Decide when to hire vs use AI

Decide when to hire versus use AI tools

Solo founders deciding whether to invest in hiring before scaling to a team, when the line between AI-capable and human-necessary work is blurry.

• · Task description you need done
• · Previous attempts with AI tools and outcomes

• · Hire/no-hire recommendation
• · Hiring type if applicable (contractor, part-time, agency)

• · Clear description of the technical problem
• · Understanding of your budget constraints

• · Assumes you can describe tasks clearly; poor briefs make hiring harder, not easier
• · Does not cover IP ownership or legal contract details (defers to separate legal skill)
• · Cannot evaluate developer quality directly; depends on communication and output

• · Core principles grounded in founder experience (cheap-bad-devs cost more than good ones)
• · Decision framework with 4 gates (describe, try AI again, serious attempts count, task type)
• · Five hiring types with cost/use-case matrix
• · Specific examples of what AI handles well (landing page, CRUD, Stripe, auth, UI polish)
• · Specific triggers for hiring (complex integrations, scale performance, data migrations, security, native mobile, infrastructure, maintenance)