applications from startups around the world. The Admissions Team is responsible for designing that process and reviewing the tens of thousands of applications we receive each year.</p>\n<p>How do we review that many applications? Mostly, it&#8217;s lots of people reading lots of applications! There&#8217;s no secret machine learning model that can find companies with great potential. Instead, we build lots of custom software to help our team work efficiently. Our app reading software allows us to quickly read applications, send messages to founders if we have any questions, and decide which teams we want to interview.</p>\n<h2>History of the Admissions Team</h2>\n<p>When YC first started, the admissions process was pretty manual. YC’s 4 founders printed out the applications, wrote comments in the margin, and passed them around the room. As the batches started to grow, Paul Graham wrote the first software to accept and process applications (it was originally part of the same code that powered <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"http://news.ycombinator.com/">Hacker News</a>!). By 2014, YC was receiving 3,000 applications per batch, PG retired, and we moved to our current application software. Then in 2016, the Admissions Team was created and began to hire more people to review applications, analyze data, and update the application. Today, a team of 5 runs the admissions process.</p>\n<h2>What’s unique about the Admissions Team?</h2>\n<p>The Admissions Team is powered by human judgement, but it couldn’t work at YC’s scale without software. Sometimes, our problems can be solved by software (like automatic parsing of a founder’s responses), but sometimes it&#8217;s a human problem (how should we evaluate teams that haven’t launched yet?). This interaction between humans and software is always changing. Each admissions cycle brings more applications than the previous one and our system is always being pushed to the limit in unexpected ways.</p>\n<h2>What are some projects we&#8217;ve recently worked on?</h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Rewriting our software to video interview teams (instead of flying<br />\nteams to California).</li>\n<li>Building new internal tools to allow us to do interviews more often<br />\n(like the <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://blog.ycombinator.com/early-deadline-for-yc-winter-2022//">early interviews</a> we&#8217;ve been running this year).</li>\n<li>Reviewing applications we didn’t fund but that raised money from<br />\nother investors, to learn how to improve our application reading and<br />\ninterview process.</li>\n<li>Analyzing YC application data — for example, we looked at whether<br />\nrepeat applications hurt a team’s chances of being funded. (It turns<br />\nout they don’t! Teams that re-apply and have made progress since<br />\ntheir first app are much more likely to get into YC.)</li>\n<li>Working with the Outreach and <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.startupschool.org//">Startup School</a> teams to get more teams<br />\napplying to YC.</li>\n</ul>\n<p>The thing I love about the Admissions Team is that we have a lot of autonomy to experiment and change our process. It’s also incredibly exciting to read all of these ideas which may someday change the world. If you&#8217;re interested in joining our team, we&#8217;re hiring <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/careers?ashby_jid=ef00c8d1-76e7-4cc3-82fe-7cc3e4679652\%22>Software Engineers</a> to improve our software and <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/careers?ashby_jid=c8a4c1c8-9410-479f-86e7-cb2c1ca35e32\%22>Admissions Associates</a> to read applications.</p>\n<!--kg-card-end: html-->","comment_id":"1104891","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/2022/02/BlogTwitter-Image-Template-2.png","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2021-08-19T02:00:13.000-07:00","updated_at":"2022-06-24T15:16:36.000-07:00","published_at":"2021-08-19T02:00:13.000-07:00","custom_excerpt":"Twice a year, YC accepts applications from startups around the world. 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During sessions, you will hear from women who joined startups as early engineers, meet YC alumni and alumni company engineering managers, and build a community of peers. The program will culminate in at least two interviews for each participant.</p>\n<p>Topics discussed will include:</p>\n<ul>\n<li>Why join a startup? What are the pros and cons? </li>\n<li>How do you determine where you should work and what should you look for in a startup and founding team?</li>\n<li>How to prepare for the interview process and interview practice</li>\n</ul>\n<p>Each session, we will also host small breakout sessions with founders, engineers and managers across a range of YC startups &#8212; from early stage to growth &#8212; including:</p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">Christina Caccioppo, Cofounder &#038; CEO of Vanta</a></li>\n<li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">Cadran Cowansage, Cofounder &#038; CEO of Elpha</a></li>\n<li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">Diana Hu, Cofounder &#038; CTO of Escher Reality and YC Visiting Partner</a></li>\n<li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">Lucia Huang, Cofounder &#038; CEO of Osmind</a></li>\n<li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">Reshma Khilnani, Cofounder &#038; CTO of MedXT and YC Visiting Partner</a></li>\n</ul>\n<p>If you are currently an engineer working at a tech company and you’re looking for your next role and might want to transition to a startup, this series is for you.</p>\n<p>To apply for the program, visit <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">YC&#8217;s Work at a Startup</a> and create a profile by September 13th. (Note that profiles are visible to YC founders and hiring managers at YC startups. If you&#8217;re not ready to share your profile or look for a job, please specify so on the application.)</p>\n<p><b><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021

