【H766】初创企业的反直觉部分，以及如何拥有想法

创业成功不是因为你懂创业流程，而是因为你懂你的用户。扎克伯格不是因为懂创业才做出 Facebook，而是因为他太懂自己那群用户了。

你可以不懂融资、不懂公司注册，但你必须知道用户到底想要什么。

3. “玩套路”在创业里行不通。

你可以靠刷存在感、拍老板马屁在大公司混日子，但创业没有老板，只有用户。

用户只关心你做的东西是不是他们想要的。你可以骗投资人一两轮，但最终骗不了市场。创业是“真刀真枪”，没有捷径。

4. 创业会吞噬你的生活。

创业不是“玩票”，而是会彻底改变你生活的事。它会占据你全部的时间和精力，甚至可能持续十年、二十年。

你要清楚，这不是一场短跑，而是马拉松。

5. 你根本无法预判自己适不适合创业。

你过去的经历没法预测你能不能把创业做成。唯一的办法就是试一试。那些一开始自信满满的人，未必能成；那些怀疑自己的人，也可能做得很好。

6. 好点子不是“想”出来的，是“做”出来的。

你越是刻意去想创业点子，越容易想出看起来靠谱、其实没用的点子。真正的好点子，往往是你在做自己感兴趣的事、解决自己真实问题时自然冒出来的。Google、Facebook、Apple 都是这样诞生的。

这篇讲稿的价值在于，它能帮你打破对创业的幻想，直面创业的本质。Paul Graham 用极其坦率、接地气的方式，把创业的“真相”讲得很透：

创业不是靠套路、不是靠“聪明劲儿”，而是靠你是否真的能解决用户的真实需求。

对于任何想创业、或者对创业感兴趣的人来说，这篇文章能让你少走很多弯路，避免掉进“自以为是”的陷阱。

它没有讲“怎么成功”的技巧，它告诉你的是“哪些路千万别走”，这比任何鸡汤都更有用。

正文内容

拥有孩子的好处之一是，当你需要给别人建议时，可以问自己：“我会如何告诉我的孩子？”——你会发现这能让你更专注。尽管我的孩子还小，今天问两岁的儿子”两岁之后是几岁啊？”，他一脸认真地回答”是蝙蝠侠！”，正确答案当然是”三岁”，但”蝙蝠侠”这个答案可精彩多了。不过，即使他们尚幼，我已清楚若他们上大学，我会对他们说些什么关于创业的事。而今天我要告诉你们的，正是这些。本质上，你们将听到的是我对自己孩子的建议——毕竟在座大多数人都年轻到足以当我的孩子。

创业往往有悖直觉，我也说不清具体原因。或许仅仅是因为相关的知识尚未渗透到我们的文化中，但无论原因如何，在这个领域里，你永远不能完全相信自己的直觉。这有点像学滑雪——你们有人成年后才学滑雪的吗？初次尝试滑雪时，如果你想减速，第一反应就是向后仰，这和其他运动的本能反应一样。但滑雪时若向后仰，只会失控地冲下山坡。因此我意识到，学习滑雪的一部分就是学会抑制这种本能。最终你会形成新的习惯，但刚开始从山坡滑下时，你得努力记住一连串要点：双脚交替发力、做S形转弯、内侧脚不要拖地等等。

创业公司就像滑雪一样违背常理，你需要记住一系列关键事项。今天我要分享的正是这个清单的开端——那些你必须牢记的反直觉原则，以防止你固有的本能将你引入歧途。

清单上的第一条正是我刚才提到的：创业公司如此反常规，如果凭直觉行事，你一定会误入歧途。只要记住这一点，当你要犯错时，至少能在行动前停顿片刻。我在运营YC孵化器时，我们常开玩笑说，我们的职责就是告诉创业者那些他们注定会忽视的建议——这确实是真的。一批又一批的创业者，YC合伙人们都会提前警告他们即将犯的错误，而他们总是置若罔闻。直到一年后，这些创业者回来懊悔地说：”早知道就该听你们的。”但那时投资人股权早已白纸黑字写进协议，他们已无力回天。

【译注：YC孵化器（简称YC），是全球最顶尖的创业孵化器，通过资金支持、导师指导和资源网络帮助初创公司快速成长】

问：为什么创始人总是无视合伙人的建议？

答： 这正是反直觉理念的本质——它们与你的直觉相悖，看似错误，所以你的第一反应自然是忽略它们。事实上，这不仅体现了YC的运作逻辑，在某种程度上更是我们存在的意义。如果创始人仅凭直觉就能获得正确答案，他们根本不需要我们。这就好比滑雪教练很多而跑步教练很少，你很少听到”跑步教练”这个词，却常听到”滑雪教练”。因为滑雪是反直觉的运动，就像YC的角色——商业领域的滑雪教练。只不过理想情况下，我们是在帮你攀登陡坡，而非滑下山坡。

然而，在识人方面你尽可相信自己的直觉。虽然你过往的生活与创业相去甚远，但所有与人打交道的经验都适用于商业世界。事实上，创始人常犯的大错就是未能充分信任自己的识人直觉——当遇到某个看似出色却令你隐隐不安的人时，若因对方光鲜的外在而忽视内心警报，最终事态爆发时，你只会懊悔：”早知那人有问题，可当时被他的表象蒙蔽了。”

在商业领域中有这样一个特定情况——尤其当你们像我猜的那样都出身工程背景时——你们会认为经商本该是件有点让人反感的事。所以当遇到那些看似聪明却令人生厌的人时，你们会想”好吧，这在商界大概很正常”，但其实并非如此。挑选合作伙伴时，请像选择朋友一样去选择。这是为数不多可以纵容自己喜好的情况，要和那些你真心欣赏尊重的人共事，并且要有足够长的观察期来确认——因为太多人特别擅长在短期内伪装讨喜。等到利益冲突时，你自然会看清他们的真面目。

第二个反常识的观点可能会让人有点失望——在创业公司取得成功，需要的并不是创业的专业知识。这也让这门课和你们上的大多数课程都不一样。比如你上法语课，结课时就学会了说法语。认真学的话，就算不能说得和法国人一模一样，也能八九不离十，对吧？这门课可以教你们创业知识，但这些并不是你们真正需要掌握的。创业成功的关键不在于掌握创业的专业知识，而在于成为自己用户的专家。

马克·扎克伯格能在脸书取得成功，并非因为他是创业专家——事实上他对创业一窍不通，要知道脸书最初注册的可是佛罗里达州有限责任公司（LLC），这种操作连在座各位都不会犯。他成功的关键在于，尽管对创业毫无经验，却极其了解自己的用户。你们大多数人都不懂天使轮融资的具体操作吧？如果为此感到不安，完全没必要，因为我敢说扎克伯格八成也不清楚——就算罗恩·康威（Ron Conway）给他开巨额支票时他留心过，现在肯定也早忘了。

【译注： LLC特性：这种企业结构适合小餐馆/便利店，而非科技初创公司；罗恩·康威（Ron Conway），硅谷著名天使投资人】

事实上，我担心的不仅是人们没必要去细究创业的具体流程——更危险的是，这可能导致年轻创业者犯下一个典型错误：机械地照搬创业的形式。他们先编造个听似靠谱的创意，通过融资获得漂亮估值，接着在旧金山南湾租下豪华办公室，招揽一群朋友加入，直到某天突然惊觉自己陷入了绝境——因为他们模仿了所有创业的表面功夫，却忽略了最本质的事：创造人们真正需要的东西。

我们目睹了太多人机械地照搬创业流程，以至于专门为这种现象起了个名字：”过家家式创业”。后来我终于明白根源所在——年轻创业者之所以陷入这种形式主义，是因为他们前半生接受的全部训练都在教他们这么做。想想大学申请的要求：课外活动？打钩完成。即便在大学课堂里，你们做的大部分作业也像绕操场跑圈一样徒具形式。我并非指责教育体系如此运作，毕竟学习过程中难免包含虚假成分。但一旦用指标衡量人的表现，他们必然会利用这种虚假性，最终你所测量的成果，多半只是形式主义催生的泡沫。

【译注：”泡沫”通常指资产价值被严重高估的市场现象】

我承认自己大学时也这么干过——事实上，我可以分享个拿高分的小技巧：我发现很多课程的考试题，其实只有二三十个核心考点能编出像样的题目。所以我的备考方式不是掌握课程内容，而是预判考题并提前准备好答案。对我来说，真正的考验不在于考场作答，而在于能押中多少道题。基本上，走进考场看到试卷的瞬间，我就知道自己能拿多少分了。这招对很多课程都管用，尤其是计算机课。比如自动机理论课，能出的考题翻来覆去就那么几种套路。

因此不难理解，在长期接受这种”应试训练”后，年轻创业者开始创业时的第一反应，就是寻找这个新游戏的通关秘籍。创业界的”课外活动”是什么？有哪些必做清单？他们总是迫切想知道这些——毕竟在他们眼中，融资额似乎成了衡量创业成功的标准，这又是个典型的菜鸟误区。他们总在追问：说服投资人有什么诀窍？而我们必须告诉他们：说服投资人的最佳方式，就是先打造一家真正表现优异的公司，比如业务快速增长，然后如实告知投资人即可。

他们接着问：好吧，那快速增长有什么诀窍？而”增长黑客”这个词的存在更是加剧了这种想法。每当你听到有人谈论”增长黑客”，就在心里把它翻译成”胡说八道”，因为我们告诉他们的是：让公司增长的方法是做出用户真正喜欢的东西，然后告诉他们。这就是你要做的：这才是真正的”增长黑客”。

【译注：增长黑客，是指用技术驱动、数据导向的创新手段实现业务爆发式增长的方法论】

YC合伙人与创始人的对话常常这样开始：创始人问”我该如何做……”，而合伙人回答”只需要……”。为什么他们总把事情想得如此复杂？经过多年困惑后我终于明白，根源在于他们总在寻找捷径——这是他们被训练出来的思维模式。

因此，这就是关于创业公司需要记住的第三个反常识事实：钻系统空子在创业这个地方是行不通的。如果你去大公司工作，玩弄系统可能仍然有效——取决于这家公司有多糟糕，你或许能通过巴结正确的人获得成功；通过深夜发邮件营造勤奋印象，或者如果你够聪明，直接修改电脑时钟（反正谁会去查邮件头信息呢？对吧？）。我喜欢能听懂笑话的观众。那边商学院的观众：”邮件头？”好吧天啊，我突然意识到这内容是要被录下来的。

从现在开始我们必须严格按剧本来。但在创业中，钻空子这套行不通。没有老板可以糊弄，当没有可糊弄的对象时，你又能糊弄谁呢？只有用户，而用户只在乎你的软件是否满足他们的需求，对吧？他们就像鲨鱼，鲨鱼笨到不会被愚弄，你挥动红旗骗不了它，它只认准有肉没肉。你必须提供人们真正需要的东西，你的成功程度完全取决于此。危险的是，尤其对你们而言，危险在于这套作假手段对投资者确实能起一定作用。

如果你真的很擅长夸夸其谈，你或许能骗过投资人一轮、两轮融资，但这样做对你自己没有好处。要知道，你们创业都是为了股权权益，这本质上是在对自己玩”庞氏骗局”。你不过是在浪费自己的时间，因为这家创业公司注定失败，你所做的一切只是在浪费时间记录失败过程。所以，别再寻找什么捷径了。创业领域确实存在技巧，就像其他任何领域一样，但这些技巧的重要性比起解决实际问题要低一个数量级。一个对融资一窍不通、但做出了用户真正喜爱的产品的人，会比那些熟读所有融资技巧、但用户增长曲线一潭死水的人更容易获得投资。

【译注：庞氏骗局，是指用后来投资者的钱支付前期投资者的高额回报，制造盈利假象并不断滚雪球的金融诈骗】

不过，从某种意义上说，游戏系统现在停止工作是个坏消息，因为你失去了最强大的武器，而你毕竟花了二十年的时间来掌握它们。 我觉得很兴奋的是，世界上竟然还有这样的地方，在那里玩弄制度并不是你获胜的方式。 如果我在大学时就明确意识到，世界上有些地方的制度博弈不如其他地方重要，而有些地方则几乎不重要，那我一定会非常兴奋。但确实存在，这也是规划未来时最需要思考的问题之一。你如何在每种工作中获胜，你想通过做这些工作赢得什么？

