Job titles can stunt startup development

Many founders model their companies on what is available around (but Startups are not scaled down versions of companies). This means they will start assigning work titles that may sound nice and that may have some flair in a big corporate: "Head of Engineering", "VP of Product Development", etc.

However, assigning titles has a heavy burden for startups which are still trying to understand what's their business model.

Customer Discovery is a process that takes a lot of time and energy, and must be done collectively by the founders and early employees. Once you start assigning different titles, people will fall into different roles. If you are the "Head of Engineering", you'll not discuss with a customer, and if you do marketing you will not argue that the product is faulty.

Especially when it comes to product development, especially for scipreneurs and deep-tech companies, which is a lengthy and expensive road, small companies need to stay lean and agile, in whatever way those two words can be interpreted.