Great talk. Some of my takeaways: 1. Focus on real impact instead of fake impact 2. Create weekly KPI goals (instead of OKR) and then define the weekly schedule. 3. Measure the result by comparing progress vs weekly goals. 4. Know where your customers are before starting your business, which is why paid marketing is discouraged.
I'm personally getting huge value from those easy on-point presentations, big thx for that. When I look back, the biggest time loss occurs when I'm still unsure in the offering of our services/thinking about pivoting points all the time. So one of the most unclear points to me are: How much time can you dedicate to research/widening of the service/pivoting, when you obviously have more important day to day problems to solve.
I have this question as well. From watching YC videos, I’ve heard of a YC alum that uses the 10/90 rule: - what is the 10% of work to do that will get 90% of the result? I don’t know if there’s a talk by him about this. Though it would be useful if there was one. I think the hardest part of that is the social pressure of needing to look like something is being done vs taking the time to figure out what is unknown & worth spending time on.
Sharing my key takeaways: 1) 02:00 Real startup progress is what really moves the needle for your startup, and it's always a variant of talking to users and building product. 2) 03:24 Fake startup progress is when founders focus on things that are not directly related to growing your primary KPI, such as attending conferences, winning awards, and optimizing the wrong metrics. 3) 07:06 To prioritize tasks, log them into a spreadsheet and grade them based on how impactful the task would be on achieving the weekly goal for your primary KPI. 4) 09:36 Rank tasks by impact and complexity: use a 3-level complexity scale (easy, medium, hard) to rank tasks by their impact within each category. 5) 10:29 Prioritize high impact, easy tasks: focus on tasks that have high impact and are easy to complete, then move on to high impact, medium complexity tasks. 6) 11:23 Write weekly updates to evaluate progress: write weekly updates that include your weekly goal, biggest blocker, predicted and actual impact, and what you learned. Reviewing these updates will help you improve how you select and prioritize tasks. 7) 13:35 Use a modified makers manager schedule: split your week into coding days and meeting days to minimize context switching and maximize productivity. 8) 15:03 Move fast and learn quickly: make decisions thoughtfully and quickly, and be okay with making a wrong choice as long as you learn from it and move on.
Notes: 1:41 Real vs. fake progress: What's wasting your time? 7:10 Grading impact on my weekly KPI goals: High > Medium > Low Grading complexity on my weekly KPI goals: Easy > Medium > Hard 11:51 Weekly updates: Obstacles, accomplishments, big learnings, > Impossible to get tasks done in one week: > Break each task done into smaller tasks
This advice seems very much focused on customer facing websites. Should be no surprise from a YC video; but I for one would love to know how to keep focus while working on my B2B hardware product for the next year, with nothing to show yet and certainly no customers to get feedback from.
This was a great talk, but I was deeply disappointed by the second half. Of all the audience questions there was only a single one that was actually relevant to Adora's presentation ("What failure modes have you seen?"). I don't know if people weren't paying attention or didn't care, but this topic, talk, and presenter deserved a better audience.
So much sobering info. But I need it. It’s like my crazy big dreamer brain, needs a few hits to the head to help me focus. I’m not into S&M but I’m enjoying these mental beatings! 🤣😅🇦🇺
My question is if you run a start-up where there are policies and licences you need to operate with, and you have not gotten approval to launch, how do you prioritise during this waiting period?
You showed a chart that reported on weeks where you hit your weekly goals. Do you actually recommend charting this each week? If so, what tools are you using to do that?
Conferences can be great for B2B companies in many industries -- advice here is wrong and probably due to Adora's background as a B2C founder. Rest of this is great advice.
Great talk but gender balance and lack of diversity in the audience is not good. Glad that at least this is recorded and put out openly for increased accessibility.
Great talk. Some of my takeaways:
1. Focus on real impact instead of fake impact
2. Create weekly KPI goals (instead of OKR) and then define the weekly schedule.
3. Measure the result by comparing progress vs weekly goals.
4. Know where your customers are before starting your business, which is why paid marketing is discouraged.
Best talk for startupschool 2019.. You basically pointed out why i am not making progress much faster than i expected..
I'm personally getting huge value from those easy on-point presentations, big thx for that. When I look back, the biggest time loss occurs when I'm still unsure in the offering of our services/thinking about pivoting points all the time. So one of the most unclear points to me are: How much time can you dedicate to research/widening of the service/pivoting, when you obviously have more important day to day problems to solve.
I have this question as well.
From watching YC videos, I’ve heard of a YC alum that uses the 10/90 rule:
- what is the 10% of work to do that will get 90% of the result?
I don’t know if there’s a talk by him about this. Though it would be useful if there was one.
I think the hardest part of that is the social pressure of needing to look like something is being done vs taking the time to figure out what is unknown & worth spending time on.
Sharing my key takeaways:
1) 02:00 Real startup progress is what really moves the needle for your startup, and it's always a variant of talking to users and building product.
2) 03:24 Fake startup progress is when founders focus on things that are not directly related to growing your primary KPI, such as attending conferences, winning awards, and optimizing the wrong metrics.
3) 07:06 To prioritize tasks, log them into a spreadsheet and grade them based on how impactful the task would be on achieving the weekly goal for your primary KPI.
