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8 Tips To Get the Most Out of Your Investors and Board

Both Sides of the Table

He wrote a post this long weekend on how he manages the board of DataSift. In his post he asserts, “You get the VCs you deserve” and the corollary “You get the performance out of your board that you deserve.” It consists of a highly intelligent and opinionated founder – Nick Halstead.

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Board Diversity

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

The board diversity problem is a symptom of a much broader problem around lack of diversity in founders that get funded and lack of diversity in VC firms. Most startup boards are made up of a few founders and a few VCs. No wonder you have no diversity on the board. But boards are important.

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What I Would Look for When Choosing a VC – Knowing What I Know Now?

Both Sides of the Table

Picking a VC is hard. So I thought I’d write about out with what I would look for in a VC knowing what I know now and why. Most VCs are book smart. VCs should be more of a coach than proscriptively telling you what to do. You want a VC who will spar with you but then STFU and let you get on with things.

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Founder Led Companies

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

I remember about fifteen years ago, a well-known VC said to me “you need to sell a company within a few years of the founder leaving. Companies can’t sustain their innovation after a founder leaves.” ” I told that VC that my experience has been different on that measure and that I did not agree.

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The Founder and Investor Trust Problem: It's not what you think.

This is going to be BIG.

Founders seem to get that. Don’t get me wrong—I don’t mean trust in the sense that VCs think founders are just going to get a fake passport and move to Fiji, or that investors are secretly plotting to take over the company. VCs aren’t experts at every aspect of a startup at the same level across the board.

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The Twenty Year Itch: My Last VC Investment Out of Brooklyn Bridge Ventures

This is going to be BIG.

To put that timeframe in perspective, here’s a picture of analyst me taken at USV’s first office in 2005, dressed in khakis and a button-down shirt versus a picture of me, a GP at my own firm, over 100 deals later, now on my latest Zoom board call from my couch at home with my junior analyst of about a year and a half. No new investments.

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My Role as a VC: What I am and what I am not.

This is going to be BIG.

There''s been some writing about how VCs and founders interact with each other and it inspired me to take a step back and reflect on what my role is supposed to be with regards to the investments I make and the founders I deal with. Here''s what I came up with. Venture Capital & Technology'

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