这就引出了我们的第四个反常识观点：创业是一场吞噬一切的持久战。一旦踏上创业之路，它对你生活的侵占程度将远超想象；若事业有成，这种状态至少会持续数年，甚至可能长达十年，乃至贯穿你的整个职业生涯。因此，这里存在着真实的机会成本。拉里·佩奇的生活或许看似令人艳羡，但其中某些部分绝对让人望而生畏。对他而言，这个世界就像是从二十五岁开始就必须全力冲刺的跑道——自那以后他再未停下脚步喘息。在谷歌帝国里，每天都会出现只有”皇帝”才能处理的棘手问题，而身为君主的他必须亲自应对。哪怕只是休假一周，各种棘手问题就会堆积如山——而他必须毫无怨言地承受这一切。原因很简单：第一，作为公司的”大家长”，他绝不能流露丝毫畏惧或软弱；第二，当你是亿万富翁时，若抱怨生活艰难，得到的同情心只会是零，甚至会是负数。

【译注：拉里·佩奇（Larry Page），是谷歌（Google）联合创始人之一，曾任谷歌CEO及 Alphabet 公司首席执行官】

这导致了一个奇特的现象：几乎所有成功的创业创始人所经历的艰辛，都被完美隐藏了起来。你看奥运百米冠军冲过终点时气喘吁吁的样子，拉里·佩奇其实也在经历同样的煎熬——只是你永远看不到他喘气的瞬间。

YC孵化器已投资了多家堪称大获成功的公司，而每一位创始人都异口同声地说：”创业从来不会变得轻松。”问题的性质会改变——你或许不再操心公寓空调故障这种琐事，转而担忧伦敦新办公室的施工延误这类”光鲜的烦恼”，但焦虑的总量从未减少。若要说变化，那只能是愈演愈烈。

创立一家成功的创业公司，就如同养育孩子——你按下那个按钮，人生便就此彻底改变。尽管这确实是人生至美之事（指养育孩子），但请务必记住本次演讲的核心观点：有些事情在为人父母前完成会更轻松，而这些经历往往能让你成为更好的家长。在发达国家，多数人会选择暂缓按下这个按钮，想必各位对此都深有体会。

然而在创业这件事上，许多人却认为大学期间就该起步——这简直荒谬！高校究竟作何考量？他们一方面不遗余力地为学生提供避孕措施，另一方面却又遍地开花地设立创业项目和孵化器。

平心而论，高校也是被逼无奈。许多新生都对创业充满兴趣，而大学至少名义上应该为学生的职业生涯铺路——既然你想学创业，学校似乎就该教创业，否则生源可能被那些号称能教创业的大学抢走。那么大学真能教会你创业吗？如果不能，我们现在又是在做什么呢？

答案即是肯定的也是否定的，正如我之前向你阐释创业本质时所言。本质上，如果你想学法语，大学能教你的是语言学——创业教育也是如此。我们现在教的相当于语言学：教你如何学习一门语言的方法论，而你需要掌握的却是特定”语言”本身。

你真正需要领悟的是用户需求，而这只有在真正创办公司时才能获得。这意味着创业本质上是一项必须亲身实践才能掌握的技能。在大学里你无法真正践行，原因我刚才已经阐明——创业会吞噬你的全部生活。若以学生身份创业，你实质上已不再是学生。或许名义上还保留学籍，但连这个名义也维持不了多久。面对这种非此即彼的选择：究竟该走哪条路？

要么认真当学生，别创业；要么认真创业，就别当学生。 这个问题我可以替你回答——毕竟我也是在告诫自己的孩子：别在大学期间创业。 希望这话不会让谁太失望。对许多有抱负的人来说，创业或许能成为美好人生的一部分，但它只是你试图解决的更大命题中的一环——如何过好这一生。 创业或许是件值得做的事，但二十岁绝不是最佳时机。

有些事情，真的只有二十来岁才能干得痛快——早了没那个劲儿，晚了又没那个机会。想干啥就干啥，不用考虑回报：可以脑子一热就扎进一个可能血本无归的项目，或者背着包说走就走，根本不用管什么时候回来。说白了，这些事儿看着五花八门，其实骨子里都是一个道理——趁着年轻，多折腾。

对胸无大志之人，这或许会沦为可悲的”啃老躺平”；但对志向远大者而言，这却是极其宝贵的探索期。如果你二十岁就创业，并且足够成功——那你反而会永远失去这种探索的机会。

马克·扎克伯格永远没法像普通人那样在国外穷游了。现在他去国外，要么是事实上的国事访问，要么就像在巴黎乔治五世酒店隐姓埋名躲清静。他再也不可能像普通人那样背着包在泰国穷游了——如果现在还有人这么玩的话。”现在还有人背包游泰国吗？”这是我第一次看到这个班的学生露出真心的热情，早知道就该去泰国做这个演讲。他确实能做我们做不到的事，比如包私人飞机去国外。超大的那种飞机。但成功也让他的人生失去了很多偶然的惊喜。现在与其说是他在运营脸书，不如说是脸书在支配着他的人生。

【译注：巴黎乔治五世酒店（Hôtel George V） 是法国巴黎最顶级的奢华酒店之一】

当你全身心投入某个自认为是毕生事业的项目时，这种感觉固然很棒，但保持人生的随机性其实更有优势。其中最重要的一点是：它能让你有更多选择来最终确定自己的人生方向。这甚至称不上是取舍——如果你不在二十岁时急着创业，你根本不会失去什么，反而更有可能在未来获得成功。除非出现像脸书那样一夜爆红的极端案例（这种概率堪比天文数字），那时你才需要面临是否要全力投入的选择，或许选择放手一搏也是合理的。但通常情况下，初创公司的成功都取决于创始人的主动推动。在二十岁就做这种决定，实在是愚蠢至极。

是不是随便什么年纪都适合创业？容我再强调一次——创业真的特别难。如果觉得太难了，你确定自己扛得住吗？

答案就在第五个反常识的观点里：你根本没法预判。以你目前的人生阅历，如果想当数学家或职业足球运动员，多少还能估摸出自己的潜力。嘿——可不是所有听众都听得懂这种比喻啊。

除非你的人生经历确实很特别，否则你基本没做过类似创业的事。这意味着，如果创业成功，它将彻底改变你。所以你要评估的不仅是现在的自己，还包括未来的可能性。但谁能做到这一点呢？反正我是做不到。过去九年来，我的工作就是试图预测（我本来写的是”预测”，结果打成了”猜测”——这个弗洛伊德式口误很能说明问题）。

【译注：弗洛伊德式口误，指无意中说错的话，往往暴露内心真实想法】

说真的，判断一个人聪不聪明十分钟就够了——就像打网球，你发几个球过去，看他是能稳稳回球还是直接下网。但真正困难也最关键的是，要预判他们未来能变得多坚韧、多有野心。

眼下恐怕没人比我更懂这行了——但就算专家又能预判多少？实话告诉你：微乎其微。这些年我学乖了，每批初创公司里谁能脱颖而出，我从不先入为主下判断。

有些创始人自以为心里有数。他们中有人信心满满地来，觉得定能轻松征服YC孵化器——就像他们此前人生中轻松搞定那些简单的人造测试一样；也有人满腹狐疑地来，暗自琢磨到底是哪里出了错才被录取，只盼着这个错误别被人发现。

创业者的初始心态与最终成败几乎毫无关联。军队研究也显示同样结论——那些趾高气扬的新兵，并不比沉默寡言者更可能成为真正的硬汉，根源或许相同：真实考验与过往的人生测试截然不同。若想到创业就双腿发软，那你确实不该干这行——除非你恰好是那种越害怕越来劲的狠人。但若只是不确定自己能否胜任，唯一验证方式就是亲身尝试——只不过，现在还不是时候。

那么，若你打算有朝一日创业，现在大学期间该做什么？最初你只需要准备两样东西：一个好点子，和靠谱的合伙人。而获取这两者的方法论其实如出一辙——这就引出了我们第六条也是最后一条反常识原则。

想找到好的创业点子，恰恰不能刻意去想创业点子。 关于这一点我专门写过一篇文章，这里就不赘述了。简单来说：如果刻意去想创业点子，你想到的不仅会很糟糕，而且听起来还挺像那么回事——结果就是连你自己和别人都会被忽悠。等你发现这些点子根本不靠谱时，已经浪费了大把时间。真正的好点子是这样来的： 你得先退后一步。别绞尽脑汁想创业点子，而是要把自己训练成”不自觉就能想到创业点子”的那种人。事实上，这种状态要自然到——你最初甚至都没意识到这些就是创业点子。

这种情况不仅存在，更是常态——雅虎、谷歌、脸书和苹果都是这么起家的。这些公司最初都没打算成为企业，全都只是无心插柳的副业。最顶尖的创业点子往往必须以副业形式起步，因为这些点子往往太过天马行空，连你自己冷静下来想想都会觉得不靠谱。

要想自然而然地获得创业灵感，你得做到三点：第一，广泛学习真正有价值的知识；第二，深入研究你感兴趣的问题；第三，与你欣赏或尊重的人一起工作。顺便说一句，这第三条正是你既能获得创业点子又能找到合伙人的关键。我最初写这段话时，写的不是”学习真正有价值的知识”，而是”精通某项技术”，后来发现这个建议太过局限才改的。

爱彼迎（Airbnb）创始人布莱恩·切斯基和乔·杰比亚的真正过人之处，并不在于他们的技术造诣——这两位都是艺术学院出身的设计专家。更重要的是，他们特别擅长组织团队推进项目。所以说，你不必非得钻研技术，只要选择能突破自我的领域就够了。

【译注：爱彼迎（Airbnb），是全球最大的短租民宿平台，开创了共享住宿经济模式】

哪些领域值得深耕？这个问题其实很难一概而论。历史上从不缺少这样的年轻人——他们钻研的课题，在当时看来毫无价值，连父母都觉得不务正业。但更常见的情况是：父母认定子女在虚度光阴，而事实也的确如此。

怎么知道自己做的事情靠不靠谱？ 比如说，有个叫Twitch的网站（它原来叫Justin.tv），突然决定转型专门直播别人打游戏。我当时一听就懵了：”这玩意儿能行？” 可人家后来还真做成了大生意。

【译注：Twitch最初是Justin.tv的生活直播平台，2011年转型专做游戏直播后爆红，现为全球最大游戏直播网站】

我深知自己判断”真问题”的标准很任性：只要觉得有趣，哪怕无人问津的事我也乐意钻研；而再重要的事若让我觉得无聊，我也死活提不起劲。回顾人生，太多这样的案例——纯粹因兴趣而投入的事，最后往往阴差阳错产生了实际价值。

当初我做YC孵化器，纯粹是觉得这事有意思。我好像天生自带指南针，总能找到有趣的事。不过今天要说的不是我的经验——你们脑子里装着什么，我可猜不透。或许再琢磨琢磨，我能总结出几条判断”真有趣点子”的套路。但现在，我只能给个看似废话的建议。这个看似废话的建议就是：如果你对某些公认有趣的问题感兴趣，那么全力以赴满足这种好奇心——这既是创业的最佳准备，或许也是最好活法。

虽然我无法一概而论什么才算有趣的问题，但可以告诉你一大类典型案例：如果把科技发展想象成一片不断扩散的分形图，边缘的每个触点都代表一个有趣命题。（蒸汽机技术可能不算？但谁说得准呢）。有个绝对管用的方法能让你自然而然地产生创业灵感：让自己站到某项技术的最前沿——当你的思维被前沿科技浸润时，好点子自会源源不断冒出来。

正如保罗·布赫海特所言，要”活在未来”。当你真正抵达未来时，那些在旁人看来神准的预见，对你而言不过是显而易见的事实。你可能不会意识到这些就是创业点子，但你会笃定：这些东西本就应该存在。

【译注：保罗·布赫海特（Paul Buchheit），Gmail创始人、硅谷传奇工程师】

举个典型的例子：90年代中期在哈佛，我朋友罗伯特和特雷弗的一位研究生同学，自己写了套网络电话软件。他压根没想创业，纯粹是为了和台湾的女友煲电话粥省长途费。作为网络专家，他觉得把声音打包成数据通过互联网免费传输是再自然不过的事，当时他还纳闷：这么简单的事怎么没人做？答案很简单：多数人写不来这种软件。后来他也没把这套软件商业化——恰恰是这样的无心插柳，往往孕育出最成功的创业。

说来有趣，想成为成功的创业创始人，在大学最该做的根本不是参加那些职业化的创业培训，而是回归传统教育的本质——纯粹为了学习而学习。如果你真想创业，在大学里就该去钻研那些真正有深度的东西。只要你保持纯粹的知识好奇心，顺着自己的兴趣走，自然会做到这一点。至于创业成功的关键，说实话，我每次说”创业”这个词都觉得有点装，归根结底还是专业领域的深厚积累。拉里·佩奇之所以成为拉里·佩奇，正因他是搜索技术专家；而他成为专家的原因，纯粹是出于发自内心的兴趣，而非别有用心。创业的最高境界，不过是给好奇心披上件功利外衣——且唯有把这层外衣留到探索旅程的终点穿上，才能成就最伟大的创业。因此，对于年轻的未来创始人们，我的终极建议可浓缩为两个字：去学。

