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> In March, we submitted our application, and kinda forgot about it. > Two months later we got an email saying that a partner would like to speak to us. This
by slap_shot 7y ago
> In March, we submitted our application, and kinda forgot about it.
> Two months later we got an email saying that a partner would like to speak to us.
This is a tangent, but I want to share something about my YC interview experience for anybody ever in this position.
I filled out my application in February for the NYC interviews. They passed on me for the early NYC interviews, but ~2 months later I got an email for Mountain View interview.
During my interview, I was asked what my revenue was two months ago, and what it was last month. When I gave my answers it created immediate disarray between the three interviewers.
I walked through my numbers and could tell something was visibly wrong, but time was ticking and I had to steer back to the product, vision and growth.
When I got my rejection email, the lead-in reason was that the revenue wasn't clear (and to clarify, we are doing VERY well with revenue growth).
A bit perplexed, I went back to my application and realized what had happened. The YC application asks for "what was your revenue last month, two months ago, three months ago, etc)"
The partner was trying to get me to talk about what caused a 100% revenue spike (and again, we're not talking about small revenue here) between February and March. But when filling the answers out in February, those questions are anchored to December and January. That spike was just onboarding customers.
As I personally had to live through the hell of onboarding these customers from December to January, it never occurred to me that he was asking about that spike while looking at my "last month" and "two months ago" revenue.
I read my application a lot the week leading up to my interview. It never occurred to me change my answers to realign with the two month gap between when I filled it out and when it was accepted. I'm not sure I would even do that now, knowing what happened.
So the upshot is this: if you fill out your YC application well in advance, be prepared to speak to your financials (and company as a whole) both as are they are today, but also as they appear in your application, because the answer to "what was your revenue last month" is different depending on whether the partner is referring to your application, or the last calendar month.
- roymurdock 7y agoWhy didn't the partners immediately ask you to clarify the discrepancy between the numbers you stated on your app and the numbers you were telling them? Is there not enough time to have a bit of a back and forth?
- slap_shot 7y agoWe did, in a round-about way. I oversimplied the conversation in the OP for the sake of the point I was making. I wrote a in depth essay about the whole experience shortly afterward while it was fresh in my mind. I'll likely publish it as a blog because I think it addresses quite a few things in a YC interview that I hadn't heard/thought of during my prep (and I've read all the prep blogs that have been written).
- SilasX 7y agoThat seems like it was a failure of the interviewer to ask the right (or any?) clarifying questions.
- slap_shot 7y agoPossibly, but the onus is on the applicant to drive through things like this, not the interviewers. Again, nobody in the room had the luxury of understanding what was happening at the time. Hopefully my experience can help others.
- Traster 7y agoIt's pragmatic advice for both sides - I would expect the interviewers to be doing lots of these interviews so it's something I would expect them to be familiar with.
- SilasX 7y agoNah, there's definitely an onus on VCs not to miss out on a super hot startup because they mixed up two months because of a bad comparison of two times expressed in relative terms.
- gamblor956 7y agoIt sounds like you're better off without YC at this point. The only thing they can offer you now is to take 7% of your equity off your hands for not providing anything you need.
- slap_shot 7y agoThat's not fair to say, and that wasn't the point of my post. I'm just reminding anybody who fills the application out in advance that the partners are looking at an application from two months ago. The financials are actually the easy part to reconcile - for most companies, the product growth that happens in two months should be the delta you're trying to close in that conversation (it was, for me).
- gamblor956 7y agoI'm not sure why you're taking that as a negative--not needing YC's money is a good thing. If you're growing at the rate described then what exactly are you hoping to get out of YC that you couldn't get from networking without giving up 7% of your equity?
- slap_shot 7y agoI'm just saying it isn't fair to say that I would have gotten nothing from YC - I'm sure it's an invaluable experience and it was genuinely and amazing opportunity to even have the chance to interview with them. And I do a agree it's a good thing - the YC program I interviewed with began June 3. From the day of the interview to June 3, we 6Xed our revenue. Trust me, I'm wasn't the least bit discouraged by a rejection.
- jacquesm 7y agoThe obvious solution is to use absolutes 'December 2018' rather than relatives 'seven months ago'.