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Startup School by Y Combinator

English, Education, 1 season, 51 episodes, 1 day, 12 hours, 32 minutes
About
Learn how to start a startup with YC’s free 10-week course. A series of lectures and conversations with YC Partners, startup founders, and experts on how to start a successful company.
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Parting Advice by Geoff Ralston

YC President Geoff Ralston concludes Startup School this year with some parting advice, as founders continue on their journey to make something people want.
9/25/201915 minutes, 22 seconds
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Startup School 2019 by the Numbers by Kevin Hale and Adora Cheung

YC Partners Adora Cheung and Kevin Hale reflect on Startup School 2019 and share some of our learnings from this year's program.
9/25/201924 minutes, 29 seconds
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How to Lead by Ali Rowghani

To succeed in building a big company in the long-term, founders must become good at leading, motivating, and retaining great people. Ali Rowghani, YC Partner and CEO of the YC Continuity Fund, takes from his experience working with great leaders to share his three observations on leadership. 
9/25/201917 minutes, 22 seconds
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Advice for Hard-tech and Biotech Founders by Jared Friedman

YC Partner Jared Friedman covers hard-tech companies and why founders should consider starting one. He also covers a couple of the most common problems hard-tech companies face and how to solve them, with examples from seven YC companies.
9/20/201924 minutes, 31 seconds
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Modern Startup Financing by Carolynn Levy

YC Partner and GC Carolynn Levy details the basics of startup financing and how modern early stage rounds of financing are done using convertible securities, like the SAFE.
9/20/201928 minutes, 43 seconds
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Evaluating Startup Ideas Pt. 2 by Kevin Hale

In this lecture, YC Partner Kevin Hale goes over how to package up your idea and communicate it to an investor. He shares his tips on how to craft your pitch in a clear and concise way that effectively grabs your audience's attention.
9/12/201941 minutes, 14 seconds
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How to Prioritize Your Time by Adora Cheung

YC Partner Adora Cheung shares her framework for how founders can efficiently make use of their time. She covers ways to identify and prioritize tasks, in addition to how you can measure their impact on your company.
9/12/201927 minutes, 20 seconds
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Startup Pricing 101 by Kevin Hale

YC Partner Kevin Hale goes over the fundamentals of pricing and monetization, how it affects your customer acquisition strategy, and how to optimize it through a few rules of thumb.
9/6/201919 minutes, 32 seconds
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How to Improve Conversion Rates by Kevin Hale

YC Partner Kevin Hale covers the first principles of conversion, one of the main drivers of growth for your startup, and how you can improve it starting with your landing page.
9/4/201918 minutes, 37 seconds
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All About Pivoting by Dalton Caldwell

YC Partner and Head of Admissions Dalton Caldwell talks about pivoting for startups and shares his advice on when and how founders should consider it for their companies.
8/29/201938 minutes, 32 seconds
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Building Culture by Tim Brady

YC Partner Tim Brady covers the importance of building a strong and coherent culture early and shares six things that you can do now to help you create a solid foundation for your startup.
8/29/201918 minutes
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How to Work Together by Kevin Hale

YC Partner Kevin Hale talks about the importance of building a successful working relationship with your cofounders, and setting up processes to optimize for the strengths of your team.
8/22/201947 minutes, 8 seconds
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Startup Finance Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them by Kirsty Nathoo

YC Partner and CFO Kirsty Nathoo shares the most common mistakes startups make with their finances and how they can prevent them.
8/22/201928 minutes, 57 seconds
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Growth for Startups by Gustaf Alstromer

YC Partner and growth expert Gustaf Alstromer talks about how to measure product market fit, how to decide on a growth channel, metrics that lie about PMF and other mechanics of growth for startups.
8/14/201949 minutes, 49 seconds
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How to Launch (Again and Again) by Kat Manalac

YC Partner Kat Manalac presents on how startups should think about launching and why you should do it repeatedly.
8/14/201926 minutes, 3 seconds
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How Investors Measure Startups Q&A by Anu Hariharan and Adora Cheung

YC Partners Anu Hariharan and Adora Cheung answer questions from Startup School founders on how investors measure startups.
8/7/201938 minutes, 1 second
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Nine Business Models and the Metrics Investors Want by Anu Hariharan

