Initial Startups: Behind the Scenes - DropMyEmail

Work emails... personal emails... Some hold certain importance with valuable information and some well... sentimental perhaps. 

What if 1 day... these emails are gone?

That's where DropMyEmail comes in! 

DropMyEmail is a free service that lets you backup your emails automatically easily.

Interview Dialogue with DropMyEmail Founder, Mr John Fearon and Pioneer Employee, Mr Zan (Developer).

The team at DropMyEmail!

1) What went through your initial thought process on forming your initial core team? How did you go about attracting your core team member? If there were challenges faced, please elaborate.

In my experience you build teams based on the short term needs of the business. Over time you find people will fit into the long term core member of team or move on. 

2) What were your initial plans for these pioneer employees when they first joined you? How is the execution differ from you initial plans, and in what ways?

I think you have long term intentions when you employ people but it does not always work out due to requirements in the business, circumstances (financial usually) or their own personal ambitions not aligning with the business. Other times, things work out great and you build good long term working relationships.  

  3) What will you advise to budding founders if they are looking to form/hire their initial core team?

Try to find people that complement you. Also try to find people that will support you but also be able to debate with you. Generally speaking it is not a good idea to hire people that are too similar to you in your expertise because you need to diversify your team. 

And next we move on to the Pioneer Employee of DropMyEmail, Mr Zan.

1) What make you join a Startup in full-time employment?

I worked in an enterprise company prior to joining a startup. My interest in startups must have got piqued after reading all the articles about teenagers making money by starting an Internet company. Another reason is I got disillusioned working at enterprise companies. They are too slow, encumbered by too much red tape and the quality of work is appalling. Initially I started dabbling in Rails in my spare time. Then I found out about the Singapore Ruby Brigade. Wow, there actually is a group of people who would meet up to talk about technology? I began to attend the ruby meetups and met many people. Most of them are working in startups. Then when jobs started to appear on the mailing list, I jumped.

2) Being one of the pioneer team member, what are the kind of initial challenges faced?

When I first joined, we only had 4 engineers. There was a mountain worth of work. It was clear we couldn't keep up with the small team we had. Hiring became an immediate challenge. We went out and tapped our networks aggressively. In a short span of 1 month, we managed to double our team size to 8 engineers.

3) Has your role differ from when you first join? If yes, please elaborate.

I was brought in to join the engineering team. I still am part of the engineering team, but I'm given more responsibilities. Our product range grew. Everyone in the team had to rise up to the challenge and take ownership. My responsibilities have since grown to take on the DropMyEmail product range. Things are always fluid, we all take on different roles when required.

4) Challenges are inevitable in a startup environment. Prior to join DropMyEmail, are you ready for these challenges? Or did you know what you might have to face?

I've worked in a few startups prior to joining DropMyEmail. I had a good expectation that the pace would be fast. It was way faster than I thought. Deal after deal, it just kept coming. I had an in camp training for 2 weeks. When I came back, we had yet another deal signed. On one hand we were buoyed by the deals, on the other we were trying very hard to keep up.

With that, we round up our 4^th interview! If you want to know more about DropMyEmail, click on this link à More About DropMyEmail

Startup Jobs Asia’s next interview will be revealed next weekend! Stay tuned!

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