YouSaid · the spoken record

Jessica Livingston

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2024-06-27
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2024-06-27
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  1. “But, like, what I really want to know about you is on the release that you sent or on the instructions for this podcast, you said, There might be some edge cases where your podcast isn't good enough to go out. We just want to warn you. And like all I could think of was like, what prompted that? There has to be a story of what prompted that. No one else would pay attention to that, but I'm just so curious. It's like, it's so weird. I'm just a weird person like this.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Dalton's Oh, good old. That's awesome. Yeah, it was really good. I really like, I learned a lot from it. I love listening to Dalton.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “I don't know. I really don't know. This is why I think I'm going to be a bad guess because I can't give practical, I can't give a practical understanding. I mean, I don't really think I can't say other people in my family are like that. And I can't say that it was part of my upbringing. I just notice these things. I don't know. I mean, I should be paying attention to other things, but I'm not. But I'm paying attention to this. I'll give you an example. With you. So Looked up your bio to read a little bit about you, and I loved the Dalton Caldwell podcast. I listened to that.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Frightening how much time I wasted, but I just was genuinely interested in it and what drives people and why did this happen? And I don't know if I ever noticed I did this, but it was just, my point is, it's always been a part of me. And I definitely notice and have an aversion to like phony people. I always have. I've never been one to fall for like someone who's super phony and like tried to have him as a friend or anything. I just can tell and ugh, I hate it.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Paul used to always call me detective livingston before I was a social radar. I was Detective Livingston. Like I cannot help myself noticing weird things like just dumb things. Like if Paul had on a yellow t-shirt and then an hour later came in with a blue t-shirt, I'd be like, why do you have a blue t-shirt on? Like, I can't, I have to understand what happened in that hour where that t-shirt is different. You know, I just or people's like what their relationships, what drives them. I was always like this. And I think it goes back to my childhood. Like I spent hours and hours on the phone with people, with my girlfriends, like dissecting situations and then all through high school and college. I mean, the amount of time we wasted, like discussing social matters with people and boys and things like that, it was just.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Well, it's because you don't have a lot of data. If someone is just applying with an idea, you have very little data. You can look at where they want to college, what have they built in the past. That's always a great predictor of their ability. And so on YC's application, we ask them what project have you worked on before or whatever. But it's really hard to tell when you're the first investor.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Relentlessly resourceful. I mean, that's sort of Paul wrote a whole essay on that. I mean, every founder is different. I never try to say, oh, this person doesn't have this. I'm not going to fund them. You always have to, everyone's different. But I mean, you're an investor. I'm curious, do you, I mean, do any of these things surprise you? Do you care about these things too?”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Just to start the startup and don't have any history, that massive red flag. Sometimes it works out, like in the case of Dropbox, Drew and Arash, you know, both went to MIT, but I think they didn't know each other before they started Dropbox. And it worked out. But most of the time, it doesn't.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Died or had near death experiences because the co founders didn't get along or broke up. It just happens all the time. And so that's why I think during interviews, I was desperately trying to search for any clues that the co-founders didn't get along. Or if they like blatantly contradicted each other. But you could also tell if they were answering, you know, finishing each other's sentences, you know, like I love co-founders that have a history together, either they went to school together, they went to college together, worked together, maybe their siblings, because when you have a long-term relationship, you trust each other and you know each other's weaknesses and you have the same, you're usually on the same page, you know, with your aspirations and everything. It's really scary when two founders get together.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “And you need that, like you sort of need that desperation. Like I have to make this startup succeed because it's my job, you know, not like, oh, I'll just stay at Google. You need that. And we found that founders who weren't leaving their jobs, it was just not working out. Or like that co-founder would always wind up leaving the company because they didn't want to actually leave their job. And, you know, that's fine. There are people that can't leave their jobs for financial reasons. That's fine. You just shouldn't be starting a startup if you're not going to be prepared to leave your job. So that's the leaving of the job thing. And the co-founders getting along, I mean, oh my. I spent a lot of my time at Y Combinator when I was there all the time, full-time. You know, mediating co-founder disputes. And so many startups.