This comment makes me so angry that it is difficult to remain calm, but I will try. You have this wrong. All three of us are in charge of so much more than you suggest here. We all participate in investment decisions and advise the companies on many different matters-- including business strategy. Since we started YC, there has not been one important decision we've made that I have not been a part of.
I contemplated a response to the question from pshin45's friend, but decided it might be a fool's errand because the question itself suggested a deep misunderstanding of YC. I am hard pressed to imagine a more incorrect characterization of the role Carolynn, Kirsty and Jessica play in YC than "one is in charge of legal, the second: taxes, and the third (largely) of founder relations". I certainly understand why Jessica's initial reaction to the question would be anger.
I would estimate that, collectively, I have worked with Carolynn, Kirsty and Jessica for upwards of 500 hours over the past 2 1/2 years. And I would estimate that 80-90% of that time has been on product development, business development, sales, customer acquisition, fundraising assistance ... I could go on.
Outside of our company, there is nobody who has been more involved with our "business strategy" than Carolynn, Kirsty and Jessica. There is not one part of our business that they have not been critically and deeply involved with.
"That's good to know - I wasn't aware of that. I'm happy to hear this isn't the case, but I've heard this from YC founders many times which is why it was my perception."
Jessica is the reason Steve + I got into Y Combinator. It was her decision to give us a second chance after we were rejected (reddit would end up being one of the first breakout hits from YC).
I wouldn't have just told Charlie Rose "All Hail Jessica Livingston" if her role were just "founder relations" -- without going into the roles all the partners (male and female alike) play in YC, that simplification is way off.
... and lest anyone think this is limited just to (the extremely helpful and insightful) JL, we (a recent-batch YC company) have been repeatedly and substantially helped on important strategy matters by KN and CL. Reducing their roles to "taxes" and "legal" misses the point completely; they are more like "finance strategy" and "legal strategy". Both have advised us on important structural decisions we made early in our company's life.
Although I'm merely a messenger in "my" two comments above, there seem to be 2 important takeaways here:
(1) First off, it's great that several YC founders are so quick to come to the female YC partners' defense, which lends a lot of credence to PG and JL's claims about the large role of female partners at YC.
(2) We all know that even the greatest product can be held back by poor marketing. I don't personally know the YC founders my friend above referenced (via my username), but the fact that some~many YC founders would think that at all, shows that there's a lack of good marketing/branding around how active and influential women (i.e. JL/KN/CL) are at YC.
The (positive) reality clearly does not match the (negative) perceptions.
I don't know what the solution would be, and you could certainly argue that PG/JL/et al. shouldn't have to "market" or "brand" this aspect of YC at all, but clearly this a problem, especially in light of PG's latest essay, the Information/Valleywag incident, etc.
Just because your friend wasn't aware of their roles doesn't mean that his/her lack of awareness is someone else's fault and responsibility. Maybe s/he should research a little more next time before singling out and belittling female tech workers. Isn't the rallying cry of social justice something like "it's not our job to educate you?"
Sounds like you, your friend, and their YC founder friends were actually hurting women by spreading untrue rumors that underplayed the true importance of these women in YC.
And yet there is no sense of remorse or apology for that.
Where is the indignation now towards yourself and them? Or is that only reserved for people who are actually doing something in the world?
It's not my place to ask, but if I were Jessica I would probably appreciate an apology. She said you made her so angry that it was difficult to remain calm. If you make someone that angry in real life based on your own mistake, wouldn't you normally apologize for it?
But my greater point was that there is generally too much criticism and indignation that are substituting for listening and understanding. Put yourself in the place of PG and YC in having unjustified criticism like you posted directed at them. And maybe take that to heart before you throw stones.
"Yes, I absolutely am sorry and saddened to have made JL upset. Again, it's been my understanding that while the female partners are great and I'm sure sit in on important decisions, they are primarily YC's accountant and lawyer. If that's not their main role at YC, I and others are mistaken. For the record, I think JL is /great/ and YC would do itself a lot of good to hire other women like her."
I can confirm that you and others with this understanding are indeed mistaken.
Based on my extensive experience with all of them, I would shuffle your words around a bit and suggest a more accurate characterization is:
YC's female partners are great and make and participate in important decisions. Though it is not their main role at YC, two of them have chief responsibility for YC's own finance/accounting/legal needs.
In hiring Kirsty and Carolynn, YC did hire other women like Jessica, at least on the "great-ness" scale.
And I wholeheartedly agree that YC would do itself a lot of good to hire other women like all three of them. Just as it would do itself a lot of good to hire other men like pg, pb, Robert, Trevor, Kevin, Aaron, Geoff and Garry.
If you are genuinely taking requests, I'd personally ask you to ask your friend to query their YC contacts on these subjects:
1) whether they can actually describe in some detail what JL / KN / CL do at YC (hint: they're easily seen to be quite active, so one might wonder what's keeeping them so busy)
2) whether they ever bothered to arrange office hours with any of them to see whether they could be helpful (YC partners' schedules are oversubscribed so you can't expect them to come to you to offer help)
3) whether they ever drafted a contract or financing document during their early stages without consulting KN or CL (and if so, why they chose to make important decisions without the advice of experts who are strongly incentivized to help them free of charge)
4) whether their company survived long enough to need advice on financing, contracts, or founder issues such as a departing founder or bringing on a late-stage founder
I think that would help to clarify how justified the initial claims were.
"there has not been one important decision we've made that I have not been a part of."
Careful, you're not fitting the narrative these people want believe. But seriously, disappointed pg even wrote this. Just engaging with these people is losing.
The sad thing is that it's very likely that sjws will embark on some sort of crusade against her for not fitting into their worldview. Anyone who exists in a way counter to their ideology is marked an enemy to be destroyed in the most high school styled manner possible. Ironic, considering that they claim that their goal is to further the cause of women in tech, etc.
