Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Grow the Puzzle Around You

foundersatwork.posthaven.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 57 posts

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#11

Post by extralego »

mrleiter wrote: post #3

First of, thanks for being part of YC and making it such a great place. I've never been there, but the whole spirit is healthy and that I very much appreciate. >I looked at qualities of the applicants my cofounders couldn't see. Did they seem earnest? Were they determined? Were they flexible-minded? And most importantly, what was the relationship between the cofounders like? I second this. People who say soft skills…

Soft skills != being nice

Soft skills most essentially involve communication. “Being nice” is a much wider umbrella which includes reciprocation of many things not limited to: dignity, consideration, morality, mutual respect, agency and comradery. When we treat the former as the whole of the latter, the structure breaks down. It may not be obvious, and the damage might be displaced out of sight, but the point I’m trying to make is there’s nothing “nice” about making that mistake.

(While the success of soft skills will usually depend on other types of skills, “soft skills” nonetheless is essentially limited to interpersonal communication skills.)

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#12

Post by [deleted] »

patkai wrote: post #8

Jeez, how painful to think that she has to explain her role regularly just because she is a woman. My wife and I are both software developers, and recently moved from Helsinki to Berlin, with two kids. If you could see the faces when we tell people how we moved here, "with _her_ job" :D First they look at her, like "does she look the part", and then looking at me, like "what does he really do?" It's actually fun, and…

[deleted]

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#13

Post by erikpukinskis »

Krustopolis wrote: post #10
patkai wrote: post #8

Jeez, how painful to think that she has to explain her role regularly just because she is a woman. My wife and I are both software developers, and recently moved from Helsinki to Berlin, with two kids. If you could see the faces when we tell people how we moved here, "with _her_ job" :D First they look at her, like "does she look the part", and then looking at me, like "what does he really do?" It's actually fun, and…

She didn't say it was because she was a woman, in fact she explicitly says it was because she was the only non-technical cofounder.

I think the issue is that there’s a kind of Jim Crow discrimination if we try to act as if “technical” is a valid filter for whether someone is recognized as making a clear contribution. If women are less likely to make technical contributions, and we only recognize technical contributions, then we’re de facto minimizing crucial contributions of women.

Also, what does “technical” even mean? Why is setting up the legal structure of a company non-technical but writing HTML for the web site is technical?

Sometimes I wonder if non-technical is just a slur.

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#14

Post by jasode »

mrleiter wrote: post #3

First of, thanks for being part of YC and making it such a great place. I've never been there, but the whole spirit is healthy and that I very much appreciate. >I looked at qualities of the applicants my cofounders couldn't see. Did they seem earnest? Were they determined? Were they flexible-minded? And most importantly, what was the relationship between the cofounders like? I second this. People who say soft skills…

>People who say soft skills are dead

Are you sure people actually say that? This struck me as odd because it seems to be the total opposite of what people say. It seems virtually everyone stresses "soft skills" repeatedly.

But I have no proof of this so I just did a quick search of Google's 130 trillion pages to try and get a sense if people out there are really saying that soft skills are useless:

"soft skills are dead": 3 results (and 2 of them happen to be from you in this thread): https://www.google.com/search?q="soft+skills+are+dead"

"soft skills are useless": 7 results : https://www.google.com/search?q="soft+skills+are+useless"

"soft skills are worthless": 4 results : https://www.google.com/search?q="soft+skills+are+worthless"

"soft skills are in demand": 43000 results : https://www.google.com/search?q="soft+skills+are+in+demand"

"soft skills in demand": 94000 results : https://www.google.com/search?q="soft+skills+in+demand"

Also, on HN... In the top 3 threads with "soft skills" in the title, the comments all emphasize the importance of soft skills: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=soft%20skills&sort=byPopularit...

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#15

Post by kumartanmay »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #13
Krustopolis wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She didn't say it was because she was a woman, in fact she explicitly says it was because she was the only non-technical cofounder.

I think the issue is that there’s a kind of Jim Crow discrimination if we try to act as if “technical” is a valid filter for whether someone is recognized as making a clear contribution. If women are less likely to make technical contributions, and we only recognize technical contributions, then we’re de facto minimizing crucial contributions of women. Also, what does “technical” even mean? Why is setting up the lega…

Had it been early years of YC, this post of explaining herself could have made sense. After so many years of being at the helm of YC, who is a nut to doubt her? Or is it that she is still insecure and any indirect reference to her capability, she begins to explain herself. I am speculating and I would be really happy to be proven wrong!

