest of all skills to vet for.
Either way if the platform was filled with strong designers interested in partnering with technical cofounders I’d be much happier and speak more highly of it.