好吧，我们还剩多少时间？18分钟提问时间。你们有问题吗？

问：当然，我们先从两个问题开始。对于非技术背景的创始人来说，如何最高效地为初创企业创造价值？

答： 如果这家创业公司涉足的是某个特定领域（而非纯技术型创业），比如像Uber这样的企业，而创始人恰好是豪华轿车行业的专家——那么实际上，这位非技术背景的创始人反而会承担大部分核心工作。

答： 如果公司业务涉及特定领域（比如Uber这样的网约车平台），非技术创始人（比如熟悉豪华轿车行业的高管）反而会成为主力——他们负责招募司机、处理运营事务等核心工作，而技术合伙人可能只需开发手机应用（iOS和Android版本），这部分工作量甚至不到一半。但如果是纯技术型创业，非技术创始人往往只能做些边缘工作：跑销售、给程序员送咖啡和汉堡之类的杂活。

问：你认为商学院对想从事创业的人有什么价值吗？

答：基本没有，虽然这话不太中听，但商学院本质是教管理的。而管理问题，只有当你创业足够成功时才会遇到。真正能让初创公司活下来的早期核心能力，是产品开发。如果非要上学，设计学院都比商学院靠谱。不过说真的，学会创业的唯一方法就是：直接动手干。我早期犯的一个错误是：曾建议那些想创业的人先去其他公司工作几年。但说实话，学习创业最好的方式就是直接动手尝试。

你未必能成功，但直接行动会让你进步更快。商学院正在拼命追赶创业热潮，但它们本质上是为了培养大公司的管理层——在那个”要么进大公司当高管，要么开街角鞋店”的商业旧时代设计的。后来出现了苹果这样的异类：起步时和街角鞋店一样小，最终却成长为巨头。商学院根本不适应这个新世界。它们应该继续专注自己擅长的领域，培养职业经理人，而不是硬凑创业的热闹。

问：管理问题确实只在公司成功后才凸显。那么对于初创阶段的两三位核心成员，该如何处理协作问题？

答： 理想情况下，在招聘两三个人之前，公司就应该已经走上正轨了。事实上，创业初期根本不需要那么多人手。当你真正开始招人时，这些早期员工几乎就是联合创始人——他们应该和创始人有着相同的动力源泉，根本不需要你去”管理”。这不是在经营传统公司，这些人是你的创业伙伴，你们之间不需要太多层级管理。

问：所以这是绝对禁忌吗？如果某个成员需要被管理，就完全没资格进入创始团队？

答：只有一种例外情况——当你的项目需要某项尖端技术，而全世界只有某个天才怪才掌握这门手艺，包括怎么给他擦嘴这种事都得你操心。这时候，雇佣这位大神并伺候他可能是值得的。但黄金法则始终是：早期团队成员必须像创始人一样自我驱动。

问：您认为当前市场是否存在泡沫？

答： 关于这个问题，我有两个层面的回应。首先，请提出对这个群体真正有价值的问题——在座的各位是来学习如何创业的，而我掌握着比任何人都更丰富的行业洞见，你却问了一个记者式的肤浅问题（这通常是因为想不出真正有深度的提问）。不过，我仍然会回答你：价格高涨 ≠ 泡沫。泡沫是价格虚高的一种特殊形态，其核心特征是：人们明知价格不合理，却仍愿意高价买入，指望未来能找到”更大的傻瓜”接盘。这正是90年代末的真实写照：风投们心知肚明地投资垃圾项目，盘算着赶在崩盘前推动IPO，把烂摊子甩给散户投资者。

【译注：IPO（首次公开募股） 是指一家私有公司首次向公众发行股票，从而在证券交易所挂牌上市的过程】

我曾亲历过这场风暴的中心。但如今的局面完全不同：虽然价格高企、估值膨胀，但估值高绝不等于泡沫。所有商品的价格都会像正弦波一样上下波动。当前价格确实处于高位，我们常提醒创业者：如果你本轮融资顺利，千万别假设下一轮也会同样轻松——谁知道中途会不会爆发中国经济危机或大萧条？必须做最坏打算。但要说这是泡沫？绝非如此。

问：我注意到一个趋势：越来越多的年轻人和成功企业家不再满足于创建一家伟大的公司，而是想同时孵化二十家。现在逐渐兴起各种”创业实验室”模式，试图批量孵化项目——虽然目前还没有特别成功的案例。

答：你指的是像IDEO（著名设计咨询公司）这样的模式吗？

问：不，是指像Idealab、 加勒特·坎普新成立的那种机构

【译注：Idealab：美国著名创业孵化器，由比尔·格罗斯创立，专注批量孵化科技项目； 加勒特·坎普：Uber联合创始人；IDEO侧重创新方法论输出，Idealab类机构专注科技创业批量生产】

答：哦对，现在确实兴起了一种新模式——人们成立实验室专门孵化创业公司。这种模式或许能成，Twitter就是这样诞生的。其实我刚想说Idealab却说成了IDEO，又是口误，推特最初根本不是推特，它只是Odeo公司（一家做播客业务的公司——话说”播客业务”这词组语法通吗？后来埃文发现确实不通）的一个副项目。结果这个副产品却成了摇钱树。现在有人专门搞这种孵化器，能成功吗？如果由合适的人操盘，很有可能。不过你搞不了，因为得用自己的钱玩。

问：对于女性联合创始人在融资方面，您有什么建议？

答：女性创业者融资确实更难，这是个不争的事实。我自己就经常看到这种情况。杰西卡（Jessica）马上要发布一组对女性创始人的采访，很多人都提到融资时遇到了更多困难。还记得我怎么教大家融资吗？关键就是把公司做好。如果你在某些方面达不到投资人的理想标准，那就更要靠实打实的业绩说话。说白了，就是把公司做到极致出色。我举个真实例子：一两年前，我在推特上发过一家公司的增长曲线图，故意没写公司名字。果然很多投资人跑来问”这是哪家公司？”其实这是家女性创办的公司，当时融资很困难，但他们的增长数据简直惊人。记住：增长曲线没有性别之分，让投资人先被你的数据征服再说。这个道理对所有创业者都适用。

【译注：杰西卡，是硅谷创投圈的重量级人物，简单来说就是创业公司“造星者”】

问：如果现在去读大学，你会学什么？

答：文学理论——开玩笑的啦！说真的，我可能会选物理，这是我觉得自己错过的东西。小时候不知怎么的，计算机成了我的全部（现在可能还是）。学编程那会儿特别兴奋，因为在卧室里就能写出真正的程序。但你可没法在卧室造粒子加速器…呃，或许也行？我发现自己总会用那种渴望的眼神看物理学，所以…也许就它了？虽然不确定这对创业有没有帮助——可我刚说过要追随好奇心不是么？管它有没有用，最后肯定会有用的。

问：你在工作和生活中哪些反复使用的系统方法，让你保持高效？

答： 养孩子其实是提升效率的绝佳方法。因为你根本挤不出时间，所以如果想做成点事，单位时间内的产出反而会更高。事实上，很多创业父母都明确提到过这点——孩子能逼你进入高度专注状态，毕竟你已别无选择。

答： 说真的，我不建议为了提升专注力就去生孩子。其实我也不算高效，我只有两种工作模式：第一种是在YC孵化器期间——完全是被逼出来的效率。设定申请截止日后，海量申请涌来，必须在限定时间审完。我知道如果敷衍了事，选中的就会是垃圾项目，所以只能全力以赴。这就是用制度倒逼自己干活。第二种是写文章，这完全出于自发。走在街上时，文章会自动在脑海里成型。枯燥的事需要强逼自己去做，但有趣的事根本停不下来。说实话，我没什么效率技巧。只要做你热爱的事，根本不需要刻意追求效率。

问：什么时候是将副业项目转变为初创企业的好时机？

答： 你自然会感觉到。关键就在于——当一个副业项目开始蚕食你生活中大块大块的时间，那种”不对劲”的侵占感出现时，你就该明白：这东西正在变成真正的创业项目了。”天啊！我居然花了一整天搞这个副业——这下真要挂科了！怎么办？…等等，干脆把它变成创业项目得了！”

问： 你之前多次提到”公司发展得好自然能感觉到”，但现实中很多情况是处于灰色地带——比如已有部分用户，却未达到那种指数级的”右上角增长曲线”。在这种情况下，你会如何建议创业者分配时间和资源？该怎么权衡取舍？

【译注：”右上角增长曲线”指企业关键指标（如用户/收入）随时间推移形成持续向右上方攀升的指数级增长轨迹】

答：当一家创业公司增长缓慢时…等等，你难道没让他们读《反规模化的运营之道》（ Do Things that Don’t Scale ）那篇文章吗？ 这位同学，你压根没预习阅读材料啊——你暴露了！因为针对这个问题，我专门写过一篇文章，整整四个章节！。答案很简单：去做那些无法规模化的事。自己翻出来重读吧，我可记不住自己说过的每句话，但那篇文章讲的就是这个困境。

问：在你看来，什么样的创业公司不适合参加孵化器？

答：毫无疑问，注定失败的项目肯定不行。还有一种情况——即便项目能成，但创始人是个让人忍无可忍的混蛋，山姆（Sam Altman）估计也会直接拒掉。除此之外，我真想不出还有什么类型不适合了。因为很多创始人都会惊讶地发现：无论做什么领域，初创公司80%的问题都是相通的。而YC最擅长的，恰恰是解决这类共性难题，而不是某个垂直领域的技术瓶颈。你们能想到哪类项目不适合YC吗？我们上一批就孵化了核裂变和核聚变这种超高门槛的创业公司。

【译注：山姆·奥尔特曼（Sam Altman）是硅谷传奇人物，现任OpenAI CEO、YC创业孵化器前总裁】

问：你提到”深耕重要领域”是个好建议，那如何判断什么才是真正重要的？有哪些实用的评估策略？

答：如果把技术发展比作不断扩散的分形图，那么前沿领域的每个触点都代表着一个有趣的想法——听起来耳熟吧？就像我之前说的，这正是问题所在：你精准指出了我在回避实质——我给出了一个循环论证的答案。我说”我对有趣的东西感兴趣”，你说”我也对有趣的东西感兴趣，专注去做就会成功”。这根本不算真正的回答。

如何判断一个问题是否真正重要？说实话我不知道——这问题值得专门写篇文章探讨。虽然我还没想明白答案，但确实该好好研究下。不过我倒发现一个鉴别标准：看你对无聊工作的忍耐度。比如文学理论研究，或者在大公司当中层管理这类公认枯燥的事——如果你能忍受这些，要么你拥有惊人的自律，要么你天生就对真正有趣的问题缺乏嗅觉，反之亦然。

问：你喜欢用 闪拍（Snapchat） 吗？

【译注：闪拍（Snapchat） ，一款主打”阅后即焚”（发完即消失）的欧美年轻人社交软件】

答：Snapchat？我压根不了解Snapchat，因为我们YC没投资过。问点别的吧！

问：如果只招聘自己喜欢的人，团队可能会陷入”同质化陷阱”——这种情况下，如何应对由此产生的认知盲区？

答： 创业本身就是问题百出的过程，别指望完美无缺。雇佣熟悉且喜欢的人带来的优势，远超过团队同质化那点微不足道的弊端。实证来看，所有最成功的创业公司，最初往往都是创始人拉上校友哥们儿干起来的。

好了，谢谢你们。

英文原文：https://genius.com/Paul-graham-lecture-3-counterintuitive-parts-of-startups-and-how-to-have-ideas-annotated

中英翻译

初创企业的反直觉部分，以及如何拥有想法｜Lecture 3: Counterintuitive Parts of Startups, and How to Have Ideas

One of the advantages of having kids is that when you have to give advice to people you can ask yourself, “what would I tell my own kids?”, and actually you’ll find this really focuses you. So even though my kids are little, my two year old today, when asked what he’ll be after two, said “a bat.” The correct answer was three, but “a bat” is so much more interesting. So even though my kids are little, I already know what I would tell them about startups, if they were in college, so that is what I’m going to tell you. You’re literally going to get what I would tell my own kids, since most of you are young enough to be my own kids. 拥有孩子的好处之一是，当你需要给别人建议时，可以问自己：“我会如何告诉我的孩子？”——你会发现这能让你更专注。尽管我的孩子还小，今天问两岁的儿子”两岁之后是几岁啊？”，他一脸认真地回答”是蝙蝠侠！”，正确答案当然是”三岁”，但”蝙蝠侠”这个答案可精彩多了。不过，即使他们尚幼，我已清楚若他们上大学，我会对他们说些什么关于创业的事。而今天我要告诉你们的，正是这些。本质上，你们将听到的是我对自己孩子的建议——毕竟在座大多数人都年轻到足以当我的孩子。

