Hire one: contract
Ilya, senior React Native contractor
We placed Ilya to build the MVP. It went well enough that Flourish asked him to go permanent, but he wanted to keep contracting. So the next search was for a permanent founding engineer.
Building Flourish's first engineering team.
Pre-seed AI health and fitness coaching app, backed by Giant Ventures.
- 2
- engineering hires
- 1st
- permanent engineer
- Live
- on iOS and Android
The brief
Founder and CTO Julian needed an engineer to build the first version of the app quickly, and then someone to take it through to launch and beyond.
Hire two: permanent
Conan, founding engineer
Conan wasn't applying for jobs; we approached him directly. Before any first conversation, we walked candidates through the MVP so they arrived already understanding the product. Conan wanted something long-term, lived in Barcelona near co-founder Aaron, and had built his own voice-led AI coaching app before.
What made it hard
A rare mix
Someone who could lead a product from scratch and was still hands-on in React Native and native mobile.
Full commitment
Many senior candidates had side projects or their own startups. Flourish needed someone all in.
A pre-seed budget
Equity made up part of the package.
The result
Flourish launched on iOS and Android in February 2026, and Conan is still its founding engineer.
“Nick really took the time to understand our product and vision, which showed in the quality and alignment of the candidates he introduced. I also appreciated the extra effort he made to walk candidates through our MVP before first conversations, which made the process far more efficient.”
Julian SprungFounder & CTO, Flourish
“Working with Nick was a fantastic experience; he made the process of finding a contract and connecting with the founder incredibly smooth and fast.”
Ilya GruReact Native contractor, Flourish