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Not to knock on the group of companies, but I tend to agree. I think the larger the YC cohorts get, the more it becomes evident that the interview/selection pro
by jeffmould 11y ago
Not to knock on the group of companies, but I tend to agree. I think the larger the YC cohorts get, the more it becomes evident that the interview/selection process is heavily weighted towards the team and not the product. My take is that they are playing the odds game. With a bigger cohort they can risk more on the team instead of focusing on the product. The theory being that if they select 120 companies, the chances of having a few unicorns is increased. The smaller the cohort, the more they have to look at the product so the risk is minimized that none of the companies are unicorns.
With that said, I completely agree that I would like to see them return to smaller batch sizes. I think the larger cohorts almost give an assembly line feel to the process. Again, not diminishing the accomplishment of any of the companies, but I think the larger cohorts is almost doing a disservice to the founders.
- mkohlmyr 11y agoI agree they are betting on teams. Teams that are able to do "something". I guess I would prefer to see them take on a smaller number of teams and encourage them to go after bigger visions with more seed capital behind them. As I think about it more it seems to me that vision is really the problem, and maybe some of the teams have a vision that is limited by their experiences and surroundings.
- jeffmould 11y agoYep. The problem they may start running into with putting all the eggs in one basket with the team approach, is it can lead to a potential misconception about the program as a whole. Investors have favored YC companies because of the quality of the program and companies it is able to product. If the quality starts to go down with products, it hsa the potential to hurt better companies coming out of a cohort.