Startups are very counterintuitive and I’m not sure exactly why . It could be simply because knowledge about them has not permeated our culture yet, but whatever the reason, this is an area where you cannot trust your intuition all the time. It’s like skiing in that way – any of you guys learn to ski as adults? When you first try skiing and you want to slow down, your first impulse is to lean back, just like in everything else. But lean back on the skis and you fly down the hill out of control. So, as I learned, part of learning to ski is learning to suppress that impulse. Eventually you get new habits, but in the beginning there is this list of things you’re trying to remember as you start down the hill: alternate feet, make s-turns, do not drag the inside foot, all this stuff. 创业往往有悖直觉，我也说不清具体原因。或许仅仅是因为相关的知识尚未渗透到我们的文化中，但无论原因如何，在这个领域里，你永远不能完全相信自己的直觉。这有点像学滑雪——你们有人成年后才学滑雪的吗？初次尝试滑雪时，如果你想减速，第一反应就是向后仰，这和其他运动的本能反应一样。但滑雪时若向后仰，只会失控地冲下山坡。因此我意识到，学习滑雪的一部分就是学会抑制这种本能。最终你会形成新的习惯，但刚开始从山坡滑下时，你得努力记住一连串要点：双脚交替发力、做S形转弯、内侧脚不要拖地等等。

Startups are as unnatural as skiing and there is a similar list of stuff you have to remember for startups. What I’m going to give you today is the beginning of the list, the list of the counterintuitive stuff you have to remember to prevent your existing instincts from leading you astray. 创业公司就像滑雪一样违背常理，你需要记住一系列关键事项。今天我要分享的正是这个清单的开端——那些你必须牢记的反直觉原则，以防止你固有的本能将你引入歧途。

The first thing on it is the fact I just mentioned: startups are so weird that if you follow your instincts they will lead you astray. If you remember nothing more than that, when you’re about to make a mistake, you can pause before making it. When I was running Y Combinator we used to joke that our function was to tell founders things they would ignore, and it’s really true. Batch after batch the YC partners warned founders about mistakes they were about to make and the founders ignored them, and they came back a year later and said, “I wish we’d listened.” But that dude is in their cap table and there is nothing they can do. 清单上的第一条正是我刚才提到的：创业公司如此反常规，如果凭直觉行事，你一定会误入歧途。只要记住这一点，当你要犯错时，至少能在行动前停顿片刻。我在运营YC孵化器时，我们常开玩笑说，我们的职责就是告诉创业者那些他们注定会忽视的建议——这确实是真的。一批又一批的创业者，YC合伙人们都会提前警告他们即将犯的错误，而他们总是置若罔闻。直到一年后，这些创业者回来懊悔地说：”早知道就该听你们的。”但那时投资人股权早已白纸黑字写进协议，他们已无力回天。

【译注：YC孵化器（简称YC），是全球最顶尖的创业孵化器，通过资金支持、导师指导和资源网络帮助初创公司快速成长】

Q: Why do founders persistently ignore the partner’s advice? 问：为什么创始人总是无视合伙人的建议？

A: That’s the thing about counterintuitive ideas, they contradict your intuitions, they seem wrong, so of course your first impulse is to ignore them and, in fact, that’s not just the curse of Y Combinator, but to some extent our raison d’être. You don’t need people to give you advice that does not surprise you. If founders’ existing intuition gave them the right answers, they would not need us. That’s why there are a lot of ski instructors, and not many running instructors; you don’t see those words together, “running instructor,” as much as you see “ski instructor.” It’s because skiing is counterintuitive, sort of what YC is—business ski instructors—except you are going up slopes instead of down them, well ideally. 答： 这正是反直觉理念的本质——它们与你的直觉相悖，看似错误，所以你的第一反应自然是忽略它们。事实上，这不仅体现了YC的运作逻辑，在某种程度上更是我们存在的意义。如果创始人仅凭直觉就能获得正确答案，他们根本不需要我们。这就好比滑雪教练很多而跑步教练很少，你很少听到”跑步教练”这个词，却常听到”滑雪教练”。因为滑雪是反直觉的运动，就像YC的角色——商业领域的滑雪教练。只不过理想情况下，我们是在帮你攀登陡坡，而非滑下山坡。

You can, however, trust your instincts about people. Your life so far hasn’t been much like starting a startup, but all the interactions you’ve had with people are just like the interactions you have with people in the business world. In fact, one of the big mistakes that founders make is to not trust their intuition about people enough. They meet someone, who seems impressive, but about whom they feel some misgivings and then later when things blow up, they say, “You know I knew there was something wrong about that guy, but I ignored it because he seemed so impressive.” 然而，在识人方面你尽可相信自己的直觉。虽然你过往的生活与创业相去甚远，但所有与人打交道的经验都适用于商业世界。事实上，创始人常犯的大错就是未能充分信任自己的识人直觉——当遇到某个看似出色却令你隐隐不安的人时，若因对方光鲜的外在而忽视内心警报，最终事态爆发时，你只会懊悔：”早知那人有问题，可当时被他的表象蒙蔽了。”

There is this specific sub-case in business, especially if you come from an engineering background, as I believe you all do. You think business is supposed to be this slightly distasteful thing. So when you meet people who seem smart, but somehow distasteful, you think, “Okay this must be normal for business,” but it’s not. Just pick people the way you would pick people if you were picking friends. This is one of those rare cases where it works to be self indulgent. Work with people you would generally like and respect and that you have known long enough to be sure about because there are a lot of people who are really good at seeming likable for a while. Just wait till your interests are opposed and then you’ll see. 在商业领域中有这样一个特定情况——尤其当你们像我猜的那样都出身工程背景时——你们会认为经商本该是件有点让人反感的事。所以当遇到那些看似聪明却令人生厌的人时，你们会想”好吧，这在商界大概很正常”，但其实并非如此。挑选合作伙伴时，请像选择朋友一样去选择。这是为数不多可以纵容自己喜好的情况，要和那些你真心欣赏尊重的人共事，并且要有足够长的观察期来确认——因为太多人特别擅长在短期内伪装讨喜。等到利益冲突时，你自然会看清他们的真面目。

The second counterintuitive point, this might come as a little bit of a disappointment, but what you need to succeed in a startup is not expertise in startups. That makes this class different from most other classes you take. You take a French class, at the end of it you’ve learned how to speech French. You do the work, you may not sound exactly like a French person, but pretty close, right? This class can teach you about startups, but that is not what you need to know. What you need to know to succeed in a startup is not expertise in startups, what you need is expertise in your own users. 第二个反常识的观点可能会让人有点失望——在创业公司取得成功，需要的并不是创业的专业知识。这也让这门课和你们上的大多数课程都不一样。比如你上法语课，结课时就学会了说法语。认真学的话，就算不能说得和法国人一模一样，也能八九不离十，对吧？这门课可以教你们创业知识，但这些并不是你们真正需要掌握的。创业成功的关键不在于掌握创业的专业知识，而在于成为自己用户的专家。

Mark Zuckerberg did not succeed at Facebook because he was an expert in startups, he succeeded despite being a complete noob at startups; I mean Facebook was first incorporated as a Florida LLC. Even you guys know better than that. He succeeded despite being a complete noob at startups because he understood his users very well. Most of you don’t know the mechanics of raising an angel round, right? If you feel bad about that, don’t, because I can tell you Mark Zuckerberg probably doesn’t know the mechanics of raising an angel round either; if he was even paying attention when Ron Conway wrote him the big check, he probably has forgotten about it by now. 马克·扎克伯格能在脸书取得成功，并非因为他是创业专家——事实上他对创业一窍不通，要知道脸书最初注册的可是佛罗里达州有限责任公司（LLC），这种操作连在座各位都不会犯。他成功的关键在于，尽管对创业毫无经验，却极其了解自己的用户。你们大多数人都不懂天使轮融资的具体操作吧？如果为此感到不安，完全没必要，因为我敢说扎克伯格八成也不清楚——就算罗恩·康威（Ron Conway）给他开巨额支票时他留心过，现在肯定也早忘了。

【译注： LLC特性：这种企业结构适合小餐馆/便利店，而非科技初创公司；罗恩·康威（Ron Conway），硅谷著名天使投资人】

In fact, I worry it’s not merely unnecessary for people to learn in detail about the mechanics of starting a startup, but possibly somewhat dangerous because another characteristic mistake of young founders starting startups is to go through the motions of starting a startup. They come up with some plausible sounding idea, they raise funding to get a nice valuation, then the next step is they rent a nice office in SoMa and hire a bunch of their friends, until they gradually realize how completely fucked they are because while imitating all the outward forms of starting a startup, they have neglected the one thing that is actually essential, which is to make something people want. By the way that’s the only use of that swear word, except for the initial one, that was involuntary and I did check with Sam if it would be okay; he said he had done it several times, I mean use the word. 事实上，我担心的不仅是人们没必要去细究创业的具体流程——更危险的是，这可能导致年轻创业者犯下一个典型错误：机械地照搬创业的形式。他们先编造个听似靠谱的创意，通过融资获得漂亮估值，接着在旧金山南湾租下豪华办公室，招揽一群朋友加入，直到某天突然惊觉自己陷入了绝境——因为他们模仿了所有创业的表面功夫，却忽略了最本质的事：创造人们真正需要的东西。

We saw this happen so often, people going through the motion of starting a startup, that we made up a name for it: “Playing House.” Eventually I realized why it was happening, the reason young founders go though the motions of starting a startup is because that is what they have been trained to do, their whole life, up to this point. Think about what it takes to get into college: extracurricular activities? Check. Even in college classes most of the work you do is as artificial as running laps, and I’m not attacking the educational system for being this way, inevitably the work that you do to learn something is going to have some amount of fakeness to it. And if you measure people’s performance they will inevitably exploit the difference to the degree that what you’re measuring is largely an artifact of the fakeness. 我们目睹了太多人机械地照搬创业流程，以至于专门为这种现象起了个名字：”过家家式创业”。后来我终于明白根源所在——年轻创业者之所以陷入这种形式主义，是因为他们前半生接受的全部训练都在教他们这么做。想想大学申请的要求：课外活动？打钩完成。即便在大学课堂里，你们做的大部分作业也像绕操场跑圈一样徒具形式。我并非指责教育体系如此运作，毕竟学习过程中难免包含虚假成分。但一旦用指标衡量人的表现，他们必然会利用这种虚假性，最终你所测量的成果，多半只是形式主义催生的泡沫。

【译注：”泡沫”通常指资产价值被严重高估的市场现象】

I confess that I did this myself in college; in fact, here is a useful tip on getting good grades. I found that in a lot of classes there might only be twenty or thirty ideas that had the right shape to make good exam questions. So the way I studied for exams in these classes was not to master the material in the class, but to try and figure out what the exam questions would be and work out the answers in advance. For me the test was not like, what my answers would be on my exam, for me the test was which of my exam questions would show up on the exam. So I would get my grade instantly, I would walk into the exam and look at the questions and see how many I got right, essentially. It works in a lot of classes, especially CS classes. I remember automata theory, there are only a few things that make sense to ask about automata theory. 我承认自己大学时也这么干过——事实上，我可以分享个拿高分的小技巧：我发现很多课程的考试题，其实只有二三十个核心考点能编出像样的题目。所以我的备考方式不是掌握课程内容，而是预判考题并提前准备好答案。对我来说，真正的考验不在于考场作答，而在于能押中多少道题。基本上，走进考场看到试卷的瞬间，我就知道自己能拿多少分了。这招对很多课程都管用，尤其是计算机课。比如自动机理论课，能出的考题翻来覆去就那么几种套路。

So it’s not surprising that after being effectively trained for their whole lives to play such games, young founders’ first impulse on starting a startup is to find out what the tricks are for this new game. What are the extracurricular activities of startups, what are things I have to do? They always want to know, since apparently the measure of success for a startup is fundraising, another noob mistake. They always want to know, what are the tricks for convincing investors? And we have to tell them the best way to convince investors is to start a startup that is actually doing well, meaning growing fast, and then simply tell investors so. 因此不难理解，在长期接受这种”应试训练”后，年轻创业者开始创业时的第一反应，就是寻找这个新游戏的通关秘籍。创业界的”课外活动”是什么？有哪些必做清单？他们总是迫切想知道这些——毕竟在他们眼中，融资额似乎成了衡量创业成功的标准，这又是个典型的菜鸟误区。他们总在追问：说服投资人有什么诀窍？而我们必须告诉他们：说服投资人的最佳方式，就是先打造一家真正表现优异的公司，比如业务快速增长，然后如实告知投资人即可。

