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Adora was very generous in making time in her busy life to talk with me, and I want to make sure all of you tune in to hear our discussion. She is a very interesting person with a story that shows that it’s not always easy to find your way, but if you persist and you work really hard, you can get a chance at making it. During the recording, we went over the time limit two times because of how much fun we were having. I want that to be something that everyone takes from these episodes. Namely, that 99% of the people you meet are similar to you in one way or another who are waiting to laugh and have impassioned discussions. I love to hear people laugh and talk about what they are interested in. In this talk, we get all of that, plus we get into the Ybio program, how people interact with her, the things she has learned traveling the world, the dark ages of her former company Homejoy, and a little bit of everything.

Stay tuned for my the Top 10 Things I learned from this episode. I will be putting out top 5-10 things from each of my episodes from now on, and going back to do the same to the past episodes as well!

Y Combinator website

The Top 21 Topics and Where to Find Them!

Go to show notes or to the website to click the timestamps to go to their position in the podcast.

1. [ 4:30 ] How to write a great email that gets a person’s attention.
2. [ 6:30 ] The key things she thinks about in regards to success.
3. [ 7:00 ] About her day, how Y Combinator works, and working with the companies.
4. [ 8:25 ] What startups are actually like on the inside vs how they are perceived on the outside.
5. [ 9:30 ] Learning about her outreach and recruiting tours.
6. [ 11:00 ] Changes in Startup funding: From having to know investors to just applying to YC.
7. [ 12:30 ] 30% of applicants from the last batch is international and the thoughts on that.
8. [ 15:30 ] How she is currently researching molecular biology (suggestions welcome).
9. [ 16:30 ] What YC and Ybio are looking for and thinking about. 
10. [ 19:00 ] Brick and Mortar, and why it one of the big things that is interesting her.
11. [ 24:30 ] New technology with Alexa-type technology to detect when people are in trouble, trying to find their keys, exercise, and more. 
12. [ 27:00 ] Microbiology type books and love of textbooks. 
13. [ 32:00 ] Blockchain explained and its benefits, such as to countries with poor buying power with their local currency.
14. [ 37:45 ] What you should do if you don’t have an idea for a company, but want to be involved with startups.
15. [ 39:00 ] How Yc internal is setup vs other firms.
16. [ 43:00 ] The things she pays attention to in order to determine if it a company and team will be successful.
17. [ 47:30 ] Don’t work with jackasses or be very selective.
18. [ 48:30] A Mark Twain quote she loves.
19. [ 49:00] The new Y bio program and the differences between their normal procedure of investment.
20. [ 53:30 ] Biotech RIO.
21. [ 57:55 ] If she’s found a mini-me yet and how she thinks about mentorship.