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “We all know how hard startups are, but I think you don't really know how hard it is until you actually do it. A lot of people would start a startup still having a job at Google or wherever, and they do it on the side, because I do recommend if people are just getting started and don't want to raise money yet, you know, starting it on the side is a great way to get going. But at some point you have to commit. You have to burn the boat because we found that founders who were still getting a paycheck and health insurance wants to go and got tough they did not quit their job.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “And by the way, one of the things we do to help people gain more confidence is to make them believe that their startup is a great investment to help them create a startup that truly is possibly going to make money or at least worth being a good bet. That's the thing. Early stage, the best you can offer is like, I might not succeed, but I'm definitely a good bet. You know, we help them with their product, we help them with their ideas, and we help them that by demo day they can get up on stage and legitimately say, we're a good bet, and here's why. Let me tell you about our idea. And so we definitely help with confidence.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Confidence is good. You definitely want confidence. I mean, it's hard to I think you can see it when you experience it like someone you can someone who's confident in answering your questions but isn't defensive there's definitely a difference and I don't know this is why I'm saying it's sort of hard to articulate these things But confidence means you can say I've thought about that and I don't know the answer Like that's confidence you know and they'll say but here's what I do to try to figure it out here are my plans to address that yeah confidence like is I should have put that up front because that's very important especially when it comes to fundraising you got to have you you cannot go into an investor meeting lacking confidence you can come into YC's interview lacking confidence but we will then help you in the next three months to gain more confidence”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Easy money. And it wasn't because they cared about fashion. It wasn't because, oh, I have, you know, a daughter who's really into fashion and I've seen this need. It was just like they made up the idea, you know? And that is not earnest. That is not authentic to me”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “It means being like sort of humble about, you know, and if you get asked a question in the interview and you don't know the answer, they say, you know, I don't know the answer to that. I'd have to think about it. Or I don't know the answer. I've given it some thought and here's what I have come up with. And they're just honest about things and they're not trying to sort of do whole smoke and mirrors thing, which we've definitely gotten people like that that avoid the question or doing it for the wrong reasons. I mean, yeah, I remember there were just, there was one group that were like 45-year-old men and they were building an app for like teenage teenagers in fashion. And I remember just thinking, we were asking them, why have you chosen teenagers in fashion? And it was so clear that they thought they could make.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Earnestness is like one of the most important Ernest, sort of to me, is bucketed with authenticity. And to be a successful startup founder, you have to care so much about the problem you're trying to solve, the users you're serving, and being earnest about it is so key to success. I mean, there are so many wannabe founders, so many people doing it because it's cool or they think, you know, this idea is cool, but they don't really deep down have what it takes. And I think we always try to fund earnest people.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “They might pivot a little bit. They might pivot a little in terms of the actual solution. They might be trying to solve a problem in the first attempt doesn't really work. I haven't mentioned earnestness, though.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “And you have to convince investors to fund you, and you have to convince users to use your product and all this stuff. So it does help being charismatic, definitely.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “I hate using the word charisma because there are a lot of charismatic people who are full of baloney and are just doing a startup because it's a cool thing to do now. And I wouldn't want anyone to get fooled by charisma. There has to be some substance behind that charisma. Of course, we all love talking to more charismatic people than less. And I certainly talk to my fair share of totally uncharismatic people, but sometimes they're really good founders too. You know, if they know what they're doing and care about the user and are fixing a problem that they have a deep connection to. So I don't want to say someone whose charismatic, but it definitely helps because, as you know, as a founder, you have to do a lot of sales and you have to recruit people.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “It's doing really, really well. And I remember that one I definitely had to convince. I mean, not that Paul, Robert, and Trevor didn't like them, but I think they really didn't think the idea was that great or just sort of where I was like, we have to fund them.