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Startup founders, how old are you?

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#11

Post by Harj »

python_kiss wrote: post #5
pg wrote: post #4

The average YC founder is about 25. The range so far has been from 19 to (I think) 33.

Paul, is the YC demographic a good representative of the average startup founder's age? Judging from your articles, I sense that there is a certain, though justified, bias towards funding younger startup founders. This is the excerpt I am referring to: "The other reason it's hard to start a company before 23 is that people won't take you seriously. VCs won't trust you, and will try to reduce you to a mascot as a cond…

I'm a current YC company founder and I'm 21. I see the points pg makes in that essay you quote but I can't say I've let them apply to me personally. I have someone working for our company at the moment who is 33, in fact I don't think I've ever worked with someone who is the same age or younger than me (my co founder is 23). I've never had a problem with it personally, in fact I probably prefer it as I can generally learn more from more older than I am.

To make that situation work I think you need to believe strongly in two things:

1) Being a good leader does not mean being the smartest/most knowledgeable person in your company. It means being able to spot the smartest people and make them work together and learn from each other. That's not as simple as it sounds

2) You MUST believe 110% that age is a completely irrelevant metric when determining the "smartness" of a person. I don't care if someone is 20 years older than I am - if they haven't done a start-up then that puts me ahead of them in respect to running a start up. They may be an infinitely better coder/designer/whatever than I am but not a better startup founder.

The second reason is why I ditched my career as an attorney to be a start up founder. I don't intend on letting my income be determined by the number of years I've been sitting behind a desk.

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#12

Post by omarish »

python_kiss wrote: post #5
pg wrote: post #4

The average YC founder is about 25. The range so far has been from 19 to (I think) 33.

Paul, is the YC demographic a good representative of the average startup founder's age? Judging from your articles, I sense that there is a certain, though justified, bias towards funding younger startup founders. This is the excerpt I am referring to: "The other reason it's hard to start a company before 23 is that people won't take you seriously. VCs won't trust you, and will try to reduce you to a mascot as a cond…

From the front page:

"We care more about how smart you are than how old you are, and more about the quality of your ideas than whether you have a formal business plan."

Perhaps the question should be: How many startups have you been a part of?

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#13

Post by ed »

python_kiss wrote: post #2

In my opinion, startup founders hit mid life crisis in their early 20s. Considering Paul's influence on YCombinator, I am guessing that is the age group most of us belong to. So go ahead and share with us your age. I just turned 22 today :)

I also agree with this observation, but it's clearly an unrealistic expectation that we should all be accomplished and nearing retirement by the time we're 30.

I'm a 22 year-old learning animal. I expect to get my ass handed to me every time I deal with someone my senior; given the experience I've had with my first start-up, I've found this to be par for the course.

While I believe that I have it in myself to build the foundation for a highly profitable company, I also expect that my ability to build great companies will only improve with age.

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#14

Post by benhoyt »

25, and my co-founders are 23 and 32.

Relatedly: two of us have wives and families, which does make things more difficult financially and time-wise. Do any other founders have families? Do you work on the startup full-time? How do you fund yourselves?

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#15

Post by davidw »

benhoyt wrote: post #14

25, and my co-founders are 23 and 32. Relatedly: two of us have wives and families, which does make things more difficult financially and time-wise. Do any other founders have families? Do you work on the startup full-time? How do you fund yourselves?

I don't know how it'll work out, but my wife and I are considering the idea of "wife's full time job as funding", in the sense that if she has a good job, and we can get by on her salary, then I'm free to work on some things of my own.

In some ways, I think it's nice to be married as it gives me a certain stability that I didn't have before.

Edit: BTW, I'm 31. I actually feel like it's the right time for me to try something of my own. I feel like I have a better vision of more things than I did when I was younger. I don't feel 'old' though, and we don't have kids (yet).

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#17

Post by jwecker »

python_kiss wrote: post #2

In my opinion, startup founders hit mid life crisis in their early 20s. Considering Paul's influence on YCombinator, I am guessing that is the age group most of us belong to. So go ahead and share with us your age. I just turned 22 today :)

Heh, funny this should come up now. I'm turning 29 tomorrow. Go Marchites.

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#18

Post by jwecker »

benhoyt wrote: post #14

25, and my co-founders are 23 and 32. Relatedly: two of us have wives and families, which does make things more difficult financially and time-wise. Do any other founders have families? Do you work on the startup full-time? How do you fund yourselves?

I have a family also.. Y'all will think I'm totally nuts, but I'm a polyphasic sleeper ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyphasic_sleep ). Altogether I sleep about 2.5 hours a day, which means I can have a 15 hour work day (at night) and still have 6+ hours at just the right times to be with my family and do personal things etc. I have my wife's 100% support though, and that makes all the difference (I won the support by cleaning the kitchen at night, of course).

In some ways I miss the freedom of being a little younger and single- being able to drop absolutely everything and move somewhere, knowing you'll be able to take care of yourself at the very least no matter what. On the other hand, there's a certain stability in your life that comes from being married and from having children. It can really be an anchor when times are difficult. It also usually forces you to take a lot more realistic view of your potential startup. Will this really produce revenue? Am I really covering my bases? etc.

Re: Startup founders, how old are you?

#19

Post by jwecker »

I was watching the "secret YC video" that was posted the other day. You could see some older people and a few who looked quite young. But you really had to look for it, because what you really saw was a bunch of geeks. And I mean that in the best possible sense.
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