Then they ask okay, so what are the tricks for growing fast, and this is exacerbated by the existence of this term, “Growth Hacks.” Whenever you hear somebody talk about Growth Hacks, just mentally translate it in your mind to “bullshit,” because what we tell them is the way to make your startup grow is to make something that users really love, and then tell them about it. So that’s what you have to do: that’s Growth Hacks right there. 他们接着问：好吧，那快速增长有什么诀窍？而”增长黑客”这个词的存在更是加剧了这种想法。每当你听到有人谈论”增长黑客”，就在心里把它翻译成”胡说八道”，因为我们告诉他们的是：让公司增长的方法是做出用户真正喜欢的东西，然后告诉他们。这就是你要做的：这才是真正的”增长黑客”。

【译注：增长黑客，是指用技术驱动、数据导向的创新手段实现业务爆发式增长的方法论】

So many of the conversations the YC partners have with the founders begin with the founders saying a sentence that begins with, “How do I,” and the partners answering with a sentence that begins with, “Just.” Why do they make things so complicated? The reason, I realized, after years of being puzzled by this, is they’re looking for the trick, they’ve been trained to look for the trick. YC合伙人与创始人的对话常常这样开始：创始人问”我该如何做……”，而合伙人回答”只需要……”。为什么他们总把事情想得如此复杂？经过多年困惑后我终于明白，根源在于他们总在寻找捷径——这是他们被训练出来的思维模式。

So, this is the third counterintuitive thing to remember about startups: starting a startup is where gaming the system stops working. Gaming the system may continue to work, if you go to work for a big company, depending on how broken the company is, you may be able to succeed by sucking up to the right person; Giving the impression of productivity by sending emails late at night, or if you’re smart enough changing the clock on your computer, cause who’s going to check the headers, right? I like an audience I can tell jokes to and they laugh. Over in the business school: “headers?” Okay, God this thing is being recorded, I just realized that. 因此，这就是关于创业公司需要记住的第三个反常识事实：钻系统空子在创业这个地方是行不通的。如果你去大公司工作，玩弄系统可能仍然有效——取决于这家公司有多糟糕，你或许能通过巴结正确的人获得成功；通过深夜发邮件营造勤奋印象，或者如果你够聪明，直接修改电脑时钟（反正谁会去查邮件头信息呢？对吧？）。我喜欢能听懂笑话的观众。那边商学院的观众：”邮件头？”好吧天啊，我突然意识到这内容是要被录下来的。

Alright for now on we are sticking strictly to the script. But, in startups, that does not work. There is no boss to trick, how can you trick people, when there is nobody to trick? There are only users and all users care about is whether your software does what they want, right? They’re like sharks, sharks are too stupid to fool, you can’t wave a red flag and fool it, it’s like meat or no meat. You have to have what people want and you only prosper to the extent that you do. The dangerous thing is, especially for you guys, the dangerous thing is that faking does work to some extent with investors. 从现在开始我们必须严格按剧本来。但在创业中，钻空子这套行不通。没有老板可以糊弄，当没有可糊弄的对象时，你又能糊弄谁呢？只有用户，而用户只在乎你的软件是否满足他们的需求，对吧？他们就像鲨鱼，鲨鱼笨到不会被愚弄，你挥动红旗骗不了它，它只认准有肉没肉。你必须提供人们真正需要的东西，你的成功程度完全取决于此。危险的是，尤其对你们而言，危险在于这套作假手段对投资者确实能起一定作用。

If you’re really good at knowing what you’re talking about, you can fool investors, for one, maybe two rounds of funding, but it’s not in your interest to do. I mean, you’re all doing this for equity, you’re puling a confidence trick on yourself. Wasting your own time, because the startup is doomed and all you’re doing is wasting your time writing it down. So, stop looking for the trick. There are tricks in startups, as there are in any domain, but they are an order of magnitude less important than solving the real problem. Someone who knows zero about fundraising, but has made something users really love, will have an easier time raising money than someone who knows every trick in the book, but has a flat usage graph. 如果你真的很擅长夸夸其谈，你或许能骗过投资人一轮、两轮融资，但这样做对你自己没有好处。要知道，你们创业都是为了股权权益，这本质上是在对自己玩”庞氏骗局”。你不过是在浪费自己的时间，因为这家创业公司注定失败，你所做的一切只是在浪费时间记录失败过程。所以，别再寻找什么捷径了。创业领域确实存在技巧，就像其他任何领域一样，但这些技巧的重要性比起解决实际问题要低一个数量级。一个对融资一窍不通、但做出了用户真正喜爱的产品的人，会比那些熟读所有融资技巧、但用户增长曲线一潭死水的人更容易获得投资。

【译注：庞氏骗局，是指用后来投资者的钱支付前期投资者的高额回报，制造盈利假象并不断滚雪球的金融诈骗】

Though, in a sense, it’s bad news that gaming the system stops working now, in the sense that you’re deprived of your most powerful weapons and, after all, you spent twenty years mastering them. I find it very exciting that there even exist parts of the world where gaming the system is not how you win. I would have been really excited in college if I explicitly realized that there are parts of the world where gaming the system matters less than others, and some where it hardly matters at all. But there are, and this is one of the most important thing to think about when planning your future. How do you win at each type of work, and what do you want to win by doing it? 不过，从某种意义上说，游戏系统现在停止工作是个坏消息，因为你失去了最强大的武器，而你毕竟花了二十年的时间来掌握它们。 我觉得很兴奋的是，世界上竟然还有这样的地方，在那里玩弄制度并不是你获胜的方式。 如果我在大学时就明确意识到，世界上有些地方的制度博弈不如其他地方重要，而有些地方则几乎不重要，那我一定会非常兴奋。但确实存在，这也是规划未来时最需要思考的问题之一。你如何在每种工作中获胜，你想通过做这些工作赢得什么？

That brings us to our fourth counterintuitive point, startups are all consuming. If you start a startup, it will take over your life to a degree that you cannot imagine and if it succeeds it will take over your life for a long time; for several years, at the very least, maybe a decade, maybe the rest of your working life. So there is a real opportunity cost here. It may seem to you that Larry Page has an enviable life, but there are parts of it that are defiantly unenviable. The way the world looks to him is that he started running as fast as he could, at age twenty-five, and he has not stopped to catch his breath since. Every day shit happens within the Google empire that only the emperor can deal with and he, as the emperor, has to deal with it. If he goes on vacation for even a week, a whole backlog of shit accumulates, and he has to bear this, uncomplaining, because: number one, as the company’s daddy, he cannot show fear or weakness; and number two, if you’re a billionaire, you get zero, actually less than zero sympathy, if you complain about having a difficult life. 这就引出了我们的第四个反常识观点：创业是一场吞噬一切的持久战。一旦踏上创业之路，它对你生活的侵占程度将远超想象；若事业有成，这种状态至少会持续数年，甚至可能长达十年，乃至贯穿你的整个职业生涯。因此，这里存在着真实的机会成本。拉里·佩奇的生活或许看似令人艳羡，但其中某些部分绝对让人望而生畏。对他而言，这个世界就像是从二十五岁开始就必须全力冲刺的跑道——自那以后他再未停下脚步喘息。在谷歌帝国里，每天都会出现只有”皇帝”才能处理的棘手问题，而身为君主的他必须亲自应对。哪怕只是休假一周，各种棘手问题就会堆积如山——而他必须毫无怨言地承受这一切。原因很简单：第一，作为公司的”大家长”，他绝不能流露丝毫畏惧或软弱；第二，当你是亿万富翁时，若抱怨生活艰难，得到的同情心只会是零，甚至会是负数。

【译注：拉里·佩奇（Larry Page），是谷歌（Google）联合创始人之一，曾任谷歌CEO及 Alphabet 公司首席执行官】

Which has this strange side effect that the difficulty of being a successful startup founder is concealed from almost everyone who has done it. People who win the one-hundred meter in the Olympics, you walk up to them and they’re out of breath. Larry Page is doing that too, but you never get to see it. 这导致了一个奇特的现象：几乎所有成功的创业创始人所经历的艰辛，都被完美隐藏了起来。你看奥运百米冠军冲过终点时气喘吁吁的样子，拉里·佩奇其实也在经历同样的煎熬——只是你永远看不到他喘气的瞬间。

Y Combinator has now funded several companies that could be called big successes and in every single case the founder says the same thing, “It never gets any easier.” The nature of the problems change, so you’re maybe worrying about more glamorous problems like construction delays in your new London offices rather than the broken air conditioner in your studio apartment, but the total volume of worry never decreases. If anything, it increases. YC孵化器已投资了多家堪称大获成功的公司，而每一位创始人都异口同声地说：”创业从来不会变得轻松。”问题的性质会改变——你或许不再操心公寓空调故障这种琐事，转而担忧伦敦新办公室的施工延误这类”光鲜的烦恼”，但焦虑的总量从未减少。若要说变化，那只能是愈演愈烈。

Starting a successful startup is similar to having kids; it’s like a button you press and it changes your life irrevocably. While it’s honestly the best thing—having kids—if you take away one thing from this lecture, remember this: There are a lot of things that are easier to do before you have kids than after, many of which will make you a better parent when you do have kids. In rich countries, most people delay pushing the button for a while and I’m sure you are all intimately familiar with that procedure. 创立一家成功的创业公司，就如同养育孩子——你按下那个按钮，人生便就此彻底改变。尽管这确实是人生至美之事（指养育孩子），但请务必记住本次演讲的核心观点：有些事情在为人父母前完成会更轻松，而这些经历往往能让你成为更好的家长。在发达国家，多数人会选择暂缓按下这个按钮，想必各位对此都深有体会。

Yet when it comes to starting startups a lot of people seem to think they are supposed to start them in college. Are you crazy? What are the universities thinking – they go out of their way to ensure that their students are well supplied with contraceptives, and yet they are starting up entrepreneurship programs and startup incubators left and right. 然而在创业这件事上，许多人却认为大学期间就该起步——这简直荒谬！高校究竟作何考量？他们一方面不遗余力地为学生提供避孕措施，另一方面却又遍地开花地设立创业项目和孵化器。

To be fair, the universities have their hand forced here. A lot of incoming students are interested in start-ups. Universities are at least de-facto supposed to prepare you for your career, and so if you’re interested in startups, it seems like universities are supposed to teach you about startups and if they don’t maybe they lose applicants to universities that do claim to do that. So can universities teach you about startups? Well, if not, what are we doing here? 平心而论，高校也是被逼无奈。许多新生都对创业充满兴趣，而大学至少名义上应该为学生的职业生涯铺路——既然你想学创业，学校似乎就该教创业，否则生源可能被那些号称能教创业的大学抢走。那么大学真能教会你创业吗？如果不能，我们现在又是在做什么呢？

Yes and no, as I’ve explained to you about start-ups. Essentially, if you want to learn French, universities can teach you linguistics. That is what this is. This is linguistics: we’re teaching you how to learn languages and what you need to know is how a particular language. 答案即是肯定的也是否定的，正如我之前向你阐释创业本质时所言。本质上，如果你想学法语，大学能教你的是语言学——创业教育也是如此。我们现在教的相当于语言学：教你如何学习一门语言的方法论，而你需要掌握的却是特定”语言”本身。

What you need to know are the needs of your own users. You can’t learn those until you actually start the company, which means that starting a startup is something you can intrinsically only learn by doing it. You can’t do that in college for the reason I just explained. Startups take over your entire life. If you start a startup in college, if you start a startup as a student, you can’t start a startup as a student because if you start a startup you’re not a student anymore. You may be nominally a student but you won’t even be that for very much longer. Given this dichotomy: which of the two paths should you take? 你真正需要领悟的是用户需求，而这只有在真正创办公司时才能获得。这意味着创业本质上是一项必须亲身实践才能掌握的技能。在大学里你无法真正践行，原因我刚才已经阐明——创业会吞噬你的全部生活。若以学生身份创业，你实质上已不再是学生。或许名义上还保留学籍，但连这个名义也维持不了多久。面对这种非此即彼的选择：究竟该走哪条路？

Be a real student and not start a startup or start a real startup and not be a student. Well, I can answer that one for you. I’m talking to my own kids here. Do not start a startup in college. I hope I’m not disappointing anyone seriously. Starting a startup could be a good component of a good life for a lot of ambitious people. This is just a part of a much bigger problem that you are trying to solve. How to have a good life, right. Those that are starting a startup could be a good thing to do at some point. Twenty is not the optimal time to do it. 要么认真当学生，别创业；要么认真创业，就别当学生。 这个问题我可以替你回答——毕竟我也是在告诫自己的孩子：别在大学期间创业。 希望这话不会让谁太失望。对许多有抱负的人来说，创业或许能成为美好人生的一部分，但它只是你试图解决的更大命题中的一环——如何过好这一生。 创业或许是件值得做的事，但二十岁绝不是最佳时机。