/n

At YC, we use an inclusive definition of “women” and welcome trans women as well as genderqueer and non-binary people who identify as women or femme in any way.</i></p>\n<!--kg-card-end: html-->","comment_id":"1104901","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/wordpress/2021/08/YC-Jobs-Series-Women-Eng-in-Startups.jpeg","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2021-08-26T03:24:01.000-07:00","updated_at":"2021-10-20T10:51:47.000-07:00","published_at":"2021-08-26T03:24:01.000-07:00","custom_excerpt":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"custom_template":null,"canonical_url":null,"authors":[{"id":"61fe29e3c7139e0001a710a2","name":"Kat Mañalac","slug":"kat-manalac","profile_image":"https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/c15939b217561ebda4c129bfea5f65f3?s=512&d=mm&r=g","cover_image":null,"bio":"Kat is the Managing Outreach Officer at YC. 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At a startup, you’ll jump into real projects and work with founders to solve mission-critical problems. </p><p>YC startups are actively looking for summer interns across engineering, marketing, and other disciplines. If you’re an undergraduate or graduate student, apply below to join our summer 2022 cohort.</p><p>When you intern at a YC startup, in addition to hands-on startup experience, you’ll have access to the YC community. You’ll attend closed-door talks with YC founders to hear their lessons learned, and you’ll be part of a strong cohort of fellow students, engineers, and builders at other YC startups. </p><p>Here’s a sneak preview of a few of the many rapidly growing YC startups that you could join: </p><ul><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/whatnot/">Whatnot (W20)</a> is a livestream shopping platform and marketplace that is building the future of ecommerce: an interactive community where creators can make a living off their passion. Whatnot is looking for a software engineer to build new features and implement growth strategies.</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/volley/">Volley (W18)</a> builds voice-controlled entertainment experiences for Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and smartphones. Volley aims to become the go-to hub for interactive audio entertainment, as Netflix did for television. Their 35-person team is looking for social media &amp; marketing and software engineering interns.</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/holy-grail-inc/">Holy Grail (S19)</a> uses electrons to capture CO2 from the atmosphere. Holy Grail, based in Mountain View, CA, has roles available for mechanical engineers, product designers, backend/data engineers and operations to help bring their modular CO2 scrubbers to market.</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/alinea/">Alinea (W21)</a> is an investing app for Gen Zs who want to understand the companies they’re investing in. This women-founded team is looking for NYC-based iOS engineering and software engineering interns. </li></ul><p>If you’re up for the challenge, apply to join our summer 2022 cohort!</p><!--kg-card-begin: html--><center>\n<a class=\"ycdc-retro-btn ycdc-retro-btn-gold mt-[-10px] ml-[13px]\" href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/internships/?utm_source=ycblog\%22 style=\"text-decoration: none;\" title=\"YC Internship Program, Summer 2022 Cohort\" target=\"_blank\">Apply Now</a>\n</center><!--kg-card-end: html-->","comment_id":"622285919235bd0001dc9f77","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/2022/03/yc-internships-2022.png","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2022-03-04T13:33:05.000-08:00","updated_at":"2022-03-09T08:59:47.000-08:00","published_at":"2022-03-09T08:59:47.000-08:00","custom_excerpt":"YC startups are actively looking for summer interns across engineering, marketing, and more. 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","reading_time":1,"access":true,"og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/content/images/2022/03/yc-internships-2022-2-1.png","twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":"YC startups are actively looking for summer interns. Apply now to join YC's Summer 2022 Internship Cohort! ","meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"email_subject":null,"frontmatter":null,"feature_image_alt":null,"feature_image_caption":null},{"id":"62cd8a8040d57c0001d58992","uuid":"e38a4797-570d-4e20-8566-2a77e7e96a92","title":"6 founding engineer roles at W22 YC startups","slug":"founding-engineer-roles-at-yc-startups","html":"<p>The <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/jobs/">YC job board</a> has always been the best way to find early roles at funded and vetted YC startups. 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New startups can use our hosted pre-built UIs which provide the simplest possible integration right out of the box.</li><li><strong>What stands out: </strong>Solo founder with eng and leadership experience from Palantir and SafeGraph. Deep experience in ML/NLP tech and product-led development. CMU grad.</li><li><strong>Comp &amp; equity: </strong>$130k - $160k, 0.50% - 2.00%</li></ul><p><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/rally-2/jobs/FYFNiTn-founding-software-engineer-product/">2.) Founding Software Engineer (Product) at Rally (W22)</strong></a></p><ul><li><strong>About the role: </strong>We're building the world’s best User Research CRM - a platform that automates outreach, screening, scheduling, incentives, and participant tracking, all in one place.</li><li><strong>What stands out: </strong>Work directly with the founder/CTO and own large portions of the product. Founders previously worked at Facebook and Hubspot. </li><li><strong>Comp &amp; equity: </strong>$100k - $150k, 0.50% - 1.50%</li></ul><p><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/mutableai/jobs/qnjnCR3-founding-full-stack-software-engineer/">3.) Founding Full Stack Software Engineer at MutableAI (W22)</strong></a></p><ul><li><strong>About the company: </strong>Our long term mission: to enable programmers to massively decrease the time to create high quality production code in all languages using AI.</li><li><strong>What stands out: </strong>Solo founder was PhD candidate in physics-turned-software engineer. Previously worked at Google and Apple. </li><li><strong>Comp &amp; equity: </strong>$100k - $180k, 0.50% - 2.00%</li></ul><p><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/vessel/jobs/JeIBiSj-founding-engineer/">4.) 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Founding Engineer at Windmill (S22)</strong></a></p><ul><li><strong>About the company: </strong>Windmill (windmill.dev) is an open-source &amp; self-hostable developer platform for multi-step automation &amp; internal tools.</li><li><strong>About the role: </strong>As a developer, be a user of your own product and contribute to product ideas and development.</li><li><strong>Comp &amp; equity: </strong>$70k - $110k, 0.25% - 2.00%</li></ul><p><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/permitflow/jobs/axcfyjc-founding-software-engineer/">6.) Founding Software Engineer at Permitflow (W22)</strong></a></p><ul><li><strong>About the company: </strong>PermitFlow is TurboTax for construction permitting. We are on a mission to streamline and simplify construction permitting in the United States, unlocking more value in the $1.6 trillion construction market. </li><li><strong>What stands out: </strong>Regulatory &amp; operational-driven industry being tackled with software. Has early customers and already generating revenue. </li><li><strong>Comp &amp; equity: </strong>$140k - $180k, 0.50% - 2.00%</li></ul>","comment_id":"62cd8a8040d57c0001d58992","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/2022/07/6-founding-engineer-roles-at-W22-YC-startups--1--2.png","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2022-07-12T07:51:44.000-07:00","updated_at":"2022-07-13T09:41:36.000-07:00","published_at":"2022-07-12T12:59:47.000-07:00","custom_excerpt":"The YC job board has always been the best way to find early roles at funded and vetted YC startups. 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Inside YC: The Admissions Team

