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Paul, the guy you spoke to afterwards is me :) Jay Liew, the guy who also posted the cofounder spreadsheet on Google Docs that spread like wildfire a few weeks

by jayliew 17y ago

Paul, the guy you spoke to afterwards is me :) Jay Liew, the guy who also posted the cofounder spreadsheet on Google Docs that spread like wildfire a few weeks ago. I do not want to be the stereotypical stubborn child who won't listen (that would be like trying to shoot my way into YC); I completely agree with your reasoning why having a co-founder is best, and I highly respect your analytical skills, but I would like to respectfully assert that you're missing the point. My write up below is not an attempt to get you to agree with me, but to merely understand my reasoning (and perhaps readers here can tell me if I am off-course). My end goal is not to have a "YC" notch in my belt (I don't need a resume stuffer). My end goal is a successful startup that will make $ by creating so much value for everybody (the founders, the investors, the customers) - I want to absolutely maximize the value pie for everybody. And having a co-founder will increase my odds of success. I am not a parent, but here is a generalized statement based on statistics: "Divorce rates in the US is some of the highest in the world, and statistically, children with parents still married fare much better than single parents." This assertion is true, when your sample size of married people is global, and when your sample size is all children who grew up with single and divorced parents in this country or world. The point that I am trying to make is that being a good parent is a choice to the individual. If I was a single parent (fyi, I view my startup as my baby), I will either take my son to soccer practice, or not. I will either spend time reading books at night to her. Or not. I will take the good in with the bad - or I can throw my hands up and say "I'm too busy for this crap, here's a baby-sitter instead". That was all I was saying. I believe in the benefits of a co-founder, but my search has been distracting me from my #1 goal of running my startup; and a co-founder is just means to an end. Just as YC is just means to an end (yes, I plan on applying - which I know I may not get in, but I still plan on succeeding with or without YC - because if my startup fails simply because I didn't get into YC, then I have a bigger problem). Note that this is different from saying "1 in 3 women will have breast cancer" (or whatever the actual number is). Because a perfectly health-conscious woman can get cancer due to pure bad luck. The difference is, being a good parent who will do anything for his child, is an individual entrepreneur's choice. He will either do it, or go watch tv. It's much tougher to say "Damnit, I'm not going to get cancer" (if I'm already a health nut) The other thing I want to mention is your investor bias. An entrepreneur has an only-child, an investor as a portfolio of children. So investors can say, X% of startups die from Y. Therefore I can completely understand when you say, "therefore, I will not bother reviewing with startups with Y". It is logical - you are optimizing your portfolio's success. I understand that statistically there are less single founders like Bezos and Patzer, and there's more cofounders like Woz-Jobs, Hewlett-Packard. Statistically that is true and unrefutable. But using Chaos Theory as an analogy, I speak for any single co-founders applying, I hope you will not write us off as "goners", and that you really look inside of that one person who is trying his hardest and pulling the weight of 2 co-founders today on top of his day job and current responsibilities, before pulling the trigger "you're fired" trigger, Donald Trump style. All said, as an investor, your goal is to optimize your portfolio. My goal is to do anything humanly possible within my means to increase the odds of success, and definitely remove any obstacle, one after another that will keep me from success. And on this one co-founder point, we may disagree on the tactics but the fact is that we do have a common end goal. I respect your choice, and I still very much respect you and want to be in YC. I just hope you understand why I cannot completely agree for the reasons mentioned above. Consider the converse: If I thought that getting into YC wouldn't "move the needle" in helping me get to success, I wouldn't be writing this comment and 3/3/10 would mean nothing to me ;) However - that would also imply that I am indifferent to you, and Jessica, who I first met in person at the Anybots party before the day of the 1st SUS. That is not true, you guys rock, and are people I look up to. So I do care about the people behind YC and I'm not a 1-dimensional robot. You have to admit, it feels good to be benevolent (isn't that YC is built on?) - and I too, wish I could be benevolent in return. I am still continuing my search for a co-founder, while minimizing the distraction as much as I can. It's tough.

