Jul 15, 2016 · 29m · 20vc
20VC: Why Every Employee Should Re-Apply For Their Job Every Year & The Strategies To Prepare For A Successful Fundraise with Kyle Hill, Founder & CEO @ HomeHero
0:00 / 0:00
gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of The 20 Minute VC, host Harry Stebbings interviews Kyle Hill, co-founder and CEO of Home Hero, discussing the evolution of his venture-backed home care platform, key fundraising and pitch strategies, and unique company culture practices like annual job re-applications.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Harry holds 25.3% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Harry as informed peer 1.9 Guest teaching 4.6 Guest disagreement 1.4 Harry pushing back 1.3
speaking balance: gold is Harry, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 6:35 Rejection of Uber comparison
Kyle vigorously rejects the host's framing, shouting 'hell no' on stage against being labeled the 'Uber for caregiving' and replacing human labor with automated systems.
Hardest push from Harry ▶ 25:25 Challenge on workplace fearHarry directly challenges Kyle's management tactic of having all staff re-apply for their jobs every January, asking if it creates widespread fear and insecurity among employees.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 6:40 Homogenous vs heterogeneous marketplacesKyle provides a comprehensive breakdown contrasting transactional marketplaces like Uber or Instacart with trust-based, high-touch marketplaces like Airbnb and Home Hero.
Harry holds his own ▶ 25:25 Critical question on employee moraleHarry sharpens the debate by challenging the psychological downside of Kyle's extreme accountability culture, forcing Kyle to defend the practice's ultimate value.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Harry as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Harry pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home Hero Founding Story and Inspiration | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | Harry asks a standard founder origin question about how Kyle got into eldercare. Kyle shares his family backstory regarding his grandmother and father, explaining how a weekend app project turned into Home Hero. | |
| Lessons and Incubation at Science Inc. | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Harry asks about Kyle's incubation experience at Science Inc. Kyle explains how Mike Jones mentored him through his prior company Flowtab and helped Home Hero focus on core technology while Science handled SEO/SEM. | |
| High-Touch Marketplaces vs. Transactional Uber Models | 2 | 7 | 5 | 1 | Kyle strongly rejects the 'Uber for caregiving' label with an emphatic 'hell no'. He educates the host on the distinction between homogenous transactional marketplaces and heterogeneous high-touch marketplaces like Match.com or Home Hero. | |
| Unit Economics, Caregiver Classification, and Operational Lessons | 2 | 6 | 1 | 1 | Kyle details unit economics and operational changes, explaining why converting caregivers from 1099 contractors to W2 employees raised price points to $22/hr while providing health credentials required for hospital partnerships. | |
| Fundraising Preparation, VC Dynamics, and Investor Newsletters | 2 | 5 | 1 | 2 | Kyle outlines fundraising lessons, including getting 'their ass kicked' in early VC meetings before building Q&A flashcards and sending monthly investor newsletters. Harry briefly probes whether investors consented to receiving newsletters. | |
| Market Opportunity and Founder Resilience | 3 | 5 | 2 | 5 | Kyle discusses macro demographic trends driving senior care and describes Home Hero's unique annual practice where all employees re-apply for their jobs in January. Harry directly pushes back, asking if this creates workplace fear and uncertainty. | |
| The Next Five Years: Hospital Partnerships and Policy Shifts | 2 | 6 | 1 | 0 | Kyle breaks down macro policy shifts under the Affordable Care Act, detailing how hospital payment structures incentivise partnerships with non-medical care providers to lower readmission rates. |
Statements from this episode (18)
Kyle Hill built HomeHero's prototype as a weekend app for his father
“And I started, I built an app for my dad just coming from a technology background. It was a weekend project and I built him an app to allow him to schedule and pay his caregivers more efficiently.”
Kyle Hill: HomeHero is not the Uber for caregiving
“Hell no, we're not the Uber for caregiving, and I'll tell you why.”
Kyle Hill: Homogeneous marketplace workers will eventually be replaced by robots
“I look at those and no offense to any of those companies, but you could probably replace those workers with robots.”
Kyle Hill: Friction builds trust in high-touch marketplace models
“I think friction builds trust. A lot of tech companies want to take all the friction out of a Experience, but you know, the more time you spend with someone, the more they're going to trust you, and that's very important in this business.”
HomeHero surpassed one million home care hours in California
“Say a year ago, we surpassed a million hours of home care in California, and we were operating on much thinner margins, a lower cost.”
HomeHero converted 100% of its caregivers from 1099 to W2 employees
“Recently, in order to work with hospitals we decided to convert a hundred percent of our caregivers, we call them heroes, from 10 99 contractors to w two employees, and in doing that it raised the, a lot of our costs, right?”
HomeHero raised its price point to $22 per hour after W2 transition
“Now our price points at 22 dollars”
Kyle Hill: Pitch meetings should never be an investor's first introduction
“You never want to go into an investor meeting, and that'd be the first time that they've heard of your business, the first time they've met you, the first time they've heard anything about you, because they don't have a relative point to compare your progress …”
HomeHero became Cedars-Sinai Medical Center's preferred home care provider
“Home Hero just partnered with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and we're now the preferred home care provider from Cedars-Sinai.”
HomeHero was the first organization to deploy Apple CareKit into a hospital
“We're the first hospital to deploy care kit Apple's care kit into a hospital. It was through Home Hero”
Kyle Hill: 40% of adults care for a sick or elderly relative
“40% of adults are caring for a sick or elderly family member.”
Kyle Hill: Unpaid caregiving reaches $470B annually, matching Apple's market cap
“Unpaid caregiving services is four hundred seventy billion dollars a year, which is roughly equal the value of Apple.”
Kyle Hill: The US senior population will double by 2050
“And then our senior population is going to double by 20 50.”
Kyle Hill: The first baby boomer will not turn 80 until 2026
“The first baby boomer won't turn 80 for another 10 years.”
Kyle Hill: The caregiver-to-senior ratio will drop by half
“The number of caregivers we have in our relative number of seniors is going to cut in half”
HomeHero forces every corporate employee to re-apply for their job every January
“Every January, everybody reapplies for their job, and we go through an interview process again.”
Kyle Hill: Going home will become the default over skilled nursing facilities
“There is going to be less reliance on skilled nursing facilities and medical home health, and going home is going to be the default option, and so you are going to see a lot more non-medical, non-clinical home care providers like Home Hero partnering with hosp…”
Kyle Hill: CMS will create reimbursement codes for non-medical home care
“I see a reimbursement code for non-medical home care being created by Center for Medicare, Medicaid Services, CMS. I think that you are going to be able to reimburse for activities of daily living, which are considered, historically have been considered non-me…”