YC Continuity Partner Anu Hariharan breaks down the important metrics we look for when we’re evaluating a startup’s business model and common mistakes to avoid when measuring them.
8/7/201934 minutes, 7 seconds
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Analytics for Startups by Ilya Volodarsky

Ilya Volodarsky, co-founder of Segment, presents his tactics for setting up analytics to build your MVP and measure your metrics.
8/1/201920 minutes, 56 seconds
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How to Set KPIs and Goals by Adora Cheung

YC Partner Adora Cheung covers the importance of defining and tracking KPIs to understand how effectively your startup is reaching your goals.
8/1/201928 minutes, 59 seconds
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How to Plan an MVP by Michael Seibel

YC CEO and Partner Michael Seibel shares his approach to building an MVP and getting your first users as a pre-launch startup.
8/1/201925 minutes, 21 seconds
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How to Talk to Users by Eric Migicovsky

YC Partner Eric Migicovsky outlines a framework for asking questions and collecting feedback from your users.
7/25/201931 minutes, 34 seconds
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How to Evaluate Startup Ideas Pt. 1 by Kevin Hale

YC Partner Kevin Hale walks us through the process of evaluating ideas and how founders should think about their startups.
7/25/201926 minutes, 35 seconds
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A Conversation with Werner Vogels

Werner Vogels, CTO of Amazon, joins YC Software Engineer Kyle Corbitt to share his experience and insights on technology and startups.Video LinkVideo Transcript
11/11/201856 minutes, 26 seconds
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How to Win by Daniel Gross

Daniel Gross, former YC Partner and founder shares his wisdom of how to survive and thrive as a startup founder.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
10/24/201847 minutes, 47 seconds
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After PMF: People, Customers, Sales by Mathilde Collin

Mathilde Collin, founder of YC alumnus Front, describes what she learned as she scaled Front to 1000s of paying customers.Video LinkTranscript
10/24/201854 minutes, 57 seconds
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The Path to $100B by Paul Buchheit

YC Partner and the creator of Gmail, Paul Buchheit in conversation with Geoff describes how he thinks about companies that manage to scale to the ultimate level.TranscriptVideo Link
10/24/201854 minutes, 42 seconds
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A Conversation with Elad Gil

Serial entrepreneur and angel investor Elad Gil sits down with YC Partner Geoff Ralston to discuss startups.TranscriptVideo Link
10/18/201853 minutes, 27 seconds
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How to Get Meetings with Investors and Raise Money by Aaron Harris

YC Partner Aaron Harris gives invaluable advice for how to most effectively and strategically meet with investors.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
10/17/201847 minutes, 44 seconds
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Understanding Safes and Priced Equity Rounds by Kirsty Nathoo

YC CFO and Partner Kirsty Nathoo gives the lowdown on several different ways to capitalize your company and how those impact founder equity and cap tables overall.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
10/17/201850 minutes, 3 seconds
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A Conversation on Hard Tech with Eric Migicovsky

YC Partner Adora Cheung talks to YC Partner Eric Migicovsky, previously founder and CEO of Pebble, about his experience as a hard tech startup founder.Video LinkTranscript
10/12/20181 hour, 1 minute, 2 seconds
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Fundraising Fundamentals by Geoff Ralston

YC Partner Geoff Ralston gives an introduction to the key concepts to keep in mind once you enter a fundraising process.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
10/10/201852 minutes, 42 seconds
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Startup Technology - Technical Founder Advice

YC Partner Jared Friedman joins founders Lillian Chou (COO, Second Measure), Diana Hu (CTO, Escher Reality), Calvin French-Owen (CTO, Segment) and Ralph Gootee (CTO, PlanGrid), to talk about what can go right and wrong building technology.Video Link
10/10/201859 minutes, 54 seconds
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A Conversation with Elizabeth Iorns - Advice for Biotech Founders

YC Partner Adora Cheung talks to Science Exchange Co-Founder and CEO Elizabeth Iorns about her experience as a biotech startup founder.TranscriptVideo Link
10/3/201855 minutes, 10 seconds
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Running Your Startup by Patrick Collison

YC Partner Adora Cheung, along with Patrick Collison, the founder of well known YC alumnus Stripe, discuss how to most effectively run a startup company towards success.TranscriptVideo Link
10/3/201857 minutes, 14 seconds
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How to Apply and Succeed at Y Combinator by Dalton Caldwell

