How Vin Bui became engineer #1 at Nowadays — and started treating it like his own company

Vin Bui was on a leave of absence from Cornell when he found Nowadays. He had just left his own YC company from the Winter 2025 batch and was back on campus, not enrolled, scrolling through Work at a Startup looking for what came next. A dog logo caught his eye. "It felt kind of childlike in a way, and I think that unique taste is what originally attracted me," he says. Then he looked at the website. "I was like, okay, this website needs a lot more work done. And I really like seeing companies that have things I know I could fix."

He sent a message to co-founder Anna, went through the interview process, and became the first full-time hire at Nowadays (S23), a San Francisco company that uses AI to plan corporate events end to end — from offsites to vendor negotiations.

Acting as the technical founder

Vin join the company as employee number one, and the first technical hire. "As engineering hire #1, you're kind of like a technical founder," he says. "Everything I do is exactly what I would've done if I were the technical founder of my own company."

That meant building engineering from the bottom up, setting up processes, leading SOC 2 compliance, handling security, and becoming the main point of contact for anything touching engineering or IT. He talked with heads of engineering at other companies to figure out what good looked like, then built it himself. "No mentorship exists, right? You have to mentor yourself."

Why he said yes

Vin evaluated Nowadays the way a founder would evaluate a co-founder. He looked at two things:

• Could he have impact? During the work trial, he immediately saw what the codebase needed. He had the background to fix it and knew he could build something meaningful.
• Could the founders make the company succeed? Having been a YC founder himself, he watched how Amy and Anna worked — how they presented the company, attracted customers, and communicated their plans. "I was like, okay, these two know exactly how to present our company. And just working with them, I understood how competent they are and that I could rely on them."

He also asked them directly about their plan for the future. "The way they answer and the way they sound tells you whether they've actually thought it through. I really like people who think."

Building AI voice — and everything else

When asked about the coolest thing he has built at Nowadays, Vin lights up about AI voice: building systems that call hotels and negotiate with them on behalf of clients. "Voice is very similar to how humans work, so it's very interesting to see how close AI can get to us."

His daily setup reflects someone who cares about craft. He uses Ghostty for his terminal, Claude Code CLI over any GUI, and orchestrates different AI models depending on the task. "I'm not the type to use the biggest model for everything. Using the right model for the right thing matters a lot." He writes his own custom skills and workflows, tests every new model that comes out, and browses Twitter to find tools worth trying. "I love building my own workflow."

At a big company, he says, you might spot something great for the product but can't act on it. At Nowadays, it's different. "Oh, I observed something and I have a great idea — let me just build it right away."

From builder to the person the team bounces ideas off of

Nowadays is now an 11-person team, and Vin's role has evolved. He still builds, but he has become the first person teammates come to when they have a big idea they haven't fully thought through. "I wouldn't call myself a manager, because I don't manage anyone. I trust them and give them full autonomy." He triages tricky problems, then hands them off to the right person to go deeper.

He is also quick to point out something that surprised him about startup life: you can have a life outside of work. "Amy has a kid, and Anna loves exercising and has been running marathons. We're a health-first type of team, and we care about each other." He values that the founders work hard and still make time for families and friends.

Who would thrive here

Vin is direct about what early startup life demands. "You need to be able to trust yourself, because the main person who can help you is yourself. You need to be self-reliant and constantly learning on your own." But it should also feel good. "You spend so much time with them that it should feel like being back in college, working on something with your friends."

If you want the intensity of a founding role without investor talks, if you want to pick your own problems and ship fast, and if you want to work with people you would genuinely spend time with outside of work — Nowadays is hiring.