I had a discovery meeting today with a potential contractor, introduced to us by a platform we're thinking about signing a deal with. It's the first time I've had a meeting with a contractor like this. At Google, they use contractors and vendors heavily but I was very far indeed from the contract and kickoff side of things. My last two startups weren't currently using contractors (but had in the past).

In my current role, I've only recently gotten a second team member. My employer invests well in the research aspect of my org, and it's exciting to see the team growing instead of facing layoffs, like at my last two startups. At my last non-tech job over a decade ago, we did hire contractors for some web design work, but I'm not sure how well that translates.

We're thinking about contractors in order to help us accelerate our adoption of a new platform. The risk of using a contractor in this scenario, in my opinion, is either the contractor doing a poor job (unlikely, given the vendor's investment and reputational risk) or leaving us with a setup that we don't understand. It's similar, in some ways, to the risks of vibe coding or copying someone else's homework.

With that in mind, we're scoping the discussion carefully to make sure that we are asking for the right work, and that the deliverables include us having full ownership over and confidence in anything they've configured for us. A good contractor will have examples of previous work they've done and can explain how they delivered for the client, as well as a clear statement of work. It may seem repetitive to explain things over and over again, especially if you're asking multiple contractors to do quote, but it is an investment worth making up front.

We're just getting started and I'm a total n00b at this, so stay tuned to find out whether we take the plunge, and if we do, how it goes!