YC Partner Dalton Caldwell gives insight into how YC admissions works and what makes for a successful YC experience.Clarification on the Application video: Founders can splice together a video if they're not all in the same place; you do not need to be in same place to do the video.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/28/201844 minutes, 4 seconds
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Building an Engineering Team - by Ammon Bartram and Harj Taggar

Former YC Partner and founder of TripleByte Harj Taggar, along with his cofounder Ammon Bartram discuss a topic startups often struggle with most: finding and hiring the key engineers who will build your product.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/26/20181 hour, 11 minutes, 40 seconds
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How to Sell by Tyler Bosmeny

Tyler Bosmeny from YC alumnus Clever shares his expertise on how an early stage company should think about sales and about building an enterprise sales team.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/26/201852 minutes, 32 seconds
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A Conversation with Aileen Lee

YC Partner Geoff Ralston talks to Cowboy Ventures Founder Aileen Lee.TranscriptVideo Link
9/21/20181 hour, 33 seconds
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PR + Content for Growth by Kat Mañalac and Craig Cannon

YC Partner Kat Mañalac and Director of Marketing Craig Cannon describe the most effective ways to use PR and content to help your companies brand and to find more users.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/19/201852 minutes, 52 seconds
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Design for Startups (Part 2) by Garry Tan

Former YC partner Garry Tan, the founder of Initialized Capital and a design expert describes how to effectively integrate design into a product development process.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/19/201819 minutes, 32 seconds
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Design for Startups (Part 1) by Garry Tan

Former YC partner Garry Tan, the cofounder of Initialized Capital and a design expert describes how to effectively integrate design into a product development process.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/19/20181 hour, 6 minutes, 44 seconds
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A Conversation About Crypto-currencies and ICOs with Andy Bromberg

YC Partner Geoff Ralston talks to CoinList Co-Founder and President Andy Bromberg.TranscriptVideo Link
9/14/20181 hour, 7 minutes, 32 seconds
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How to Measure Your Product by Suhail Doshi

Suhail Doshi, founder of YC alumnus Mixpanel and a world-class expert on measurement details how startups should think about discovering the important facts about how their product is used.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/12/201859 minutes, 2 seconds
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How to Get Users and Grow by Gustaf Alströmer

YC Partner Gustaf Alströmer, who was most recently a growth expert at AirBnb describes strategies for scaling your user base.Lecture SlidesLecture TranscriptVideo Link
9/12/20181 hour, 4 minutes, 14 seconds
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How to Succeed with a Startup by Sam Altman

Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator, shares his thoughts on how you can succeed as a startup.TranscriptLecture SlidesVideo Link
9/12/201816 minutes, 13 seconds
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A Conversation with Ooshma Garg

YC Partner Adora Cheung talks to Gobble founder and CEO Ooshma Garg.TranscriptVideo Link
9/12/201856 minutes, 2 seconds
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How to Find Product Market Fit by David Rusenko

David Rusenko from YC alumus Weebly details the story of how Weebly developed one of the most popular website creation and hosting sites on the web today.TranscriptLecture SlidesVideo Link
9/12/201858 minutes, 36 seconds
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Building Product by Michael Seibel

YC CEO Michael Seibel outlines how successful startups think about building something people want.What problem are you solving? Who is your Customer? How to set up metrics Product Development Pivot vs. Iterate?TranscriptLecture SlidesVideo Link
9/12/201859 minutes, 5 seconds
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A Conversation with Paul Graham

YC Partner Geoff Ralston talks with Paul Graham, one of the founders of YC, and tries to draw out as much startup wisdom as possible in 1/2 hour of conversation.TranscriptVideo Link
9/12/20181 hour, 3 minutes, 9 seconds
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Startup Legal Mechanics by Carolynn Levy

YC Partners Carolynn Levy, Jon Levy, and YC General Counsel Jason Kwon recap on legal mechanics for startups, in addition to common mistakes and problems.TranscriptLecture SlidesVideo Link
9/12/201857 minutes, 44 seconds
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Introduction to Startup School by Adora Cheung and Geoff Ralston

YC Partners Adora Cheung and Geoff Ralston introduce Startup School 2018.Geoff's SlidesAdora's SlidesTranscriptVideo Link
9/12/201840 minutes, 16 seconds