Sarah A. Downey of Accomplice has been hosting a regular blog series called Startup Trek. It features a single blog post on each episode of Star Trek the Next Generation. Every post covers a lesson learned on startups.
Earlier this Winter Daniellle and I made a regular affair of watching Startup the Next Generation before falling asleep. We both loved the show. Danielle admires Picard’s principled integrity, and I think Data is a fascinating exploration of AI and emotion. So we’ve watched Startup Trek with delight, and I asked Sarah if she’d be willing to let me write on up a post on one of the episodes. She politely offered, and I was blown away.
I chose one of the climactic episodes of Season 1 where the security chief Tasha dies. It ends up being an exploration of nihilism. How does this relate to startups? See the post Startup trek episode 22: Skin of Evil to see what I think it means for founders.
From the Investors
Uber’s IPO is starting out with a wild ride, and for those who follow public offerings we highly recommend The Impact of Short Interest on the Performance of Tech Initial Public Offerings in the U.S. to provide helpful context on what to expect in the months leading up to the end of various lockup periods.
Struggling to put together a diverse panel, board, or recruiting strategy? HBCUvc’s List of Black, Latinx ‘Rising Stars In Venture Capital’ gives you the names, so now you have no excuse.
Sarah A. Downey of Accomplice who started Starutp Trek also wrote a great post this week on How to get a job in VC: the college student edition. She sums it up eloquently:
It’s not like a normal job function where there’s an ascending ladder of neat titles and constructed programs where you move up, like with investment banks or private equity firms that siphon up MBA students. Venture doesn’t really have that. Although some of the big firms might have associate programs, most don’t.
The number of jobs that come up annually is just a handful. There are roughly the same number of open U.S. professional athlete positions as there are available VC positions nationwide. And because of that scarcity, those jobs are always going to people who already have context around startups, their own deal flow, strong networks, unique talents, advisor or angel roles, or as many of the above as possible.
So how do you get a job in VC? It just kind of…happens. You don’t pick venture; venture picks you.
So You Think You’re Ready to Hire a Marketer? Read This First. It challenges the assumption that you need a marketer to launch, among many myths that cause founders to hire this role too early