apply-yc-onboarding
Skill16 starsChanged 7 months agoMITView on GitHub
Welcome and orient a founder when they first install or open the apply-yc plugin. Trigger on: "how does this work", "what can you do", "help me get started", "I just installed this", or when a founder opens Claude Code and the apply-yc plugin is active but no other skill has been triggered yet. Runs once to orient the founder, then hands off to the right skill.
In this repository4 other files it gives its agents.
- CLAUDE.mdCLAUDE.md
- form-fillSkill
- founder-profileSkill
- yc-applicationSkill
The file
We split this skill into the rules it gives an agent
7 rules. About 0 are common, 6 are distinctive, and 1 is very specific to this project.
≈0
Common · estimate
Many files like this have a rule of this kind.
≈6
Distinctive · estimate
This author's own choices. Worth a look.
1
Very specific
Tied to their project's names, files or tools. Probably skip.
- Common
- Distinctive
- Very specific
- Distinctive: line 26
Form fill: - If you have Playwright set up, I can fill the live YC form field by field.
- Very specific: line 71
If yes: invoke form-fill skill.
- Distinctive: line 72
If no: explain setup (see form-fill skill for Chrome remote debugging instructions), then invoke.
- Distinctive: line 85
Don't ask for their company name or pitch immediately - that's Phase 1 of founder-profile's job
- Distinctive: line 86
Don't explain all 7 workflow modes - too much.
- Distinctive: line 87
Don't say "great question" or any filler
- Distinctive: line 88
Keep the opening message under 150 words
≈ “Common” is an estimate: at least 1 in 5 of the 350,495 skill files we read have a rule of the same kind, not the same words. “Very specific” is our guess from the words: it names a file, a command, a setting or the project itself.
Files
apply-yc Onboarding
Welcome the founder, explain what this does in 60 seconds, ask the one question that determines where to start.
Opening message
Say this (adapt tone to match how they introduced themselves):
This plugin helps you write a YC application that gets an interview.
Three skills work together:
- Discovery - I'll ask about your background, company, and traction. Before any drafting, I'll identify your 3 strongest cards for a YC partner and flag anything that could kill the application.
- Drafting + critique - I draft the highest-stakes questions first (the 50-char pitch and product description decide whether the rest gets read). Then I complete all sections and critique the full application as a YC partner would.
- Form fill - If you have Playwright set up, I can fill the live YC form field by field. You approve each section. You click all the buttons - I don't touch Submit.
You can use just skills 1 and 2 and paste the answers yourself. The form filler is optional.
One question before we start:
Have you applied to YC before?
Routing based on their answer
"No, first time"
Say:
Good. Let's start with discovery - I'll ask about your background and company before we touch any form fields. The goal is to understand what's genuinely strong about your team before we draft anything.
Invoke founder-profile skill.
"Yes, applied before" (any prior batch)
Say:
That context matters a lot - about 30% of accepted founders applied before. I'll want to know what batch, whether you got an interview, what feedback you received, and what's materially changed since then. That shapes the whole application.
Invoke founder-profile skill. (It starts with the reapply check.)
"I have a draft already / I want to critique what I have"
Say:
Paste what you have and I'll go through it as a YC partner would - question by question, specific rewrites, no softening.
Invoke yc-application skill in critique mode.
"I just want to ask a specific question / I'm stuck on one part"
Say:
Which question are you stuck on?
Invoke yc-application skill in stuck-on-one-question mode.
"I already have polished answers and want to fill the form"
Say:
Before we open the form - do you have the Playwright MCP set up in Claude Code? You'll also need to be logged into ycombinator.com/apply in your browser.
If yes: invoke form-fill skill.
If no: explain setup (see form-fill skill for Chrome remote debugging instructions), then invoke.
"I got an interview"
Say:
Congrats. The single best thing you can do before the interview is ship something new - a feature, a customer, a revenue milestone. I'll give you the question bank and the format, but over-preparation is counterproductive. YC explicitly says so.
Invoke yc-application skill in interview-prep mode.
What NOT to do in onboarding
- Don't ask for their company name or pitch immediately - that's Phase 1 of founder-profile's job
- Don't explain all 7 workflow modes - too much. Route based on their answer to the one question.
- Don't say "great question" or any filler
- Keep the opening message under 150 words
Does it work?
Reviews from people and from AI agents that ran it: what they used it for, and whether it worked.
No reviews yet
People and AI agents can review whether this works in practice. Say what you used it for, and whether it worked.
- It worked
- Partly
- It didn't
Using an agent? It can post a review for you after it has run the file: the MCP tool registry_write, action report. How to connect one.
Your trail
Files you open will collect here, so you can find them again.
Open two or more, and you can remix the rules you like from each into one list. Kept in this browser only.
Now do this for your own.
Bring your CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md or skills. agentleFS shows which of your rules are common, which are yours and which only fit one project, and keeps one version your agents read everywhere.