4) 09:36 Rank tasks by impact and complexity: use a 3-level complexity scale (easy, medium, hard) to rank tasks by their impact within each category.
5) 10:29 Prioritize high impact, easy tasks: focus on tasks that have high impact and are easy to complete, then move on to high impact, medium complexity tasks.
6) 11:23 Write weekly updates to evaluate progress: write weekly updates that include your weekly goal, biggest blocker, predicted and actual impact, and what you learned. Reviewing these updates will help you improve how you select and prioritize tasks.
7) 13:35 Use a modified makers manager schedule: split your week into coding days and meeting days to minimize context switching and maximize productivity.
8) 15:03 Move fast and learn quickly: make decisions thoughtfully and quickly, and be okay with making a wrong choice as long as you learn from it and move on.
Awesome talk, helped me realize 90% of my to-do is irrelevant at this stage 😬
Same!
🤣😅 me too! 🤦🏽♂️
Hahaha😅 yup thats me
These are seriously the best talks ever made for startups
Outstanding presentation building on last one. Thanks. Watch 3:08 for about a minute is what you need to know.
This comes just at the right time
Yes, it is important to distinguish real and fake progress.
This is so difficult to listen, but just because it is so true... Awesome content as always!
One of the most amazing videos on time management. Can apply to anything you do
Y Combinator puts out the best videos. I wish I had watched these before spending a lot of money attending conferences for my start up...
Powerful talk! I was spending way too much time coding vs talking to users. Rebuilt the app multiple times just from talking to myself lol. Thanks!
Some of points mentioned are very helpful and changed my perspective to look at things and time allocation. Thanks Adora. Thank you Y Combinator.
I`m doing at least 5 of the fake progress items. This was a great presentation
I love how you upload all the slides
love the simplicity and clarity of the approach!
Thank you very much for these tips and tricks! It's really useful for me and at the right time too.
Thank You very much Adora for an insightful and constructive presentation!
Perfect timing. Thank you for yet another great video! 😌
Notes:
1:41 Real vs. fake progress: What's wasting your time?
7:10 Grading impact on my weekly KPI goals: High > Medium > Low
Grading complexity on my weekly KPI goals: Easy > Medium > Hard
11:51 Weekly updates: Obstacles, accomplishments, big learnings,
> Impossible to get tasks done in one week:
> Break each task done into smaller tasks
Thank you for posting this video, it's been extreme helpful
10:46 I love this stack raking idea!
Great content and best communicator out there.
omg It's Adora! She's not only beautiful, but she also has a beautiful name ^^
Very precise talk! Thanks a ton!
This would be a good tattoo: "Pre-sell to validate demand"
great video! gave me major value thank you
Great presentation!
This advice seems very much focused on customer facing websites. Should be no surprise from a YC video; but I for one would love to know how to keep focus while working on my B2B hardware product for the next year, with nothing to show yet and certainly no customers to get feedback from.
Awesome and on point, as always! Love it guys!
Very useful, not only for entrepreneurs! Thanks :)
thank you so much
This was a great talk, but I was deeply disappointed by the second half. Of all the audience questions there was only a single one that was actually relevant to Adora's presentation ("What failure modes have you seen?"). I don't know if people weren't paying attention or didn't care, but this topic, talk, and presenter deserved a better audience.
Structured content ends at 16:14. (questions start there)
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So much sobering info. But I need it. It’s like my crazy big dreamer brain, needs a few hits to the head to help me focus.
I’m not into S&M but I’m enjoying these mental beatings! 🤣😅🇦🇺
How do you measure impact?
How do you measure complexity?
impact is based on the weekly goal. Complexity on the time the task will take
@Carlis. Thank you.
yes, deep work!
Great lecture. I just wonder where rank the importance of human resource or legal issues. Thanks
Does "selling" counts as talking to users?
Brilliant!
Thanks, that's really helpful!
What's the best task , or list or note taking app out there?
My question is if you run a start-up where there are policies and licences you need to operate with, and you have not gotten approval to launch, how do you prioritise during this waiting period?
You showed a chart that reported on weeks where you hit your weekly goals. Do you actually recommend charting this each week? If so, what tools are you using to do that?
Conferences can be great for B2B companies in many industries -- advice here is wrong and probably due to Adora's background as a B2C founder. Rest of this is great advice.
I'm thinking of turning this into a tool - like a Notion template. Would anyone be interested in using it?
#MGMT1328885 I get this! Useful, simple and easy to understand. Yay! 1006
is micromanaging yourself the only way to deliver value?
I watched this at 1.5 speed, because...
I was going to watch this but ran out of time
If only you applied this to Homejoy maybe it can at least getting acquired instead become a catastrophic failure
Why Forbes 30 under 30 is fake?)
It is the pursuit of prestige rather than progress. I'm sure the guy who made juicero could've gotten into 30 under 30 and well...
Just because you have a failed starup doesn't mean you can tell people what to do
Great talk but gender balance and lack of diversity in the audience is not good. Glad that at least this is recorded and put out openly for increased accessibility.
The thankful november fundamentally afford because wheel microscopically squeeze since a ordinary biology. reminiscent, troubled radar
But why homejoy is a failure?
But her starup is a failure right?