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “Okay, when Eddie Anne Darshan applied, they were not doing the sneaker company. They were doing this group sort of book a group dinner at a restaurant with people you don't know as a way to meet new people. And for some reason, I loved the idea because I thought maybe it could be like a secret dating, like a Trojan horse for dating sort of site. But I really loved the two founders. And one of the reasons, again, they had this passion about their idea, but they had worked, they had had like this cream puff company before that they had run and they just told these stories about how hard it was and they all this stuff and I for some reason just thought these are hustlers these guys are scrappy they're gonna make this succeed and they didn't make that company succeed but they pivoted and made goats succeed”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “What they're working on might not work, but I feel like it's so worth the bet based on these founders. And that happened, there were definitely a couple other of our most successful companies that I clearly felt that way about. You just feel like they know what they're talking about. They've thought about the problem. They're not solving this problem because it's sort of the problem du jour or fun and exciting like some are very unsexy problems. Like, you know, when Parker Conrad applied with Xenophones, you know, unsexy HR stuff, benefit stuff. But he knew how broken it was and was trying to fix it. And I love stories like that. You know, there's one story in terms of the one time I did sort of persuade the rest of the group to fund someone was, do you know the company? Goat, the sneaker”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “I mean, the only interesting thing as it relates to being the social radar is that there were just some interviews that I remember because I just thought this is great. Like these founders are so good. I'm totally convinced.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “No, I think we all liked him. We all liked him. But I remember saying we have got to, I just remember being like, we have got to fund these guys. I don't know about the idea. Maybe they'll change their idea. Who knows? But they seem really great. They just, again, the energy level and the passion with which they spoke about their experience, you know, hosting, because they've been around struggling but had been a company with an idea for, you know, a little while before they applied to YC, we were there, basically their Hail Mary, their last resort for them. And so they could tell us about their story about how they hosted the people at a conference. And there was definitely some magic to it, which was convincing.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “I don't think Paul and I looked in his backpack and us. I think there was definitely some pressure on Joe not to show us the cereal boxes. I think Nate was really down on that, especially. And I think they were walking out the door and they're like, hey, we just brought you a little something. I think Joe did pull it out. And we had an extra minute or so around the cereal boxes. That's how I heard about the glue gun story and everything. But I think Joe had been reluctant, but he did it at the end. And I think it was a good call.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “Oh, yeah, that's part of the story. And they had to keep driving to talk to Paul again and find out that they were accepted. Oh, yeah. It was just a crazy interview.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “It was definitely a whole crazy story, and how Paul called them to accept them and the They were on the 280 or something, or the 101, and the reception went down. And so he didn't hear if they were accepted or not. Did you tell that”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “In fact, it's a famous part of the story. Like, we hated their idea, and Paul tried to get Brian and Joe and Nate to change it. So we didn't even like the idea, but I remember specifically they brought at the end, Joe brought out these like the cereal boxes, the Obama O's and Captain McCain's or whatever. Yeah, Captain McCain's. And they were saying that They had to, they went to some Costco or something and bought off brand cheerios and off-brand cap and crunches, took them out of the box, put them in this new box, glue gunned it shut, and I just thought, oh my God, these guys are really like going to great lengths for this. And for some reason, Make this company succeed. And even though we were skeptical about the idea, I mean, I think we definitely made the right bet on the founders. And it was just very clear in that interview.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “Okay, because that was definitely one I'll never forget. That was one that was clear. The founders were really good. The market had just crashed, basically, with all the banks going out of business and everything. And so we were only funding startups that we felt had like really scrappy founders and could be cockroaches, meaning could live off of very little amounts of money or could charge customers and make money. And we didn't fund that many people in that winter 09 batch. So we're being very strict with ourselves, very disciplined about things. And the Airbnb guys came in and I just remember they had a contagious amount of energy. They just had an energy about them, the way that they talked about their product, which was crazy at the time, staying in someone's, you know, bed or air bed.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “That. A loved one I'd find someone sort of showcased that they'd make something happen no matter what. Like they're scrappy, they're hustlers. I remember, can I tell the story about the Airbnb interview?”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “A janky version on the web, and they were begging for this to be on the web. And finally, the founder said, oh, I see, you know, what most people want this for. You have to be open-minded to see what direction really is what your users want. And so if you find someone is defensive, usually they're not open-minded. The other thing is that the best founders will want to learn from other people and listen to other people. I mean, you talk to the Collison brothers and say something that they ask you a question. They are listening to your answer. Like so many founders think, oh, I can't learn from anyone, but the best founders are always listening and having spirited debates about things. I mean, that's part of the process. And so I think when someone's defensive, it's just a bad sign. Yeah. So I would look for that.