Kevin Hale
Former Partner, Y Combinator. On 1 show, 4 appearances, plus 1 compilation re-air not counted. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
founderinvestoroperator@ilikevests ↗LinkedIn ↗particletree.com ↗
Kevin Hale co-founded the online form builder Wufoo, which was acquired by SurveyMonkey in 2011. He subsequently joined Y Combinator as a partner and Startup School instructor, where he became known for lectures on product design and evaluating startup ideas.
1shows
4appearances
54statements
1resolved
1supported
0contradicted
100%fully supported
19said about them ↓ Everything Kevin Hale said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Hale: Investors should figure out how non-obvious startups can win
“His job and the way he sees our work at YC is that it's not to figure out what's wrong with the company, but to figure out how it could possibly when. Cause our bets, the ones that when, are the ones that are non-obvious.”
Hale: Great investors imagine billion-dollar paths and pitch them back
“And so we have to, like, work on our imagination, we have to work on our optimism to figure out, Oh, what is the way that whatever story that they're telling me could become a billion dollar company? And then a great investor pitches that back to the founder.”
Kevin Hale: If you must ask if you have PMF, you don't
“If you have to ask the question, you definitely don't have it.”
Hale: Companies over-optimize for serendipitous chance encounters instead of focused execution
“I actually think a lot of companies or organizations, the group over optimize for serendipity. Like they're like, what about that chance moment? But to me, like serendipity, like we were like some random thing happened, all of a sudden we have a great idea. Li…”
Hale: Big Tech Experience Does Not Give Founders an Unfair Advantage
“And so if you think it's like, well, I'm a product manager at Google. There's a lot of product managers at Google. If you say you're an engineer at Microsoft, there's a lot of engineers at Microsoft. It's like, great, but it's not one that will make me think, …”
Hale: Founders should only give co-founder equity to actual co-founders
“And for us, we actually feel like the only people you should be giving equity, equity to for co-founder is two other co-founders.”
Hale: Video lectures are the least important part of Startup School
“Like, I actually think the lectures are the least important part. Of startup school. Like, it's a one thing that, like, it brings a lot of tension, it helps build up the brand. But those lectures are a way for people to understand and like get help. You know, …”
Hale: UX features and customer support improve retention, not conversion
“Customer support is actually a good one for improving retention. And it's something I also tell People about in terms of, like, that's a great, like, user experience, and most user experience features, like, a lot of people like to be forward on them, especial…”
Hale: Investors Cannot Accurately Predict Which Startups Reach $10B
“Part of the shotgun model is based on the fact that it's like, we actually can't accurately predict who's going to be a ten billion dollar company.”
Hale: Needing over 10% market share for $100M revenue is implausible
“If they need to capture more than 10% of the market just to get to that hundred million dollar revenue, that's probably not plausible.”
Hale: Freemium Business Models Require Very Large Addressable Markets
“Freemium won't work for every company. Mostly because, like, what it requires is a very, very large market.”
Hale: Founders work part-time due to lack of conviction, not resources
“It was the main reason why a lot of people are only able to work on their startup sometimes part-time. Yes, they might be stuck without resources, but they didn't have conviction.”
Hale: Startups are defined strictly by rapid growth
“For us at YC, the definition of a startup is a company that is designed or created to try to grow very quickly. So if you're not trying to build a company that grows very, very fast, ah, then you're just building a normal company. It's a small business.”
Kevin Hale never tells founders he dislikes their ideas at recruiting events
“If you ever meet me or talk to me about your startup and kind of recruiting or at one of these events, ah, I will never tell you that I do not like your idea.”
Kevin Hale: A startup idea is a hypothesis about rapid growth
“A startup idea is basically a hypothesis, and this is the way you should think about it. It's a hypothesis about why a company could grow quickly, and your job is to figure out how to construct your hypothesis, basically the pitch to the investor, so they unde…”
Hale: Frequent problems are vital because they provide more conversion opportunities
“The last one about frequency is super important because I like problems, and you'll find a lot of other YC partners like problems a lot that gives people a lot of opportunities to convert.”
Hale: Most Startups Struggle with Retention by Not Sending Enough Triggers
“And oftentimes most companies don't send enough, for example, email notifications, or triggers, or reminders, or figure out ways to come back into the app, or figure out ways to be back in front of the user at the right time.”
Kevin Hale: Startup Unfair Advantages Must Directly Explain Rapid Growth
“You have to have an unfair advantage that explains why you're gonna grow quickly. If it's not related to that, then it's not gonna be something that an investor is gonna find valuable.”
Hale: 99% of YC-Funded Founders Lack a True Founder Unfair Advantage
“And, 99% of the people we fund at YC do not fall into that category.”
Hale: Market growth is the weakest unfair advantage on its own
“If this is your only company advantage, then it's one of the weakest ones that you could have.”
Hale: Sole reliance on paid acquisition fails as scale attracts competitors
“If paid acquisition is the only way that you are able to grow your company, then I'm gonna discount that channel of growth greatly. That is because if you actually get really popular, you can actually start being someone significant, Let's say becoming a hundr…”
Hale: Blue Apron stalled after exhausting paid customer acquisition channels
“Blue Apron is a really good example of this. Almost all their acquisitions isn't paid, and then once they ate through that, there's almost nowhere else for them to sort of go.”
Kevin Hale: Enterprise startup success is determined by sales ability, not engineering
“So if you are heavy engineering team or doing a BDB or enterprise startup, again, the default is you have to build it. So if you can't even build it, then it's not even gonna work. So I don't spend actually a lot of time looking at that. For me, I'm trying to …”
The other half of the tape: Kevin Hale's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 18 times in 13 episodes across the shows. 1 statement on the record names them. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Ryan Hoover 4Courtland Allen 3Paul Buchheit 2Kalam Dennis 2Alexandria Lafci 2Mathilde Collin 1Kat Manalac 1David Hua 1
Statements about Kevin Hale, by other people (1)
Hoover: Pumping your chest before pitching boosts confidence and calms nerves
“Someone gave me this advice actually during YC is before you do anything like that, before you do a pitch, pump your chest physically. It might've been Kevin Hale that said this. Yeah, I could be wrong. So sorry, Kevin, if I'm putting words in your mouth, but …”
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
the Y Combinator Startup Podcast 18
2019 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2018 7 mentions in 6 episodes 1 per episode
- 3D Home Printing for the Developing World – Alexandria Lafci and Brett Hagler of New Story Charity · Y Combinator
- Starting a Startup After Business School - Reham Fagiri and Kalam Dennis of AptDeco · Y Combinator
- After PMF: People, Customers, Sales by Mathilde Collin · Y Combinator
- The Path to $100B by Paul Buchheit · Y Combinator
- Cannabis Startup Founders David Hua and Vincent Ning on Legalization, Banking, and Industry Trends · Y Combinator
- Paul Buchheit - Startup Investor School Day 2 · Y Combinator
- every mention in 2018, scene by scene →
2017 6 mentions in 3 episodes 2 per episode
- Your Whole Goal Is to Not Quit - Courtland Allen of Indie Hackers · Y Combinator
- Communicate with Users, Build Something They Want - Ryan Hoover of Product Hunt · Y Combinator
- Building a Startup is About Solving a Problem - Avni Patel Thompson of Poppy · Y Combinator
- every mention in 2017, scene by scene →
2016 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Kevin's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Y COMBINATORLEDGER | Former Partner, Y Combinator | 4 +1 | 54 | 100% 1/1 | full record on the Y Combinator Startup Podcast → |