The social radar: Y Combinator’s secret weapon | Jessica Livingston (co-founder of YC, author)

Jessica Livingston is a co-founder of Y Combinator, the first and most successful startup accelerator. Y Combinator has funded over 5,000 companies, 200 of which are now unicorns, including Airbnb, Dropbox, DoorDash, Stripe, Coinbase, and Reddit. Jessica played a crucial role in YC’s early success, when she was nicknamed the “social radar” because of her uncanny ability to quickly evaluate people—an essential skill when investing in early-stage startups. She’s also the host of the popular podcast The Social Radars, where she interviews billion-dollar-startup founders, and the author of the acclaimed book Founders at Work, which captures the origin stories of some of today’s most interesting companies. In our conversation, we discuss: • How Jessica gained the affectionate title of the “social radar” • Why defensive founders are a red flag • How to develop your social radar • What she looks for in founders during YC interviews • How YC’s early inexperience in angel investing led to the batch model • Her favorite stories from interviews with Airbnb, Rippling, and more • Lessons learned from hosting her own podcast • Much more — Brought to you by: • Enterpret—Transform customer feedback into product growth • Anvil—The fastest way to build software for documents • Vanta—Automate compliance. Simplify security Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/the-social-radar-jessica-livingston Where to find Jessica Livingston: • X: https://x.com/jesslivingston • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicalivingston1/ • Podcast: https://www.thesocialradars.com/ Where to find Lenny: • Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com • X: https://twitter.com/lennysan • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/ In this episode, we cover: (00:00) Jessica’s background (02:42) Thoughts on being under-recognized (07:52) Jessica’s superpower: the social radar (15:11) Evaluating founders: key traits and red flags (21:00) The Airbnb story: a lesson in hustle and determination (25:57) A YC success story (28:26) The importance of earnestness (32:45) Confidence vs. defensiveness (34:43) Commitment and co-founder disputes (37:46) Relentless resourcefulness (40:00) Jessica’s social radar: origins and insights (43:24) Honing her social radar skills (45:44) Conviction and scams: a Y Combinator story (46:50) The interview process: challenges and insights (48:20) Operationalizing founder evaluation (49:38) Advice for building social radar skills (52:08) The “Reading the Mind in the Eyes” quiz: https://s3.amazonaws.com/he-assets-prod/interactives/233_reading_the_mind_through_eyes/Launch.html (55:19) Jessica’s podcast: The Social Radars (01:00:34) Lessons from podcasting and interviewing (01:09:58) Lightning round Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.