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “Several things. First of all, being defensive is really bad if you're a startup founder because you're always going to get people who question you. And it's your job to sort of educate them if it's a new area, if you're doing something presumably pretty new, you're always going to have people who question it or say that product's already out there. Why is yours better? You have to educate them. You don't want to be defensive about it. Also, a lot of times the first idea isn't bang right on the right idea. And you have to be open-minded and maybe adjust it in a certain direction. The famous like PayPal story, how it started off being, you know, the Palm Pilot, you know, or money transfer and money transfer between the Palm Pilots or whatever. And then all the customers were like using.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. “And the other founder put his arm in front of him and said, I'll answer that question. It was just so weird that he wouldn't let his co-founder speak. We'd have situations where we'd call people like hackers in a cage where it's kind of obvious there'd be like a business founder, business person who had clearly convinced a programmer to join the team They were given the programmer was given like very little equity and just we called them like programmers in a like hackers in a cage and Sometimes that works out. I'm not saying it doesn't, but I'd always try to observe like, okay, does this hacker in a cage have any like say in the company the direction of the product, that sort of thing, because the programmer needs to have opinions, right?”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. “That was always a bad sign. Always a bad sign. The best founders would say, you know, gosh, I have thought about it. And here's what I figured out. Or they'd just have this almost a tennis match and a conversation rather than closing up and feeling like, oh, this person's interrogating me. You could just sort of the open-mindedness, the flexible-mindedness of people was really important. I'd get really excited about domain expertise. I mean, like my co-founders, we all like loved that. If someone was fixing their own problem in a broken industry, we loved that. Definitely I'd look for co-founder relationships. And again, I'm not saying I was always right, but you could tell if, you know, one founder, I'll give a story. One founder once we asked a question and one person started to respond.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. “Move to Silicon Valley? What are their current shareholders? Is like 90% of their company already owned by someone else? They're all these weird things that we like to just flag and we wouldn't like necessarily not fund someone because of them, but it's just more data, right? So that was in the application that I'd looked through all of those. But in the interview, I definitely was sort of one thing I remember I would always look for was when you'd have a conversation with us, a lot of times Paul especially, but Robert and Trevor would really be getting right into the idea and questioning you and how do you know this and what about this and if a founder would get defensive?”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  36. “There's looking for in the application, and then there's looking for in the interview. And now we have software that looks for all of the red flags in the application that I used to do by hand. In the application, I'd look for just weird things. Like, was there like a huge gap in the equity allocation? Like, did one founder have 99% and one founder have 1%? That's weird. I'd want to dig in on that. That doesn't feel right. You know, are they going to quit their job? Are they going to...”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  37. “And rooted for one another and made introductions for each other. And I think it's a big part of our Y Combinator community now.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  38. “Life's too short, you know? Life's too short. And I wanted a nice, I wanted to be able to work with these founders. And as it turns out, it was sort of important early on in weeding out explicit assholes because that was the basis of our Y Combinator community, which is now thousands of founders. Now, of course, all the founders aren't all, you know, running their company anymore, but most, I would say like most all of the founders bring something useful and valuable to the table. So if you ask a question on book face, on our, you know, forum for founders, someone is going to be there to help you. And it's amazing. And that all started very early on there was this culture of, you know, older batchmates helping newer ones and this pay it forward mentality where everyone helped one another.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  39. “I mean, I've definitely heard that Steve Jobs could be an asshole. I've heard stories, but I think I would have funded him because he's so incredible and he's so, it was so smart and so interested in the product and new, like I'm very persuaded by people who know what they're talking about and love their product and our domain experts. especially early on, less so later on, early on I did sometimes tend to say I really think this person's an asshole. I do not want to fund them. And we often wouldn't. And I very early on when we were just funding, you know, 10, 20, 30 startups a batch, I would sometimes, I have been known to say like, I don't know if I can have dinner with them every week. Like it was that point. And I don't think. We've ever regretted any of those. It didn't happen all the time. That was rare. But I just”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  40. “That by the end of the interview he'd be giving them ideas about how to grow their product and what they could become. And they'd sit there saying, yeah, yeah. That's a great idea. And then he'd say, fundum. And I'd say, whoa, whoa, whoa, Paul. You can't just fund this because you love the idea. Let's take a step back and let's look like these two founders are working at Google and they don't say they're going to quit. That's not good. point out these things that I had observed. But I mean, we always agreed. It was very rare that we wouldn't agree on funding, something we were usually on the same page.