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> YC often also mentors founders on pivots Interesting. I once talked to an investor (not YC) and they asked me what I would do if the product failed. I said o

by ls-a 8mo ago

> YC often also mentors founders on pivots Interesting. I once talked to an investor (not YC) and they asked me what I would do if the product failed. I said one thing I can do is pivot. And they literally responded with "we don't invest in founders who think about pivoting" > YC also needs to pivot it's marketing to compete with a16z Speedrun and PeakXV Surge Maybe. A write up about the new design would be cool I think > YC has always been founder first. Internally yes there is a "founder community". But publicly I would argue it was product-first.

throwaway89201 8mo ago
> YC often also mentors founders on pivots It doesn't seem unlikely to me that YC coined or at least popularized 'the pivot' in the context of changing business / startup directions. The first mention of using the word in that sense is in this comment [1] which explicitly mentions the usage by YC, while it only gets used when talking about pivot tables or more traditional uses of the word before that. Edit: The "Lean Startup" blog series [2], which was quite influential, mentions 'the pivot' a little earlier than the post above, and really seems to coin it, so I guess that's the source (edit again: wrong :D). [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=806601 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=806601 [2] https://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/06/pivot-dont-jump-to-new-vision.html https://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/06/pivot-dont-jum...
- dang 8mo ago
  That's a fun question! 806601 was from Sept 2009. I found 3 earlier cases of 'pivot' in the startup sense: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=699611 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=699611 (July 2009) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=676514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=676514 (June 2009) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=562739 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=562739 (April 2009) All 3 of those posts were by YC founders, so the term was obviously in circulation by then. The last of them includes a (broken) likn to this article: https://web.archive.org/web/20090703130211/https://redeye.firstround.com/2009/03/pivoting-and-yogi-berra.html https://web.archive.org/web/20090703130211/https://redeye.fi.... Edit: that one was discussed here, but the comments didn't say the p-word: Yogi Berra wisdom for startups - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=537331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=537331 - March 2009 (9 comments)
alephnerd 8mo ago
> I said one thing I can do is pivot. And they literally responded with "we don't invest in founders who think about pivoting" I'd say it depends on a VC's investment thesis as well as the stage your startup is at. For the former, some wouldn't like your answer because it implies a lack of conviction (why should I invest in something the founder doesn't trust). Others wouldn't because it adds a degree of uncertainty (if this B2C reels company pivots into MLOps tooling how can I do due dilligence on my investment). For the latter, seed/pre-seed that is open to pivoting isn't necessarily a negative flag because they are barely generating revenue as is and are trying to find PMF, but a Series B startup suddenly taking about a pivot might imply they aren't doing so hot. > A write up about the new design would be cool I think We ain't the LPs. We don't deserve an answer.
- anonymous908213 8mo ago
  It's a lot deeper than an apparent lack of conviction. Mentioning the possibility of a pivot completely changes the dynamic of the investment. 'No pivot' is asking "please invest in this startup; here's why it's a good idea". 'Pivot possible' is asking "please invest in me; I will find a way to get you a return on investment regardless of the means". Asking someone to invest in you as a person requires a certain level of egoistic thinking. Is the ego warranted? Maybe, but the investor won't know unless they build an extremely close rapport with you. Something like YC does with a 3-month on-premise bootcamp is that exact opportunity for investors to build a close rapport, so investing in people makes sense for YC. But a lot of investors are investing without building that rapport, so investing purely on the merits of business ideas makes more sense for them.

by ls-a 8mo ago

throwaway89201 8mo ago

> YC often also mentors founders on pivots It doesn't seem unlikely to me that YC coined or at least popularized 'the pivot' in the context of changing business / startup directions. The first mention of using the word in that sense is in this comment [1] which explicitly mentions the usage by YC, while it only gets used when talking about pivot tables or more traditional uses of the word before that. Edit: The "Lean Startup" blog series [2], which was quite influential, mentions 'the pivot' a little earlier than the post above, and really seems to coin it, so I guess that's the source (edit again: wrong :D). [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=806601 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=806601 [2] https://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/06/pivot-dont-jump-to-new-vision.html https://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/06/pivot-dont-jum...

dang 8mo ago
That's a fun question! 806601 was from Sept 2009. I found 3 earlier cases of 'pivot' in the startup sense: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=699611 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=699611 (July 2009) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=676514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=676514 (June 2009) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=562739 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=562739 (April 2009) All 3 of those posts were by YC founders, so the term was obviously in circulation by then. The last of them includes a (broken) likn to this article: https://web.archive.org/web/20090703130211/https://redeye.firstround.com/2009/03/pivoting-and-yogi-berra.html https://web.archive.org/web/20090703130211/https://redeye.fi.... Edit: that one was discussed here, but the comments didn't say the p-word: Yogi Berra wisdom for startups - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=537331 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=537331 - March 2009 (9 comments)

alephnerd 8mo ago

> I said one thing I can do is pivot. And they literally responded with "we don't invest in founders who think about pivoting" I'd say it depends on a VC's investment thesis as well as the stage your startup is at. For the former, some wouldn't like your answer because it implies a lack of conviction (why should I invest in something the founder doesn't trust). Others wouldn't because it adds a degree of uncertainty (if this B2C reels company pivots into MLOps tooling how can I do due dilligence on my investment). For the latter, seed/pre-seed that is open to pivoting isn't necessarily a negative flag because they are barely generating revenue as is and are trying to find PMF, but a Series B startup suddenly taking about a pivot might imply they aren't doing so hot. > A write up about the new design would be cool I think We ain't the LPs. We don't deserve an answer.

anonymous908213 8mo ago
It's a lot deeper than an apparent lack of conviction. Mentioning the possibility of a pivot completely changes the dynamic of the investment. 'No pivot' is asking "please invest in this startup; here's why it's a good idea". 'Pivot possible' is asking "please invest in me; I will find a way to get you a return on investment regardless of the means". Asking someone to invest in you as a person requires a certain level of egoistic thinking. Is the ego warranted? Maybe, but the investor won't know unless they build an extremely close rapport with you. Something like YC does with a 3-month on-premise bootcamp is that exact opportunity for investors to build a close rapport, so investing in people makes sense for YC. But a lot of investors are investing without building that rapport, so investing purely on the merits of business ideas makes more sense for them.