There are things that you can do in your early twenties that you cannot do as well before or after. Like plunge deeply into projects on a whim that seem like they will have no pay off. Travel super cheaply with no sense of a deadline. In fact they are really isomorphic shapes in different domains. 有些事情，真的只有二十来岁才能干得痛快——早了没那个劲儿，晚了又没那个机会。想干啥就干啥，不用考虑回报：可以脑子一热就扎进一个可能血本无归的项目，或者背着包说走就走，根本不用管什么时候回来。说白了，这些事儿看着五花八门，其实骨子里都是一个道理——趁着年轻，多折腾。

For unambitious people your thing can be the dreaded failure to launch. For the ambitious ones it’s a really valuable sort of exploration and if you start a startup at twenty and you are sufficiently successful you will never get to do it. 对胸无大志之人，这或许会沦为可悲的”啃老躺平”；但对志向远大者而言，这却是极其宝贵的探索期。如果你二十岁就创业，并且足够成功——那你反而会永远失去这种探索的机会。

Mark Zuckerberg will never get to bum around a foreign country. If he goes to a foreign county, it’s either as a de-facto state visit or like he’s hiding out incognito at George V in Paris. He’s never going to just like backpack around Thailand if that’s still what people do. Do people still backpack around Thailand? That’s the first real enthusiasm I’ve ever seen from this class. Should have given this talk in Thailand. He can do things you can’t do, like charter jets to fly him to foreign countries. Really big jets. But success has taken a lot of the serendipity out of his life. Facebook is running him as much as he’s running Facebook. 马克·扎克伯格永远没法像普通人那样在国外穷游了。现在他去国外，要么是事实上的国事访问，要么就像在巴黎乔治五世酒店隐姓埋名躲清静。他再也不可能像普通人那样背着包在泰国穷游了——如果现在还有人这么玩的话。”现在还有人背包游泰国吗？”这是我第一次看到这个班的学生露出真心的热情，早知道就该去泰国做这个演讲。他确实能做我们做不到的事，比如包私人飞机去国外。超大的那种飞机。但成功也让他的人生失去了很多偶然的惊喜。现在与其说是他在运营脸书，不如说是脸书在支配着他的人生。

【译注：巴黎乔治五世酒店（Hôtel George V） 是法国巴黎最顶级的奢华酒店之一】

While it can be really cool to be in the grip of some project you consider your life’s work, there are advantages to serendipity. Among other things, it gives you more options to choose your life’s work from. There’s not even a trade off here. You’re not sacrificing anything if you forgo starting a start up at twenty because you will be more likely to succeed if you wait. In the astronomically unlikely case that you are twenty and you have some side project that takes off like Facebook did, then you face a choice to either be running with it or not and maybe it’s reasonable to run with it. Usually the way that start ups take off is for the founders to make them take off. It’s gratuitously stupid to do that at twenty. 当你全身心投入某个自认为是毕生事业的项目时，这种感觉固然很棒，但保持人生的随机性其实更有优势。其中最重要的一点是：它能让你有更多选择来最终确定自己的人生方向。这甚至称不上是取舍——如果你不在二十岁时急着创业，你根本不会失去什么，反而更有可能在未来获得成功。除非出现像脸书那样一夜爆红的极端案例（这种概率堪比天文数字），那时你才需要面临是否要全力投入的选择，或许选择放手一搏也是合理的。但通常情况下，初创公司的成功都取决于创始人的主动推动。在二十岁就做这种决定，实在是愚蠢至极。

Should you do it at any age? Starting a startup may sound kind of hard, if I haven’t made that clear let me try again. Starting a startup is really hard. If it’s too hard, what if you are not up to this challenge? 是不是随便什么年纪都适合创业？容我再强调一次——创业真的特别难。如果觉得太难了，你确定自己扛得住吗？

The answer is the fifth counter intuitive point. You can’t tell. Your life so far has given you some idea of what your prospects might be if you wanted to become a mathematician or a professional football player. Boy, it’s not every audience you can say that to. 答案就在第五个反常识的观点里：你根本没法预判。以你目前的人生阅历，如果想当数学家或职业足球运动员，多少还能估摸出自己的潜力。嘿——可不是所有听众都听得懂这种比喻啊。

Unless you have had a very strange life indeed you have not done much that’s like starting a startup. Meaning starting a startup will change you a lot if it works out. So what you’re trying to estimate is not just what you are, but what you could become. And who can do that? Well, not me. for the last nine years it was my job to try to guess (I wrote “predict” in here and it came out as “guess”—that’s a very informative Freudian slip.） 除非你的人生经历确实很特别，否则你基本没做过类似创业的事。这意味着，如果创业成功，它将彻底改变你。所以你要评估的不仅是现在的自己，还包括未来的可能性。但谁能做到这一点呢？反正我是做不到。过去九年来，我的工作就是试图预测（我本来写的是”预测”，结果打成了”猜测”——这个弗洛伊德式口误很能说明问题）。

【译注：弗洛伊德式口误，指无意中说错的话，往往暴露内心真实想法】

Seriously it’s easy to tell how smart people are in ten minutes. Hit a few tennis balls over the net, and do they hit them back at you or into the net? The hard part and the most important part was predicting how tough and ambitious they would become. 说真的，判断一个人聪不聪明十分钟就够了——就像打网球，你发几个球过去，看他是能稳稳回球还是直接下网。但真正困难也最关键的是，要预判他们未来能变得多坚韧、多有野心。

There may be no one at this point who has more experience than me in doing this. I can tell you how much an expert can know about that. The answer is not much. I learned from experience to keep completely open mind about which start ups in each batch would turn out to be the stars. 眼下恐怕没人比我更懂这行了——但就算专家又能预判多少？实话告诉你：微乎其微。这些年我学乖了，每批初创公司里谁能脱颖而出，我从不先入为主下判断。

The founders sometimes thought they knew. Some arrived feeling confident that they would ace Y Combinator just as they had aced every one of the few easy artificial tests they had faced in life so far. Others arrived wondering what mistake had caused them to be admitted and hoping that no one discover it. 有些创始人自以为心里有数。他们中有人信心满满地来，觉得定能轻松征服YC孵化器——就像他们此前人生中轻松搞定那些简单的人造测试一样；也有人满腹狐疑地来，暗自琢磨到底是哪里出了错才被录取，只盼着这个错误别被人发现。

There is little to no correlation between these attitudes and how things turn out. I’ve read the same is true in the military. The swaggering recruits are no more than likely to turn out to be really tough than the quiet ones and probably for the same reason. The tests are so different from tests in people’s previous lives. If you are absolutely terrified of starting a startup you probably shouldn’t do it. Unless you are one of those people who gets off on doing things you’re afraid of. Otherwise if you are merely unsure of whether you are going to be able to do it, the only way to find out is to try, just not now. 创业者的初始心态与最终成败几乎毫无关联。军队研究也显示同样结论——那些趾高气扬的新兵，并不比沉默寡言者更可能成为真正的硬汉，根源或许相同：真实考验与过往的人生测试截然不同。若想到创业就双腿发软，那你确实不该干这行——除非你恰好是那种越害怕越来劲的狠人。但若只是不确定自己能否胜任，唯一验证方式就是亲身尝试——只不过，现在还不是时候。

So if you want to start a startup one day, what do you do now in college? There are only two things you need initially, an idea and cofounders. The MO for getting both of those is the same which leads to our sixth and last counterintuitive point. 那么，若你打算有朝一日创业，现在大学期间该做什么？最初你只需要准备两样东西：一个好点子，和靠谱的合伙人。而获取这两者的方法论其实如出一辙——这就引出了我们第六条也是最后一条反常识原则。

The way to get start up ideas is not to try to think of startup ideas. I have written a whole essay on this and I am not going to repeat the whole thing here. But the short version is that if you make a conscious effort to try to think of startup ideas, you will think of ideas that are not only bad but bad and plausible sounding. Meaning you and everybody else will be fooled by them. You’ll waste a lot of time before realizing they’re no good. The way to come up with good startup ideas is to take a step back. Instead of trying to make a conscious effort to think of startup ideas, turn your brain into the type that has startup ideas unconsciously. In fact, so unconsciously that you don’t even realize at first that they’re startup ideas. 想找到好的创业点子，恰恰不能刻意去想创业点子。 关于这一点我专门写过一篇文章，这里就不赘述了。简单来说：如果刻意去想创业点子，你想到的不仅会很糟糕，而且听起来还挺像那么回事——结果就是连你自己和别人都会被忽悠。等你发现这些点子根本不靠谱时，已经浪费了大把时间。真正的好点子是这样来的： 你得先退后一步。别绞尽脑汁想创业点子，而是要把自己训练成”不自觉就能想到创业点子”的那种人。事实上，这种状态要自然到——你最初甚至都没意识到这些就是创业点子。

This is not only possible: Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Apple all got started this way. None of these companies were supposed to be companies at first, they were all just side projects. The very best ideas almost always have to start as side projects because they’re always such outliers that your conscious mind would reject them as ideas for companies. 这种情况不仅存在，更是常态——雅虎、谷歌、脸书和苹果都是这么起家的。这些公司最初都没打算成为企业，全都只是无心插柳的副业。最顶尖的创业点子往往必须以副业形式起步，因为这些点子往往太过天马行空，连你自己冷静下来想想都会觉得不靠谱。

How do you turn your mind into the kind that has startup ideas unconsciously? One, learn about a lot of things that matter. Two, work on problems that interest you. Three, with people you like and or respect. That’s the third part incidentally, is how you get cofounders at the same time as the idea. The first time I wrote that paragraph, instead of learn a lot about things that matter, I wrote become good at some technology. But that prescription is too narrow. 要想自然而然地获得创业灵感，你得做到三点：第一，广泛学习真正有价值的知识；第二，深入研究你感兴趣的问题；第三，与你欣赏或尊重的人一起工作。顺便说一句，这第三条正是你既能获得创业点子又能找到合伙人的关键。我最初写这段话时，写的不是”学习真正有价值的知识”，而是”精通某项技术”，后来发现这个建议太过局限才改的。

What was special about Brain Chesky and Joe Gebbia from Airbnb was not that they were experts in technology. They went to art school, they were experts in design. Perhaps more importantly they were really good at organizing people in getting projects done. So you don’t have to work on technology per se, so long as you work on things that stretch you. 爱彼迎（Airbnb）创始人布莱恩·切斯基和乔·杰比亚的真正过人之处，并不在于他们的技术造诣——这两位都是艺术学院出身的设计专家。更重要的是，他们特别擅长组织团队推进项目。所以说，你不必非得钻研技术，只要选择能突破自我的领域就够了。

【译注：爱彼迎（Airbnb），是全球最大的短租民宿平台，开创了共享住宿经济模式】

What kinds of things are those? Now that is very hard to answer in the general case. History is full of examples of young people who were working on problems that no one else at the time thought were important. In particular that their parents didn’t think were important. On the other hand, history is even fuller of examples of parents that thought their kids were wasting their time and who were right. 哪些领域值得深耕？这个问题其实很难一概而论。历史上从不缺少这样的年轻人——他们钻研的课题，在当时看来毫无价值，连父母都觉得不务正业。但更常见的情况是：父母认定子女在虚度光阴，而事实也的确如此。

How do you know if you’re working on real stuff? I mean when Twitch TV switched from being Justin.tv to Twitch TV and they were going to broadcast people playing video games, I was like, “What?” But it turned out to be a good business. 怎么知道自己做的事情靠不靠谱？ 比如说，有个叫Twitch的网站（它原来叫Justin.tv），突然决定转型专门直播别人打游戏。我当时一听就懵了：”这玩意儿能行？” 可人家后来还真做成了大生意。

【译注：Twitch最初是Justin.tv的生活直播平台，2011年转型专做游戏直播后爆红，现为全球最大游戏直播网站】

I know how I know real problems are interesting, and I am self-indulgent: I always like working on anything interesting things even if no one cares about them. I find it very hard to make myself work on boring things even if they’re supposed to be important. My life is full of case after case where I worked on things just because I was interested and they turned out to be useful later in some worldly way. 我深知自己判断”真问题”的标准很任性：只要觉得有趣，哪怕无人问津的事我也乐意钻研；而再重要的事若让我觉得无聊，我也死活提不起劲。回顾人生，太多这样的案例——纯粹因兴趣而投入的事，最后往往阴差阳错产生了实际价值。

