#119 - Amy Buechler and Michael Seibel

Amy Buechler is an executive coach for startup founders.

Michael Seibel is a partner and the CEO of YC.

In this episode we talk about coaching and use examples from Michael’s time working on Justin.tv and Socialcam.

You can find Amy at her site foundercoach.io and on Twitter at @amybue.

Michael is on Twitter at @mwseibel.

The YC podcast is hosted by Craig Cannon.

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Topics

00:00 - Intro

00:41 - What is coaching?

01:11 - How is coaching different from therapy?

2:31 - What are the most common challenges founders in coaching have?

3:26 - Challenges with roles and responsibilities at Twitch

7:46 - How would Amy have coached Michael around roles and responsibilities?

9:41 - Not being disruptive as a leader

11:31 - Switching roles at Twitch

12:46 - Uneven equity splits

15:01 - Distributing and negotiating equity

21:16 - Communicating your own value

22:51 - Can there be too much communication?

24:11 - Productive arguments

28:11 - Talking about performance issues

30:16 - Setting clear goals and managing motivation

33:16 - Enjoying the work

34:01 - Conversations about runway

36:51 - Digging your company out of the grave and continuing

40:21 - Michael being against coaching initially

42:31 - How to have hard conversations

44:16 - Removing a responsibility from someone

49:51 - Returning to roles and responsibilities

50:41 - Jeanie McCallister asks - What’s the single most important piece of advice you can give a founder?