Video · 35 min

Best Practices for Managing a Remote Team

Y Combinator Free Intermediate

YC is openly skeptical of a remote co-founder (they discount the plan if a linchpin is distant), which makes this the most honest place to pressure-test the idea before you commit. YC founders running fully-remote teams walk through the actual mechanics: the right check-in cadence, keeping culture alive across a gap, and why demonstrated communication is the thing investors watch for in a distributed team.

• Expect investors, and reality, to discount a founding team where a key person is remote, so over-invest in showing you collaborate well.
• There is a right cadence of check-ins for a distributed team; set it deliberately instead of letting async drift happen.
• Culture and communication rituals have to be designed on purpose when you cannot bump into each other, especially in the fragile first year.