c/austin-tech-business

Shoutout to the guy at the coffee shop on South Lamar who was talking about hiring

I was grabbing a coffee yesterday and the table next to me had two people talking about hiring for their tech startup. One guy said, 'We spent $15,000 on a recruiter for a senior dev role and the person quit after 3 months.' That hit me hard because my roofing business has the same problem finding good people who stick around. It made me think that maybe the Austin tech scene and my small trade business aren't so different. We're all just trying to find reliable talent in this crazy city. It's not just about the money you pay, it's about finding someone who fits the team. Has anyone else here found a hiring method that actually works long term for technical roles?

Our entire team got locked out of our Slack workspace on Monday because of a single admin mistake

Our new office manager in the Domain accidentally changed the primary email domain for our company Slack without telling anyone, and it kicked all 47 of us out instantly. We lost a full afternoon of work scrambling to get back in through support tickets. Has anyone else in Austin tech had a major productivity tool fail because of an internal slip-up?

Showerthought: I just blew $800 on a fancy CRM that nobody on my team used

I bought it for our small Austin startup last quarter, thinking it would organize our sales leads better. After three months, I checked the logs and saw only two logins total, both by me. What's a simpler tool that actually works for a small tech team here?

Heads up on the new city permit portal for tech office builds

We started a small office expansion project off South Lamar last quarter and used the city's new online permit system. I submitted our plans for a new server room and got an approval email in 48 hours, which felt way too fast. Turns out the system auto-approved it without a real review because of a software bug, and we got a stop-work order two weeks into construction. The city said they've had this glitch with about 15% of commercial tech space applications since the launch. Has anyone else run into this with the new portal, and did you find a better way to check your permit status?

Three years ago at a South Congress meetup, I told a founder his idea was just a feature, not a product.

He raised a $2 million seed round last month, proving my gut check was completely wrong and making me question how I evaluate early-stage ideas here in Austin.

Tbh I tried using a local Austin AI startup's API for a client project and it completely failed at scale

Unpopular opinion: The 'move fast and break things' culture here is getting old

I just watched a local startup I know launch a new feature that broke their core service for almost two hours last Friday. In my experience, that kind of sloppy push happens way too often when teams are told to just ship it. How do you build a real business here if your product isn't reliable?

Spent a full week trying to get a simple city permit for our new office

We signed a lease for a small spot on South Congress and needed a basic occupancy permit. The city's online portal kept saying our file was 'in review' with zero updates. I must have called the permit office 15 times, got transferred around, and was on hold for over 30 minutes each time. It finally got approved yesterday after 7 business days for something they said takes 48 hours. Has anyone else hit a wall with Austin's permit system lately?

Our Austin startup's open rate jumped from 12% to 32% after we changed one email subject line word

Swapped 'newsletter' for 'update' in our weekly email and saw the change within a month. What's one small tweak that made a big difference for your local tech company?

A chat with a founder at Cosmic Coffee made me rethink Austin's talent pool

I was talking to a software founder last week who moved her team here from San Francisco about 18 months ago. She said she came expecting to hire senior engineers fast, but found she had to build them up from mid-level talent instead. She argued it's better for Austin in the long run, creating a deeper local bench. I always thought we needed to just keep pulling in big names. Her point about investing in the people already here hit different. What's your take on building vs. buying senior tech talent in Austin?

Tried a fully remote team setup versus a hybrid model for six months

We ran two software teams side by side starting in January, one fully remote and one with two days in the office. The remote team's project finished three weeks faster and their code reviews got better feedback. The big difference was they used a strict rule for daily stand-ups and kept all project notes in one shared doc. Has anyone else in Austin seen better results with one model over the other?

PSA: I stopped cold-emailing Austin startups with generic pitches

For my first year trying to get freelance dev work here, I sent the same basic email to about 50 companies I found on LinkedIn. I got maybe two replies. Then last quarter, I started spending 30 minutes before each email to find a specific project or news item about that company and mention it. My first email doing that got a meeting with a small fintech firm on South Congress. What's the best way you've found to actually get a founder's attention in this city?

Choosing between a downtown Austin office and staying remote for my startup

When we hit 10 people, I had to pick between getting a real office in the Domain area or keeping everyone remote. The office quote was $8,500 a month for a small space, plus all the extra costs like internet and furniture. I chose to stay remote and put that money into better tools and a quarterly team trip instead. It's been six months and our work is just as good, maybe better because people aren't tired from traffic. We meet up at a coffee shop on South Congress every other week for a few hours to talk in person. The saved cash let us hire a part-time bookkeeper, which was a huge help. Anyone else make this choice and find a good way to keep the team feeling connected without a full office?

