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What We Look for in Founders

paulgraham.com

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Re: What We Look for in Founders

#91

Post by jedberg »

hasenj wrote: post #86

I'm still skeptical about the whole co-founder thing. Sure, maybe if you're building youtube or justin.tv, and you need to talk to investors or talk face-to-face to potential clients or make deals with giant media corporations gasp then you probably can't do it as a single-founder. But, there is a large space of problems that can be solved by a single founder. But I suppose if you're determined enough you won't be bo…

The purpose of a cofounder is not to help alleviate load. It is to have someone tell you no, that your idea/implementation/justification sucks. They question your moves and make you justify them. Having a cofounder keeps you in check and keeps you from straying too far off the successful path.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#92

Post by rexreed »

Is lack of distractions or possessing some financial independence anywhere on the list of what is good for founders? By this I mean -- if there are financial or non-startup distractions, could this be detrimental? Does not having a family to take care of rank more favorably than not? Just askin.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#93

Post by mcyger »

chegra wrote: post #83

It is pretty hard to change who you are at the core. But the thing about it is that you have your own way of succeeding. You see at some point in life, you more than likely have succeeded. Instead of determination, you have passion. Instead of flexibility, you are a perfectionist. Instead of imagination, you can communicate well. Instead of being naughty, you are efficient. Instead of a partner, you are well connecte…

Well said.

There's no one "perfect person" that will succeed, although the article by PG would imply otherwise (since YC only wants entrepreneurs and start-ups that will be successful...hence the application/interview questions).

The key is to use your core strengths to your advantage.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#94

Post by starkness »

Andrew_Quentin wrote: post #77

PG, Aren't you misleading the young by so strongly suggesting that their start up needs a friend. Was it Mark... the Facebook founder who created the empire by himself? Perhaps it is your opinion that friends do better, but to so strongly state it as a requirement aren't you perhaps implicitly disproving any sole founder start up and if so you are, why would you?

Even that Mark had two cofounders: Chris and Dustin. And they were all roommates.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#95

Post by jdavid »

Questions

#Determination " maybe you should ask for a time when you saw something through, something that was tough, and at your core hard to do. basically what was your last marathon?"

# flexibility " when were your basic assumptions challenged, and how did you adapt or over come them? "

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#96

Post by spenrose »

My concern about Paul's vision has always been (2), flexibility. It is my humble belief that you should care what you succeed at, not just that you succeed at something. On this point Paul seems to be leading in the opposite direction from Tim O'Reilly ("work on stuff that matters"), and I wish he would do a 180.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#97

Post by bobf »

Jun8 wrote: post #63
bobf wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought pg's comment on "naughtiness" was interesting, as I was tempted to use a shorter version of the story I'll relate below in response to the "hacked" question, as it was a very recent experience. I ultimately shied away from using it as my answer, as I thought it might be a little socially unacceptable ("naughty"). At Startup School, there was a line of several hundred people waiting for lunch, which consiste…

See, I think that's an example of the "bad hack" because it has the potential of damaging people, e.g. what if I was standing in that line for 15mins ahead of you and because you took that box of pizza, just when my turn comes the pizza runs out (you think it's unlikely? Then you haven't been to the wild world of college-student-after-event-pizza-eating). My definition of a hack is to add value to the an existing sys…

There was a defined number of Startup School attendees, which means the amount of pizza needed is easily calculable (X participants * Y slices each.. maybe + Z "extra, just in case"). From hosting numerous events, I would definitely expect YC to have "how many pizzas do we need for X people" reasonably well figured out. I would think the greater danger is from people eating Y++++ slices each rather than a group of 3-4 sharing a box and having 1-2 slices each. As limedaring mentions below, we also handed out a few slices to others.

To your point of the "better hack", we advocated the "use both sides of the table" for breakfast, but with pizza it is unwieldly because the lids of pizza boxes only open one way. Yes, reconfiguring the tables would have also probably improved things.. but is much more difficult with 25-50 people trying to access the pizza boxes, and no readily available unused tables on hand.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#98

Post by portman »

robg wrote: post #68
pg wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, because in most startups there's a point where things seem hopeless. At that point the startup itself has no power to hold you together, because its expected value is (or appears to be) zero. You need a strong friendship to keep you together. E.g. I know for sure there were lots of times when Rtm thought Viaweb was never going to amount to anything, and only worked on it because I asked him to.

Were Woz and Jobs "friends"? Don't Page and Brin claim explicitly they weren't? It seems more like the shared purpose brought those pairs closer together than where they started or where they would have ended up had they never worked together. That example of Viaweb helps clarify the distinction I'm thinking of. You guys were friends and so worked together despite differing convictions. But what of people who share a…

I don't know about Woz/Jobs, but Page/Brin were definitely friends when they started a company.

They may not have been friends when they started collaborating on their first research project, but at the moment they were "co-founders", they had already become friends.

Re: What We Look for in Founders

#100

Post by access_denied »

brlewis wrote: post #16

The running back metaphor appeals to me. I wonder how far you can take it. Running backs pivot for something that will completely stop them. The fact that getting downfield will take a long time does not make them pivot. Does this analogy make a good rule of thumb for startup pivot decisions?

> The running back metaphor appeals to me. I wonder how far you can take it.

That's an easy one: you can take it as far as the American border outside thereoff nobody knows what a running back actually does.

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