Y Combinator itself is something I only did because it seemed interesting. I seem to have some internal compass that helps me out. This is for you not me and I don’t know what you have in your heads. Maybe if I think more about it I can come up some heuristics for recognizing genuinely interesting ideas. For now all I can give you is the hopelessly question begging advice. Incidentally this is the actual meaning of the phrase begging the question. The hopelessly question begging advice that if you’re interested in generally interesting problems, gratifying your interest energetically is the best way to prepare yourself for a startup and probably best way to live. 当初我做YC孵化器，纯粹是觉得这事有意思。我好像天生自带指南针，总能找到有趣的事。不过今天要说的不是我的经验——你们脑子里装着什么，我可猜不透。或许再琢磨琢磨，我能总结出几条判断”真有趣点子”的套路。但现在，我只能给个看似废话的建议。这个看似废话的建议就是：如果你对某些公认有趣的问题感兴趣，那么全力以赴满足这种好奇心——这既是创业的最佳准备，或许也是最好活法。

Although I can’t explain in the general case what counts as an interesting problem I can tell you about a large subset of them. If you think of technology as something that’s spreading like a sort of fractal stain, every point on the edge represents an interesting problem. Steam engine not so much maybe you never know. One guaranteed way to turn your mind into the type to start up ideas for them unconsciously. Is to get yourself to the leading edge of some technology. 虽然我无法一概而论什么才算有趣的问题，但可以告诉你一大类典型案例：如果把科技发展想象成一片不断扩散的分形图，边缘的每个触点都代表一个有趣命题。（蒸汽机技术可能不算？但谁说得准呢）。有个绝对管用的方法能让你自然而然地产生创业灵感：让自己站到某项技术的最前沿——当你的思维被前沿科技浸润时，好点子自会源源不断冒出来。

To, as Paul Buchheit put it, “Live in the future.” And when you get there, ideas that seem uncannily prescient to other people will seem obvious to you. You may not realize they’re start up ideas, but you will know they are something that ought to exist. 正如保罗·布赫海特所言，要”活在未来”。当你真正抵达未来时，那些在旁人看来神准的预见，对你而言不过是显而易见的事实。你可能不会意识到这些就是创业点子，但你会笃定：这些东西本就应该存在。

【译注：保罗·布赫海特（Paul Buchheit），Gmail创始人、硅谷传奇工程师】

For example back at Harvard in the mid 90s. A fellow grad student of my friends Robert and Trevor wrote his own voice over IP software. It wasn’t meant to be a startup, he never tried to turn it into one. He just wanted to talk to his girlfriend in Taiwan without paying for long distance calls. Since he was an expert on networks, it seemed obvious to him that thing to do was to turn the sound into packets and ship them over the internet for free. Why didn’t everybody do this? They were not good at writing this type of software. He never did anything with this. He never tried to turn this into a startup. That is how the best startups tend to happen. 举个典型的例子：90年代中期在哈佛，我朋友罗伯特和特雷弗的一位研究生同学，自己写了套网络电话软件。他压根没想创业，纯粹是为了和台湾的女友煲电话粥省长途费。作为网络专家，他觉得把声音打包成数据通过互联网免费传输是再自然不过的事，当时他还纳闷：这么简单的事怎么没人做？答案很简单：多数人写不来这种软件。后来他也没把这套软件商业化——恰恰是这样的无心插柳，往往孕育出最成功的创业。

Strangely enough the optimal thing to do in college if you want to be a successful startup founder is not some sort of new vocational version of college focused on entrepreneurship. It’s the classic version of college is education its own sake. If you want to start your own startup what you should do in college is learn powerful things and if you have genuine intellectual curiosity that’s what you’ll naturally tend to do if you just follow your own inclinations. The component of entrepreneurship, can never quite say that word with a straight face, that really matters is domain expertise. Larry Page is Larry Page because he was an expert on search and the way he became an expert on search was because he was genuinely interested and not because of some ulterior motive. At its best starting a startup is merely a ulterior motive for curiosity and you’ll do it best if you introduce the ulterior motive at the end of the process. So here is ultimate advice for young would be startup founders reduced to two words: just learn. 说来有趣，想成为成功的创业创始人，在大学最该做的根本不是参加那些职业化的创业培训，而是回归传统教育的本质——纯粹为了学习而学习。如果你真想创业，在大学里就该去钻研那些真正有深度的东西。只要你保持纯粹的知识好奇心，顺着自己的兴趣走，自然会做到这一点。至于创业成功的关键，说实话，我每次说”创业”这个词都觉得有点装，归根结底还是专业领域的深厚积累。拉里·佩奇之所以成为拉里·佩奇，正因他是搜索技术专家；而他成为专家的原因，纯粹是出于发自内心的兴趣，而非别有用心。创业的最高境界，不过是给好奇心披上件功利外衣——且唯有把这层外衣留到探索旅程的终点穿上，才能成就最伟大的创业。因此，对于年轻的未来创始人们，我的终极建议可浓缩为两个字：去学。

Alright how much time do we have left? Eighteen minutes for questions good god. Do you guys have the questions? 好吧，我们还剩多少时间？18分钟提问时间。你们有问题吗？

Q: Sure we will start with two questions. How can a nontechnical founder most efficiently contribute to a startup? 问：当然，我们先从两个问题开始。对于非技术背景的创始人来说，如何最高效地为初创企业创造价值？

A: If the startup is, if the startup is working in some domain, if it’s not a pure technology startup but is working in some very specific domain, like if it is Uber and the non technical founder was an expert in the limo business then actually then the non technical founder would be doing most of the work. 答： 如果这家创业公司涉足的是某个特定领域（而非纯技术型创业），比如像Uber这样的企业，而创始人恰好是豪华轿车行业的专家——那么实际上，这位非技术背景的创始人反而会承担大部分核心工作。

Recruiting drivers and doing whatever else Uber has to do and the technical founder would be just writing the iPhone app which probably less, well iPhone and android app, which is less than half of it. If it’s purely a technical start up the non technical founder does sales and brings coffee and cheeseburgers to the programmer. 答： 如果公司业务涉及特定领域（比如Uber这样的网约车平台），非技术创始人（比如熟悉豪华轿车行业的高管）反而会成为主力——他们负责招募司机、处理运营事务等核心工作，而技术合伙人可能只需开发手机应用（iOS和Android版本），这部分工作量甚至不到一半。但如果是纯技术型创业，非技术创始人往往只能做些边缘工作：跑销售、给程序员送咖啡和汉堡之类的杂活。

Q: Do you see any value in business school for people who want to pursue entrepreneurship? 问：你认为商学院对想从事创业的人有什么价值吗？

A: Basically no, it sounds undiplomatic, but business school was designed to teach people management. Management is a problem that you only have in a startup if you are sufficiently successful. So really what you need to know early on to make a start up successful is developing products. You would be better off going to design school if you would want to go to some sort of school. Although frankly the way to learn how to do it is just to do it.One of the things I got wrong early on is that I advised people who were interested in starting a startup to go work for some other company for a few years before starting their own. Honestly the best way to learn on how to start a startup is just to just try to start it. 答：基本没有，虽然这话不太中听，但商学院本质是教管理的。而管理问题，只有当你创业足够成功时才会遇到。真正能让初创公司活下来的早期核心能力，是产品开发。如果非要上学，设计学院都比商学院靠谱。不过说真的，学会创业的唯一方法就是：直接动手干。我早期犯的一个错误是：曾建议那些想创业的人先去其他公司工作几年。但说实话，学习创业最好的方式就是直接动手尝试。

You may not be successful but you will learn faster if you just do it. Business schools are trying really hard to do this. They were designed to train the officer core of large companies, which is what business seemed to be back when it was a choice to be either the officer core of large companies or Joe’s Shoe Store. Then there was this new thing, Apple, that started as small as Joe’s Shoe Store and turns into this giant mega company but they were not designed for that world they are good at what they’re good at. They should just do that and screw this whole entrepreneurship thing. 你未必能成功，但直接行动会让你进步更快。商学院正在拼命追赶创业热潮，但它们本质上是为了培养大公司的管理层——在那个”要么进大公司当高管，要么开街角鞋店”的商业旧时代设计的。后来出现了苹果这样的异类：起步时和街角鞋店一样小，最终却成长为巨头。商学院根本不适应这个新世界。它们应该继续专注自己擅长的领域，培养职业经理人，而不是硬凑创业的热闹。

Q: Management is a problem only if you are successful. What about those first two or three people? 问：管理问题确实只在公司成功后才凸显。那么对于初创阶段的两三位核心成员，该如何处理协作问题？

A: Ideally you are successful before you even hire two or three people. Ideally you don’t even have two or three people for quite awhile. When you do the first hires in a startup they are almost like founders. They should be motivated by the same things, they can’t be people you have to manage. This is not like the office, these have to be your peers, you shouldn’t have to manage them much. 答： 理想情况下，在招聘两三个人之前，公司就应该已经走上正轨了。事实上，创业初期根本不需要那么多人手。当你真正开始招人时，这些早期员工几乎就是联合创始人——他们应该和创始人有着相同的动力源泉，根本不需要你去”管理”。这不是在经营传统公司，这些人是你的创业伙伴，你们之间不需要太多层级管理。

Q: So is it just a big no no, someone has to be managed no way they should be on the founding team. 问：所以这是绝对禁忌吗？如果某个成员需要被管理，就完全没资格进入创始团队？

A: In the case were you are doing something were you need some super advanced technical thing and there is some boffin that knows this thing and no one else in this world including on how to wipe his mouth. It may be to your advantage to hire said boffin and wipe his mouth for him. As a general rule you want people who are self motivated early on they should just be like founders. 答：只有一种例外情况——当你的项目需要某项尖端技术，而全世界只有某个天才怪才掌握这门手艺，包括怎么给他擦嘴这种事都得你操心。这时候，雇佣这位大神并伺候他可能是值得的。但黄金法则始终是：早期团队成员必须像创始人一样自我驱动。

Q: Do you think we are currently in a bubble? 问：您认为当前市场是否存在泡沫？

A: I’ll give you two answers to this question. One, ask me questions that are useful to this audience because these people are here to learn how to start startups, and I have more data in my head than anybody else and you’re asking me questions a reporter does because they cannot think of anything interesting to ask. I will answer your question. There is a difference between prices merely being high and a bubble. A bubble is a very specific form of prices being high where people knowingly pay high prices for something in the hope that they will be able to unload it later on some greater fool. That’s what happened in the late 90’s, when VC’s knowingly invested in bullshit startups thinking that they would be able to take those things public and unload them on other retail investors before everything blew up 答： 关于这个问题，我有两个层面的回应。首先，请提出对这个群体真正有价值的问题——在座的各位是来学习如何创业的，而我掌握着比任何人都更丰富的行业洞见，你却问了一个记者式的肤浅问题（这通常是因为想不出真正有深度的提问）。不过，我仍然会回答你：价格高涨 ≠ 泡沫。泡沫是价格虚高的一种特殊形态，其核心特征是：人们明知价格不合理，却仍愿意高价买入，指望未来能找到”更大的傻瓜”接盘。这正是90年代末的真实写照：风投们心知肚明地投资垃圾项目，盘算着赶在崩盘前推动IPO，把烂摊子甩给散户投资者。

【译注：IPO（首次公开募股） 是指一家私有公司首次向公众发行股票，从而在证券交易所挂牌上市的过程】

I was there for that at the epicenter of it all. That is not what is happening today. Prices are high, valuations are high, but valuations being high does not mean a bubble. Every commodity has prices that go up and down in some sort of sine wave. Definitely prices are high. We tell people if you raise money, don’t think the next time you raise money it’s going to be so easy, who knows maybe between now and then the Chinese economy will have exploded then there’s a giant disaster recession. Assume the worst. But bubble? No. 我曾亲历过这场风暴的中心。但如今的局面完全不同：虽然价格高企、估值膨胀，但估值高绝不等于泡沫。所有商品的价格都会像正弦波一样上下波动。当前价格确实处于高位，我们常提醒创业者：如果你本轮融资顺利，千万别假设下一轮也会同样轻松——谁知道中途会不会爆发中国经济危机或大萧条？必须做最坏打算。但要说这是泡沫？绝非如此。

Q: I am seeing a trend among young people and successful entrepreneurs where they don’t want to start one great company but twenty. You are starting to see a rise in these labs attempts were they are going to try to launch a whole bunch of stuff, I don’t have any stellar examples yet. 问：我注意到一个趋势：越来越多的年轻人和成功企业家不再满足于创建一家伟大的公司，而是想同时孵化二十家。现在逐渐兴起各种”创业实验室”模式，试图批量孵化项目——虽然目前还没有特别成功的案例。

