YC Startup School 2020. My Journey

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. Confucius

For the last six weeks, I was involved in a crazy journey called Y Startup School. After receiving an email with a weekly newsletter, I decided to jump into it. I have a shortlist of ideas that I want to implement in the near future. Periodically, I review this list and start thinking about lots of the stuff related to creating either a small MVP or PoC. I guess most of you who have tried to do the same understand my feelings. When I stumbled upon the email, I did think for a while and decided to give it a shot. I had three main goals: gain new knowledge, ask questions to other future founders, and, of course, get some motivation and inspiration. Now that six weeks have passed, all the exercises have been done, and I've got the answers, I am 100% sure this course is worth trying.

The course has a perfect structure. Each week is related to a separate topic with a bunch of information (e.g. YC articles and videos) and has an appropriate exercise. Also, there is a weekly Q&A session where you can ask questions (if any) via chat or video call with other future founders. Please find below some notes:

1. Talk to users. All founders need to participate in this process as well. If you're the engineer or the developer, don't think that you can escape this process just because you're the person who's coding.
2. Focus on making your idea legible - it can be understood by people who know nothing about your business.
3. Before you decide to build your MVP, it is helpful to talk to some users. This doesn't mean you have to go into a three-year research situation or work in the industry for 10 years. But some conversations are helpful.
4. If you're like most startups, you will launch something that no one will care about.
5. If you're at an idea stage, you can test your short pitch on family and friends and see how they respond. And once you have an MVP, do friends and family launch as quickly as possible.
6. There are 24 hours in a day, and you need to be able to allocate those hours across your startup versus everything else that is important to you: sleep, family, friends, hobbies, and so on.
7. Do things that don't scale.
8. Startup is all about growth.

I know, for some of you, it looks like a small step for a man. But as for me, it's a giant leap further. Cheers.