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  41. “Standing sometimes, even the technology that they were talking about, I let my co founders do that. And then after, you know, we'd be talking, they'd look at me and they'd be like, should we fund them? You know, Jessica, should we fund them? And sometimes I could tell based on the conversation, whether they thought that the technology was good or how they felt, and sometimes I'd say absolutely we should, or sometimes I'd say guys, you know, I'm a little nervous. Did you see how that founder interrupted the other founder and wouldn't let the other founder talk? And so, because my three co-founders sometimes wouldn't notice this. They'd be so caught up in the conversation they were having about the technology, especially Paul. Paul would get really into things. And sometimes I always tease Paul because one of his defining qualities is that sometimes someone would have an idea that he'd get so excited about.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  42. “Well, in the early days, especially before I knew a lot as much as I know now about startups and founders, I mean, early on, I was learning a lot in the first few years. And in the first few years, you know, it was just the four of us. So I would be in charge of going out, telling people, wait here while we do the interview, come on in. I'd be in charge of like the stopwatch that would time us. And I'd say, okay, our time's up. And it was very administrative. And I would observe. I wouldn't, you know, Paul, Robert, and Trevor are my co-founders would be asking them all sorts of questions about their product and their technology and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. They would occasionally ask questions, but I'd usually remain pretty silent. And so I don't think people even really noticed me. But I would be just watching them and sort of trying to observe as much as I could, not understanding.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  43. “Are these people the co founders get along? Are these people committed? Do they really know about their product? Do they care? Are they going to quit their job? Or are they telling us that they are going to quit their job but really aren't? All these little social cues that I try to pick up on. And in a lot of cases, red flags about them that I'd add to the decision making process. And so that's why they called me the social radar. And it just sort of stuck. And it's because I love people and the dynamics and understanding what's motivating people. I mean, that's, I just love it and I love founder psychology, founder's personalities. I mean, I just, I am absolutely fascinated with it.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  44. “I will try, Lenny. I will try. I don't talk much about it because I don't. It's hard to talk about. I don't understand it's hard to put into words exactly what it is about me, but it's true that my nickname at Y Combinator was the social radar. And I think it was because my three co-founders were deeply technical people. And I was not, but I would look at other things about founders when we'd have these 10 minute interviews, I would look at”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  45. “Is true. I've often been sort of erased. And in some cases, it's annoying because it's a lot of people who have a certain narrative about why Combinator that don't want me to exist. I mean, maybe making that up a little bit. Or the people that sort of don't want me to be part of the narrative or the ones that think that Y Combinator only invests, it's run by white men, only invests in white men. And gosh, if there was a woman on the founding team making choices of who to fund, that would undermine their narrative. So I think. Sometimes that's what happens too.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  46. “It's sort of a hard question. It is true. Like I was one of the co-founders of Y Combinator, and yet news articles, I mean, Wikipedia people want to take my entry off of Wikipedia all the time. I'm not as notable. And I'm sort of like, gosh, I'm a founder of Y Combinator, author of a best-selling book on startups. You know, what does a girl have to do? But, you know, it is what it is. It's the external views. And it doesn't matter to me. Do you know what I mean? Like people within YC know what I've done. The Y Combinator alumni know what I've done. My friends and family and people I respect in the Silicon Valley community know what I've done, or most of them do. So that's fine.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  47. “Hated their idea, and Paul tried to get Brian and Joe and Nate to change it. But I remember specifically Joe brought out the cereal boxes, the Obama O's and Captain McCain's, and I just thought, oh my God, they're going to work hard to do whatever they can to make this company succeed.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  48. “Would look at the co founders get along? Are these people committed? And if a founder would get defensive, that was always a bad sign.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  49. “Three co founders were deeply technical, but I would look at other things about founders. You know, all these little social cues.”

    2024-06-27 · Lenny's Podcast · The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of Y Combinator, author, podcast host) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source