Y Combinator's Michael Siebel on Startup Success: The Real Challenges and Insights

Michael Seibel, Managing Director and Group Partner at Y Combinator, shares crucial insights into the successes and failures of startups. Drawing from his experience with over a thousand YC companies, Michael debunks common misconceptions about startup ideas and highlights the real reasons why startups fail. He emphasizes the importance of commitment, problem-solving passion, and realistic goal-setting for founders. Michael also discusses the cultural dynamics of the startup world, the role of advisors, and the critical need for a strong support system. Additionally, he shares key advice specific to college entrepreneurs, insights into YC's programs, and answers audience questions on managing work-life balance, utilizing competition, and more. A must-watch for budding entrepreneurs and seasoned founders alike, this talk is packed with practical advice and motivational insight.

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Chapters:
00:00 Introduction and Welcome
00:37 Common Causes of Startup Failure
02:47 The Reality of Startup Excellence
05:59 The Role of Peers and Support Systems
08:32 Understanding the Role of Investors
10:57 Y Combinator Programs for College Students
17:29 Audience Q&A

[DecodeSV]

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[Weensy]

he has such a calming way to explain things

[mmjsj]

Notes if you prefer skimming:

- People often think that startups fail because they have a "bad idea" (whatever that is). But bad ideas don't kill startups. A loss of faith often does.
- Sometimes startups start working quickly, but usually they don't. Founders often lose faith after 18 months of trying, but it usually takes longer.
- Founders should spend more time connecting with users and liking them, genuinely, and thinking about the problem they're trying to solve for them. This attachment to others is what will pull you through the inevitable stress.
- Excellence in startups is very different from excellence in the real world. In most situations, being above average sets you up. It's what gets you into Google or other FAANG companies. But in startups, being above average isn't good enough. You have to be exceptional, extraordinary, orders of magnitude above average.
- The startup community isn't here to support you. Starting a startup is more like trying to be on a sports team. Lots of people want to; very few do. Those that do sacrifice a lot of their life for it. It is their life.
- Be careful about where you get advice. Using your peers isn't going to work, because you need to be far better than your peers. Statistically speaking, most of your peers would fail at this. The vast majority of people on Twitter who give startup advice are bad at startups.
- We have a culture that glorifies investors as heroes, but they're more like accountants or lawyers than "angels". They give you money, not advice. You take their money and use it to change the world. They usually aren't very good mentors unless they've actually gone through the grind themselves.
- Investors help, but founders change the world.
- You don't live within a system, you create new systems. That's far more valuable than writing a check.
- There's too much emphasis put on ideas. Other factors have a much stronger impact on your likelihood of success. One is your cofounders - it's basically like a marriage. Two - your commitment. Are you hedging your bets? Three - your passion. Are you working on something you believe in? Can you and your team commit to making the idea work, even when things aren't looking good?
- Nobody's really qualified to determine what ideas can turn into a good business. YC accepts so many companies not because they're nice, but because they have no idea what will succeed.
- There's a lot of advice written for post-PMF companies, and not much for pre-PMF companies.
- Competition is only an issue for post-PMF companies. The vast majority of startups die before they ever build anything that anyone wants. Competition won't kill you pre-PMF. You should know of it, but it's mostly irrelevant to pre-PMF companies. Most "business" stuff is. Business school trains managers, not startups.
- Founders don't need encouragement. Nobody can teach you to give a shit. It comes from within.
- When people say "we invest in people, not ideas", what they mean is - we invest in evidence of execution. The earlier the stage in the company, the more that evidence has to come from what the founder has done before the startup. The later the stage in the company, the more that evidence has to come from what the founder has done within the startup.
- The biggest risk for investors is giving money to someone who doesn't do anything with it.
- "Execution" doesn't have much to do with revenue. It just means that you've executed by talking to customers, making products, iterating upon feedback - some evidence of progress.
- A lot of founders believe that they can't make progress without money, but this isn't true, especially if you can code.
- Startups don't go from idea to team to money to product to launch to revenue. They go from idea to product to launch to learning to maybe revenue/funding.
- If you're a minority, your opportunity might feel like it's limited by the fact that gatekeepers give Zuckerbergs the benefit of the doubt more than they give minorities the benefit of the doubt. But investors' core motivation is money, full-stop. So if you give them a way to make more money, you'll eventually get a hit. The bias within the startup community isn't organized, it's disorganized and different from the systemic bias you might see in big companies. If you execute, you will get resources.
- Startups are sort of like guerilla warfare. You don't have a lot of resources and you're up against large incumbents with powerful weaponry. But they're slow, they have a lot of taxes to pay, and those taxes present a tactical opportunity. Your job is to find those opportunities and exploit them. When people talk about "unique insight" - this is what they're talking about. What do you understand that they don't see and can't leverage? How can you throw all of your resources into that blind spot in order to exploit it?
- An example of this is Slack. They didn't win by hiring B2B salespeople. Instead, they targeted the individual users and let them carry the tech into enterprises. Most people don't voluntarily use Microsoft software. It's usually forced upon them.

[callmelil]

"Most business schools are not training entrepreneurs, they're training managers" 100% true. Thanks a lot for sharing this with us! 👍

[christiangada]

Wow !! this morning I started doubting my Idea, but now at night I find This. Thanks Decode :D

[baihaocheng]

^Investor helps but founders change the world

[anthonyanurugwo]

Michael soooo proud of you...we await you some day in Africa...Lagos Nigeria precise....You need to seee what opportunity this city holds....still young and

[cherubinth]

Founders change the world, but investors own it.

[AleatoricSatan]

Michael Seibel and Justin Kan must have been such a kickass team.

[GabrielSestrem]

I am a programmer and we are building a powerful software without money.

[thatryanp]

4:16 "five wins out of two hundred"
Michael giving the straight facts

[eliaslouw]

Hi mike you a one of the best if not the best of all thank you

[shanrocksify]

This guy is smart, , , Like google for business

[Lnaks]

"No one can teach you to give a sh*t"

[BobF]

The wisdom in this content is unmatched. A book with related material had a monumental impact on my life. "The Hidden Empire: Inside the Private Worlds of Elite CEOs" by Adam Skylight

[marcoscarlomagno]

Poor guy with the back shirt, he was almost slaping Michael with his hand during the Q&A and couldn't ask his question

[CandyLemon]

I'm moved by this content. A book with a corresponding subject matter was a pivotal moment in my life. "The Hidden Empire: Inside the Private Worlds of Elite CEOs" by Adam Skylight

[ja]

I've witnessed this "worship" first-hand. People in silicon valley give way too much respect to the famous/rich people without realizing that they're idiots like us. Everyone is an idiot, including me. If you aren't Von Neumann, then you probably just got lucky in life.