by Mark Thurman8/19/2021

Twice a year, YC accepts applications from startups around the world. The Admissions Team is responsible for designing that process and reviewing the tens of thousands of applications we receive each year.

How do we review that many applications? Mostly, it’s lots of people reading lots of applications! There’s no secret machine learning model that can find companies with great potential. Instead, we build lots of custom software to help our team work efficiently. Our app reading software allows us to quickly read applications, send messages to founders if we have any questions, and decide which teams we want to interview.

History of the Admissions Team

When YC first started, the admissions process was pretty manual. YC’s 4 founders printed out the applications, wrote comments in the margin, and passed them around the room. As the batches started to grow, Paul Graham wrote the first software to accept and process applications (it was originally part of the same code that powered Hacker News!). By 2014, YC was receiving 3,000 applications per batch, PG retired, and we moved to our current application software. Then in 2016, the Admissions Team was created and began to hire more people to review applications, analyze data, and update the application. Today, a team of 5 runs the admissions process.

What’s unique about the Admissions Team?

The Admissions Team is powered by human judgement, but it couldn’t work at YC’s scale without software. Sometimes, our problems can be solved by software (like automatic parsing of a founder’s responses), but sometimes it’s a human problem (how should we evaluate teams that haven’t launched yet?). This interaction between humans and software is always changing. Each admissions cycle brings more applications than the previous one and our system is always being pushed to the limit in unexpected ways.

What are some projects we’ve recently worked on?

  • Rewriting our software to video interview teams (instead of flying
    teams to California).
  • Building new internal tools to allow us to do interviews more often
    (like the early interviews we’ve been running this year).
  • Reviewing applications we didn’t fund but that raised money from
    other investors, to learn how to improve our application reading and
    interview process.
  • Analyzing YC application data — for example, we looked at whether
    repeat applications hurt a team’s chances of being funded. (It turns
    out they don’t! Teams that re-apply and have made progress since
    their first app are much more likely to get into YC.)
  • Working with the Outreach and Startup School teams to get more teams
    applying to YC.

The thing I love about the Admissions Team is that we have a lot of autonomy to experiment and change our process. It’s also incredibly exciting to read all of these ideas which may someday change the world. If you’re interested in joining our team, we’re hiring Software Engineers to improve our software and Admissions Associates to read applications.

Author

  • Mark Thurman

    Mark is a Product Engineer on the YC Admissions team. Previously he worked on backend systems and API design for Evernote and App.net.