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I like Michael's take that the real value in a founder is their ability to recruit the right team. What I don't think was said explicitly here is that typically
by oooyay 3y ago
I like Michael's take that the real value in a founder is their ability to recruit the right team. What I don't think was said explicitly here is that typically technical people are progressively marginalized as the business grows. We get some harrowing stories where that doesn't happen, but I don't think that's the standard story. Like they allude to, it's a story of what the people who handle the money and investments value.
Context: Michael is a non-technical founder from Justin.tv and Twitch.
- michaelmior 3y agoI'm confused what is harrowing (acutely distressing or painful as Merriam-Webster says) about stories where technical people are not marginalized.
- oooyay 3y agoTypically stories I hear where technical people maintained equity it was through a lot of maneuvering. It wasn't given to them by the merits of their accomplishments.
- michaelmior 3y agoFair point. That makes sense :)
- bomewish 3y agoI was also puzzled. Thanks for asking and thanks for clarifying.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- choppaface 3y ago> typically technical people are progressively marginalized as the business grows I know three YC technical co-founders who were ousted by their CEOs, and a justintv alumn who got nothing from the follow-on exits. When YC says “you need a technical co-founder” they mean it like you need a disposable lawyer. The essay here is about targeting growth and flipping, not high-performance teamwork.
- jjeaff 3y agoThis does seem to be the pattern. I was a technical cofounder in one startup (not YC), even though I do have the chops and experience as a startup CEO. You have to focus so much on the tech and tech hiring early on that you are left out of a lot of the deal making and fund raising. It seems to slide you over into the same bucket as early employees pretty quickly.
- dontupvoteme 3y agoWe're (probably) rapidly shifting to a reality where your biggest value will be Agentifying as many things as you can. Even if it's mediocre, it's basically free, and has almost no costs. Compare that to the incalculable potential switching costs of us meatbags and our many non-linearities.
- Satam 3y agoHmmm, an extremely interesting thought! Basically, agentifying might be the next programming. Do you have a guess how that would play out or how likely that might be? It seems like the main blocker here would be if the agents remain relatively weak in pure reasoning.
- dontupvoteme 3y agoI have no clue how it will play out, but Autogen looks like it's going down the right path + has MS behind it. I am able to get some pretty nice ideas out of LLMs by gaslighting them into larping as tenured professors at <insert good university for subject here>. I haven't really tested yet if using actual people's names helps or hurts.
- dumbfounder 3y agoIt still needs to be scaled and maintained and understood, and that is probably best done by a technical co-founder.
- j45 3y agoAlso they notice yc applications that are taking advantage of tech co-founders or tech team builders with unfair equity structure.