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#16

Post by elvinyung »

jasode wrote: post #14
mrleiter wrote: post #3

First of, thanks for being part of YC and making it such a great place. I've never been there, but the whole spirit is healthy and that I very much appreciate. >I looked at qualities of the applicants my cofounders couldn't see. Did they seem earnest? Were they determined? Were they flexible-minded? And most importantly, what was the relationship between the cofounders like? I second this. People who say soft skills…

>People who say soft skills are dead Are you sure people actually say that? This struck me as odd because it seems to be the total opposite of what people say. It seems virtually everyone stresses "soft skills" repeatedly. But I have no proof of this so I just did a quick search of Google's 130 trillion pages to try and get a sense if people out there are really saying that soft skills are useless: "soft skills are d…

Feels like a pretty typical strawman for socially awkward nerds in the tech industry.

On that note -- has soft skills ever actually been called useless, ever? Even in the earlier decades of Silicon Valley, when (it seemed like) more of the valley was more hacker than entrepreneur?

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#17

Post by brodsky »

closeparen wrote: post #9

If you've spent any time working with stage managers, this isn't counterintuitive at all. Complex human endeavor runs more smoothly with a skilled and dedicated operator systematically clearing the logistical and interpersonal hurdles, creating a conducive space for the "real" work. We've known this for a while in performing arts. I hope call-outs like this will bring tech around to the role’s importance.

this is an incredible, non-obvious parallel. Thank you.

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#18

Post by theoh »

whatshisface wrote: post #7
wallflower wrote: post #4

> The first was the quality that caused my YC cofounders to nickname me "The Social Radar." I was one of those kids that you just couldn’t get anything past. If something seemed off or out of character, I noticed and made inquiries. I was always trying to figure things out based on subtle social cues. > When it came to investing, I had something that my cofounders didn’t have: I was the Social Radar. I couldn’t judge…

You have to watch out for the "water dowser" effect. If you're in front of a group of people who have no ability to check your answers, it's very easy to convince them that you're always right. If a trusted person with good social skills came in and said, "don't work with him he's not earnest," how would the room ever find out whether he was or not? They'd be unlikely to trust him enough to end up in a situation wher…

I wonder how much of the "social radar" reputation came from her just being a woman in a team of men. I don't know the gender breakdown in those days at YC but I'd be concerned that Livingston is elevating a socially ambiguous and widespread female trait — making normative intuitive judgements — into some kind of superpower. Women are socialized to do this, to make judgements of value based on scant information. Men, in contrast, especially engineers, tend to stick to reliable, formal knowledge.

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#19

Post by kkotak »

Thanks Jessica for that wonderful and candid post. I've applied for YC once a while back but didn't get in. I think many founders who don't have access to YC get bitter and start thinking it's a clan and only certain type of people (Elite schools, etc.) get in.

I think the problem, as you rightly pointed out, is that a lot of entrepreneurs are not that at all. They want to start a company and do a me-too venture just to ride the 'Sold to XYZ' train.

No one likes the test or to be judged by others and resent being rejected. When we talk of emotional intelligence, I think it's about knowing what you want to and can do, and allowing your peers or mentors to help you get there. I've met many YC alums and do see a certain set of qualities that unite them - I suspect those are the ones you picked up on :)

Thanks to you and the YC team for creating a wonderful new pathways to fulfillment for budding entrepreneurs.

Re: Grow the Puzzle Around You

#20

Post by noonespecial »

whatshisface wrote: post #7
wallflower wrote: post #4

> The first was the quality that caused my YC cofounders to nickname me "The Social Radar." I was one of those kids that you just couldn’t get anything past. If something seemed off or out of character, I noticed and made inquiries. I was always trying to figure things out based on subtle social cues. > When it came to investing, I had something that my cofounders didn’t have: I was the Social Radar. I couldn’t judge…

You have to watch out for the "water dowser" effect. If you're in front of a group of people who have no ability to check your answers, it's very easy to convince them that you're always right. If a trusted person with good social skills came in and said, "don't work with him he's not earnest," how would the room ever find out whether he was or not? They'd be unlikely to trust him enough to end up in a situation wher…

It's also impossible to know if she's "set right".

It's not enough to never pick a "bad" team if you're also turning away 9 out of every 10 good ones.

Post reply on HN