Want to Get Into Founder Mode? You Should Be So Lucky

Fledgling founders entering a three-month residency at Y Combinator often start their term with a bang: Brian Chesky, the cofounder and CEO of Airbnb, fires off an inspirational speech..

Y Combinator cofounder and nonresident guru Paul Graham (who years ago traipsed off to England and turned the enterprise over to a series of CEOs) reports that the talk so dazzled the budding tech moguls, alumni, and top investors that some were calling it the best talk they ever heard..

Specifically, Graham was moved by Cheskys confession that during Airbnbs rise, he listened to the investors who told him he needed professional management to help direct the company's growth..

Founder mode, which Graham predicts will one day get its closeup in management texts, really applies only to the most exceptional founders, the ones Steve Jobs once described as the crazy ones..

It's dramatically cheaper to start a company now than it was in the dot-com boom, and possible to build a substantial operation before requiring venture capital or achieving that liquidity event. (To pay salaries and costs during that time, one can get "angel funding"less money than a VC firm pays, but in exchange for less equity.) Software tools, which used to cost hundreds of thousands, are now largely free..

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