#151 - Startup School Week 10 Recap - Ali Rowghani on How to Lead and Kevin Hale and Adora Cheung on Startup School 2019 by the Numbers

Y Combinator

We've cut down the tenth week of lectures to be even shorter and combined them into one podcast.
First, a lecture from Ali Rowghani. Ali is a partner at YC. His lecture covers how to lead.
Then a lecture from Kevin Hale and Adora Cheung. Kevin and Adora are both partners at YC. Their lecture breaks down this year’s Startup School by the numbers and they share tips on what helped companies most.
Y Combinator invests a small amount of money ($150k) in a large number of startups (recently 200), twice a year.
Learn more about YC and apply for funding here: https://www.ycombinator.com/apply/
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Topics
00:00 - Intro
00:36 - Ali Rowghani - How to Lead
1:36 - Ali's background
2:56 - There's no single archetype for a great leader so be yourself
5:16 - Great leaders think and communicate clearly
9:56 - Great leaders have good judgement about people
12:56 - Great leaders have strong personal integrity and commitment
13:46 - The transparency test
14:41 - The best way to measure great leaders is in terms of the amount of trust they engender in the people that work with them
15:21 - The science of trust
16:08 - The art of trust
16:36 - Optimize for trust
17:40 - Kevin Hale and Adora Cheung - Startup School 2019 by the Numbers
19:24 - Startup School grew during the course
20:24 - Did SUS make a difference?
21:14 - 106 SUS companies were accepted into YC
23:17 - How can you replicate their success?
23:44 - Be clear and concise
26:59 - Edit your company description
28:04 - Weekly updates submitted
28:39 - Top 7 biggest obstacles for SUS companies
29:04 - Top 7 KPI movers
29:59 - Top 7 user insights
31:04 - Average startup weeks to launch
31:54 - Average hard tech or biotech startup weeks to launch
32:54 - % of weekly updates from launched startups
33:34 - Group sessions
33:59 - Companies got better at explaining their ideas, selling themselves, and getting others excited
35:09 - Founders like qualitative feedback
36:09 - No shows
37:19 - Morale
37:49 - Technical, launched, full-time, revenue generating, non-flaky, non-solo founder startups that talk to users are happier
41:14 - Summary