What We Look for in Founders - Paul Graham  ## Metadata - Author: **Paul Graham** - Full Title: What We Look for in Founders - Category: #articles - URL: http://www.paulgraham.com/founders.html ## Highlights - as long as you're over a certain threshold of intelligence, what matters most is determination. You're going to hit a lot of obstacles. You can't be the sort of person who gets [demoralized](http://paulgraham.com/die.html) easily ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3x9x6fv02ttsrkm4aahmsx)) - Bill Clerico and Rich Aberman of [WePay](http://wepay.com) are a good example. They're doing a finance startup, which means endless negotiations with big, bureaucratic companies. When you're starting a startup that depends on deals with big companies to exist, it often feels like they're trying to ignore you out of existence. But when Bill Clerico starts calling you, you may as well do what he asks, because he is not going away. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3xbnw6555wer75byfsvhk0)) - The world of startups is so unpredictable that you need to be able to modify your dreams on the fly. The best metaphor I've found for the combination of determination and flexibility you need is a [running back](http://paulgraham.com/relres.html) ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3xnx9yvaa1e4qfmf4wnfyf)) - In the startup world, most good ideas [seem bad](http://paulgraham.com/googles.html) initially. If they were obviously good, someone would already be doing them. So you need the kind of intelligence that produces ideas with just the right level of craziness. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3xpaexhfxr05p8crn5abmt)) - Sam Altman of [Loopt](http://loopt.com) is one of the most successful alumni, so we asked him what question we could put on the Y Combinator application that would help us discover more people like him. He said to ask about a time when they'd hacked something to their advantage—hacked in the sense of beating the system, not breaking into computers ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3xt3xc64fvsqmmpaz4fjc4)) - They must genuinely like one another, and work well together. Startups do to the relationship between the founders what a dog does to a sock: if it can be pulled apart, it will be. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01hh3xxe4fe36db25ed0dewmpq))