A: Do you mean like IDEO? 答：你指的是像IDEO（著名设计咨询公司）这样的模式吗？

Q: No, like Idealab , Garrett Camp’s new one… 问：不，是指像Idealab、 加勒特·坎普新成立的那种机构

【译注：Idealab：美国著名创业孵化器，由比尔·格罗斯创立，专注批量孵化科技项目； 加勒特·坎普：Uber联合创始人；IDEO侧重创新方法论输出，Idealab类机构专注科技创业批量生产】

A: Oh yeah. There’s this new thing were people start labs that are supposed to spin off startups. It might work, that’s how Twitter started. In fact, I meant Idealab, not IDEO, that was another Freudian slip. Twitter was not Twitter at first. Twitter was a side project at a company called Odeo that was supposed to be in the podcasting business, and you like podcasting business, do those words even grammatically go together? The answer turned out to be no as Evan discovered. As a side project they spun off Twitter and boy was that a dog wagging tail, people are starting these things that are supposed to spin off startups, will it work? Quite possibly if the right people do it. You can’t do it though, because you have to do it with your own money. 答：哦对，现在确实兴起了一种新模式——人们成立实验室专门孵化创业公司。这种模式或许能成，Twitter就是这样诞生的。其实我刚想说Idealab却说成了IDEO，又是口误，推特最初根本不是推特，它只是Odeo公司（一家做播客业务的公司——话说”播客业务”这词组语法通吗？后来埃文发现确实不通）的一个副项目。结果这个副产品却成了摇钱树。现在有人专门搞这种孵化器，能成功吗？如果由合适的人操盘，很有可能。不过你搞不了，因为得用自己的钱玩。

Q: What advice do you have for female co-founders as they are pursuing funding? 问：对于女性联合创始人在融资方面，您有什么建议？

A: It probably is true that women have a harder time raising money. I have noticed this empirically and Jessica is just about to publish a bunch of interviews on female founders and a lot of them said that they thought they had a harder time raising money, too. Remember I said the way to raise money? Make your start up actually do well and that’s just especially true in any case if you miss the ideal target from the VC’s point of view in any respect. The way to solve that problem is make the startup do really well. In fact, there was a point a year or two ago when I tweeted this growth graph of this company and I didn’t say who they were. I knew it would get people to start asking and it was actually a female founded startup that was having trouble raising money, but their growth graph was stupendous. So I tweeted it, knowing all these VC’s would start asking me, “Who is that?” Growth graphs have no gender, so if they see the growth graph first, let them fall in love with that. Do well, which is generally good advice for all startups. 答：女性创业者融资确实更难，这是个不争的事实。我自己就经常看到这种情况。杰西卡（Jessica）马上要发布一组对女性创始人的采访，很多人都提到融资时遇到了更多困难。还记得我怎么教大家融资吗？关键就是把公司做好。如果你在某些方面达不到投资人的理想标准，那就更要靠实打实的业绩说话。说白了，就是把公司做到极致出色。我举个真实例子：一两年前，我在推特上发过一家公司的增长曲线图，故意没写公司名字。果然很多投资人跑来问”这是哪家公司？”其实这是家女性创办的公司，当时融资很困难，但他们的增长数据简直惊人。记住：增长曲线没有性别之分，让投资人先被你的数据征服再说。这个道理对所有创业者都适用。

【译注：杰西卡，是硅谷创投圈的重量级人物，简单来说就是创业公司“造星者”】

Q: What would you learn in college right now? 问：如果现在去读大学，你会学什么？

A: Literary theory, no just kidding. Honestly, I think I might try and study physics that’s the thing I feel I missed. For some reason, when I was a kid computers were the thing, maybe they still are. I got very excited learning to write code and you can write real programs in your bedroom. You can’t build real accelerators, well maybe you can. Maybe physics, I noticed I sort of look longingly at physics so maybe. I don’t know if that’s going to be helpful starting a startup and I just told you to follow your own curiosity so who cares if it’s helpful, it’ll turn out to be helpful. 答：文学理论——开玩笑的啦！说真的，我可能会选物理，这是我觉得自己错过的东西。小时候不知怎么的，计算机成了我的全部（现在可能还是）。学编程那会儿特别兴奋，因为在卧室里就能写出真正的程序。但你可没法在卧室造粒子加速器…呃，或许也行？我发现自己总会用那种渴望的眼神看物理学，所以…也许就它了？虽然不确定这对创业有没有帮助——可我刚说过要追随好奇心不是么？管它有没有用，最后肯定会有用的。

Q: What are your reoccurring systems in your work and personal life that make you efficient? 问：你在工作和生活中哪些反复使用的系统方法，让你保持高效？

A: Having kids is a good way to be efficient. Because you have no time left so if you want to get anything done, the amount of done you do per time is high. Actually many parents, start up founders who have kids have made that point explicitly. They cause you to focus because you have no choice. 答： 养孩子其实是提升效率的绝佳方法。因为你根本挤不出时间，所以如果想做成点事，单位时间内的产出反而会更高。事实上，很多创业父母都明确提到过这点——孩子能逼你进入高度专注状态，毕竟你已别无选择。

I wouldn’t actually recommend having kids just to make you more focused. You know, I don’t think I am very efficient, I have two ways of getting work done. One is during Y Combinator, the way I worked on Y Combinator is I was forced to. I had to set the application deadline, and then people would apply, and then there were all these applications that I had to respond to by a certain time. So I had to read them and I knew if I read them badly, we would get bad startups so I tried really hard to read them well. So I set up this situation that forced me to work. The other kind of work I do is writing essays. And I do that voluntarily, I am walking down the street and the essay starts writing itself in my head. I either force myself to work on less exciting things; I can’t help working on exciting things. I don’t have any useful techniques for making myself efficient. If you work on things you like, you don’t have to force yourself to be efficient. 答： 说真的，我不建议为了提升专注力就去生孩子。其实我也不算高效，我只有两种工作模式：第一种是在YC孵化器期间——完全是被逼出来的效率。设定申请截止日后，海量申请涌来，必须在限定时间审完。我知道如果敷衍了事，选中的就会是垃圾项目，所以只能全力以赴。这就是用制度倒逼自己干活。第二种是写文章，这完全出于自发。走在街上时，文章会自动在脑海里成型。枯燥的事需要强逼自己去做，但有趣的事根本停不下来。说实话，我没什么效率技巧。只要做你热爱的事，根本不需要刻意追求效率。

Q: When is a good time to turn a side project into a startup? 问：什么时候是将副业项目转变为初创企业的好时机？

A: You will know, right. So the question is when you turn a side project into a startup, you will know that it is becoming a real startup when it takes over a alarming large percentage of your life, right. My god I’ve just spent all day working on this thing that’s supposed to be a side project, I am going to fail all of my classes what am I going to do, right. Then maybe it’s turning into a startup. 答： 你自然会感觉到。关键就在于——当一个副业项目开始蚕食你生活中大块大块的时间，那种”不对劲”的侵占感出现时，你就该明白：这东西正在变成真正的创业项目了。”天啊！我居然花了一整天搞这个副业——这下真要挂科了！怎么办？…等等，干脆把它变成创业项目得了！”

Q: I know you talked a lot, earlier, about you’ll know when your start up is doing extremely well, but I feel like in a lot of cases it’s a gray line, where you have some users but not explosive growth that is up and to the right, what would you do or what would you recommend in those situations? Considering allocating time and resources, how do you balance? 问： 你之前多次提到”公司发展得好自然能感觉到”，但现实中很多情况是处于灰色地带——比如已有部分用户，却未达到那种指数级的”右上角增长曲线”。在这种情况下，你会如何建议创业者分配时间和资源？该怎么权衡取舍？

【译注：”右上角增长曲线”指企业关键指标（如用户/收入）随时间推移形成持续向右上方攀升的指数级增长轨迹】

A: When a start up is growing but not much. Didn’t you tell them they were supposed to read Do Things that Don’t Scale? You sir have not done the readings, you are busted. Because there are four, I wrote a whole essay answered that question and that is to do things that don’t scale. Just go read that, because I can’t remember everything I said. It’s about exactly that problem. 答：当一家创业公司增长缓慢时…等等，你难道没让他们读《反规模化的运营之道》（ Do Things that Don’t Scale ）那篇文章吗？ 这位同学，你压根没预习阅读材料啊——你暴露了！因为针对这个问题，我专门写过一篇文章，整整四个章节！。答案很简单：去做那些无法规模化的事。自己翻出来重读吧，我可记不住自己说过的每句话，但那篇文章讲的就是这个困境。

Q: What kind of startup should not go through incubation, in your opinion? 问：在你看来，什么样的创业公司不适合参加孵化器？

A: Definitely any that will fail. Or if you’ll succeed but you’re an intolerable person. That also Sam would probably sooner do without. Short of that, I cannot think of any, because a large percentage, founders are often surprised by how large a percentage of the problems that start ups have are the same regardless of what type of thing they’re working on. And those tend to be kind of problems that YC helps the most not the ones that are domain specific. Can you think of the class of startups? That YC wouldn’t work for? We had fission and fusion startups in the last batch. 答：毫无疑问，注定失败的项目肯定不行。还有一种情况——即便项目能成，但创始人是个让人忍无可忍的混蛋，山姆（Sam Altman）估计也会直接拒掉。除此之外，我真想不出还有什么类型不适合了。因为很多创始人都会惊讶地发现：无论做什么领域，初创公司80%的问题都是相通的。而YC最擅长的，恰恰是解决这类共性难题，而不是某个垂直领域的技术瓶颈。你们能想到哪类项目不适合YC吗？我们上一批就孵化了核裂变和核聚变这种超高门槛的创业公司。

【译注：山姆·奥尔特曼（Sam Altman）是硅谷传奇人物，现任OpenAI CEO、YC创业孵化器前总裁】

Q: You mentioned that it’s good advice to learn a lot about something that matters, what are some good strategies to figure out what matters? 问：你提到”深耕重要领域”是个好建议，那如何判断什么才是真正重要的？有哪些实用的评估策略？

A: If you think of technology as something that’s spreading as a sort of fractal stain. Anything on the edge represents an interesting idea, sounds familiar. Like I said that was the problem, you have correctly identified the thing I didn’t really answer the question were I gave this question begging answer. I said I’m interested in interesting things and you said you were interested in interesting things, work on them and things will work out. 答：如果把技术发展比作不断扩散的分形图，那么前沿领域的每个触点都代表着一个有趣的想法——听起来耳熟吧？就像我之前说的，这正是问题所在：你精准指出了我在回避实质——我给出了一个循环论证的答案。我说”我对有趣的东西感兴趣”，你说”我也对有趣的东西感兴趣，专注去做就会成功”。这根本不算真正的回答。

How do you tell what is a real problem? I don’t know, that’s like important enough to write a whole essay about. I don’t know the answer and I probably should write something about that, but I don’t know. I figured out a technique for detecting whether you have a taste for generally interesting problems. Which is whether you find working on boring things intolerable and there are known boring things. Like literary theory and working in middle management in some large company. So if you can tolerate those things, then you must have stupendous self-discipline or you don’t have a taste for genially interesting problems and vice versa. 如何判断一个问题是否真正重要？说实话我不知道——这问题值得专门写篇文章探讨。虽然我还没想明白答案，但确实该好好研究下。不过我倒发现一个鉴别标准：看你对无聊工作的忍耐度。比如文学理论研究，或者在大公司当中层管理这类公认枯燥的事——如果你能忍受这些，要么你拥有惊人的自律，要么你天生就对真正有趣的问题缺乏嗅觉，反之亦然。

Q: Do you like Snapchat? 问：你喜欢用 闪拍（Snapchat） 吗？

【译注：闪拍（Snapchat） ，一款主打”阅后即焚”（发完即消失）的欧美年轻人社交软件】

A: Snapchat? What do I know about Snapchat? We didn’t fund them. I want another question. 答：Snapchat？我压根不了解Snapchat，因为我们YC没投资过。问点别的吧！

Q: If you hire people you like, you might get a monoculture and how do you deal with the blind spots that arise? 问：如果只招聘自己喜欢的人，团队可能会陷入”同质化陷阱”——这种情况下，如何应对由此产生的认知盲区？

A: Starting a startup is where many things will be going wrong. You can’t expect it to be perfect. The advantage is of hiring people you know and like are far greater than the small disadvantage of having some monoculture. You look at it empirically, at all the most successful startups, someone just hires all their pals out of college. 答： 创业本身就是问题百出的过程，别指望完美无缺。雇佣熟悉且喜欢的人带来的优势，远超过团队同质化那点微不足道的弊端。实证来看，所有最成功的创业公司，最初往往都是创始人拉上校友哥们儿干起来的。

Alright you guys thank you. 好了，谢谢你们。