paulbaumgart 17y ago
Not sure I understand the next-to-last paragraph, but other than that, it seems like PG is convinced having a good co-founder is so important that focusing on finding one is the best way to maximize your chances for success (ie. achieving your "#1 goal"). Clearly, that's only true in the average case, and if you're convinced you're significantly different from that average, that might well not apply to you. The point about investor bias is spot-on, though I wouldn't say it's something specific to investors- it's just that, without looking deeply into your particular circumstances, the advice with the highest chance of being useful that anyone can give you is precisely for the average case.
- jayliew 17y ago
  In corporate sales (thanks dayjob!), you have the transactional sales and the relationship based sales. Transactional: e.g. used car salesman. The sales guy promises you the world to convince you to hand over a boatload of cash, even if he knows the car is crap. Why? Because after the paperwork is inked and the money is safely in his bank account, he's done with you and moving on to the next guy. Nevermind if the car breaks on the 31st day - just 1 day past the warranty date. Because all the effort is on that single transaction. He could care less about why you actually need a car. Relationship-based: e.g. System integrators, consulting firms. e.g. They sell you a firewall / router / set up your internal network, but it is in their best interest not to screw you over because your lifetime value to them as a customer is greater than the immediate gain (e.g. marking up the hardware or charging ridiculous installation fees). Plus, they want your respect and need credibility so that next time when you need something else, you will go to them first. E.g. Maybe aside from an email solution for your SMB, you now need, a simple internal collaboration tool installed. Granted there are also sleazy relationship-based sales people, but the difference is that it is not as transactional as a used car salesman. The reason why I mentioned that is because I'm not trying to be the jerk who says "gimme all your goodies now now now" and then conveniently forget how I got there when I get there. At the risk of aiming for too lofty of a loooong-term goal - just as Mark Zuckerberg said "these are my people" at the last YC SUS, I <3 startup entrepeneurs and I too, wish that I could one day be in a position to be like Paul Graham. To start a startup that helps other startups. But I realize that in order to do that I need to succeed at my own startup first. pg started YC to help the small guy, and I feel that I should stand up for the even smaller guy amongst the other small guys, since single founders get easily drowned out by the majority of non-single startups. Thanks for the opportunity to clarify.

by jayliew 17y ago

paulbaumgart 17y ago

Not sure I understand the next-to-last paragraph, but other than that, it seems like PG is convinced having a good co-founder is so important that focusing on finding one is the best way to maximize your chances for success (ie. achieving your "#1 goal"). Clearly, that's only true in the average case, and if you're convinced you're significantly different from that average, that might well not apply to you. The point about investor bias is spot-on, though I wouldn't say it's something specific to investors- it's just that, without looking deeply into your particular circumstances, the advice with the highest chance of being useful that anyone can give you is precisely for the average case.

jayliew 17y ago
In corporate sales (thanks dayjob!), you have the transactional sales and the relationship based sales. Transactional: e.g. used car salesman. The sales guy promises you the world to convince you to hand over a boatload of cash, even if he knows the car is crap. Why? Because after the paperwork is inked and the money is safely in his bank account, he's done with you and moving on to the next guy. Nevermind if the car breaks on the 31st day - just 1 day past the warranty date. Because all the effort is on that single transaction. He could care less about why you actually need a car. Relationship-based: e.g. System integrators, consulting firms. e.g. They sell you a firewall / router / set up your internal network, but it is in their best interest not to screw you over because your lifetime value to them as a customer is greater than the immediate gain (e.g. marking up the hardware or charging ridiculous installation fees). Plus, they want your respect and need credibility so that next time when you need something else, you will go to them first. E.g. Maybe aside from an email solution for your SMB, you now need, a simple internal collaboration tool installed. Granted there are also sleazy relationship-based sales people, but the difference is that it is not as transactional as a used car salesman. The reason why I mentioned that is because I'm not trying to be the jerk who says "gimme all your goodies now now now" and then conveniently forget how I got there when I get there. At the risk of aiming for too lofty of a loooong-term goal - just as Mark Zuckerberg said "these are my people" at the last YC SUS, I <3 startup entrepeneurs and I too, wish that I could one day be in a position to be like Paul Graham. To start a startup that helps other startups. But I realize that in order to do that I need to succeed at my own startup first. pg started YC to help the small guy, and I feel that I should stand up for the even smaller guy amongst the other small guys, since single founders get easily drowned out by the majority of non-single startups. Thanks for the opportunity to clarify.