Spent $3k on a booth at that tech expo last month and it was a total bust

We paid for a 10x10 spot at the Austin Convention Center event hoping to meet local founders. Barely anyone stopped by, and the few who did were just grabbing free pens. Our sales team stood around for two days straight with maybe five real conversations. I think these big generic expos are a trap for small Austin tech firms now. Has anyone actually gotten a solid lead from one of these things recently, or are we all just wasting money to look busy?

Just saw a report that Austin tech job postings dropped 18% last quarter

I was looking through the Austin Chamber's quarterly tech report yesterday, and the number for Q2 really caught me off guard. It showed a clear drop from the previous quarter, which wasn't the trend I expected. Found it on their public data page under 'Tech Talent Indicators'. Has anyone else noticed this shift in hiring around town, or is it just certain types of roles?

Went to a talk at Capital Factory and now I run my meetings totally different

I was at a founder talk at Capital Factory last Tuesday, just grabbing free coffee honestly. The speaker, a CEO from a local fintech, said something simple that hit me. She said 'Never ask your team 'what are you working on' in a meeting. Ask 'what problem are you solving' instead.' I tried it the next day with my dev team of 6 people. The whole vibe changed. Instead of just listing tasks, they started explaining the actual business reasons behind their code. It shifted us from just checking boxes to talking about real value. I've done it for a week now and it feels like we're finally all rowing in the same direction. Has anyone else tried changing up their meeting questions here in Austin and seen a big difference?

Just realized my whole take on Austin's startup scene was off after a talk with a founder at Cosmic Coffee

I was chatting with a founder who just moved her AI company from San Francisco. She said she picked Austin not for the hype, but because she could hire three senior engineers here for the price of one there. I always thought it was all about the cool factor and networking... but her point about real costs hit different. It made me rethink if we're focusing on the right things when we talk about the tech scene here. What's the bigger draw for companies coming in now, the vibe or the actual math?

I was at a startup demo day on South Congress last month and saw a pitch that made me rethink my whole hiring plan.

This founder showed a simple dashboard that tracked how much time her team spent on meetings versus actual coding. The numbers were brutal, like 60% of the week in meetings. She said she cut it down to 20% by making all meetings 25 minutes and banning laptops. I walked out and canceled three standing meetings the next day. My team's output is already up. What's the most wasteful process you've cut from your Austin tech company lately?

Update: That AI hiring tool cost my startup $15k and we got zero hires

We signed up for a new AI hiring platform last quarter, thinking it would cut our tech recruiting time in half. The sales guy promised it would find 'perfect fits' for our Austin software dev roles. We paid $15,000 for a year-long contract. After six months, it sent us over 200 candidates, but not one passed our technical screen. The matches were all wrong for our stack. We're back to old-school networking and referrals now. Has anyone found a recruiting tool that actually works for Austin's specific tech talent pool?

I keep hearing Austin is a great place to start a tech company, but my experience getting a simple city permit for a small office renovation was a 4-month nightmare.

I finally gave up on that downtown Austin co-working space after burning $800

Signed up for a 6 month deal at that new spot on 5th street, thinking it would be great for client meetings. The internet dropped at least twice a week, and the 'community manager' was never around to fix it. Lost a potential client call because of it last month. Anyone know a reliable spot south of the river that doesn't have these issues?

Can we talk about the push for remote work in Austin tech?

I thought forcing everyone back to the office 3 days a week was a bad move, but after seeing my team's project speed drop by half when we went fully remote last quarter, I'm starting to think some in-person time is actually needed for complex work.

Shoutout to the weird Travis County permitting portal that ate a full Tuesday of my life

I spent 9 hours trying to get a simple business license filed because the portal kept rejecting my LLC's EIN, which my accountant said was a common glitch they've seen for months.

DAE think the vibe at Capital Factory's demo day changed how you look at funding?

I was at the Capital Factory demo day last month, and something clicked for me. I saw two founders pitch the same kind of app, but one just talked about their tech and the other told a story about a real problem they saw at a food truck on South Congress. The second one got way more questions and, I heard later, a meeting with a local VC. It made me rethink my whole pitch deck. I used to lead with our algorithm's speed, but now I start with the story of the first client who called us crying with relief. Is that the move now in Austin, or was I just reading too much into one event? What's your take on storytelling vs. hard specs when trying to get local investors to bite?

Pro tip: Austin tech founders, stop pitching your whole life story in the first meeting

I've been in three pitch meetings downtown this week where the founder spent 15 minutes on their personal journey from college. The actual product demo got maybe five minutes. My boss at our VC firm on South Congress literally said, 'I don't need to know you were a barista in 2015, I need to know your burn rate.' It kills the momentum and wastes time we could use to ask real questions. Has anyone else had to gently steer a founder back to the actual business plan?