Fully Vested

Firms of a Feather

Episode Summary

This week we discuss venture scouting programs and routes to get a job in the venture capital industry.

Episode Notes

General

Subscribe to Fully Vested at FullyVested.co or through your podcast app of choice.

Links about VC scout programs

General stuff about deal sourcing

• LP Corner: How VCs Source Deals
• OpenLP: When Money Isn’t Enough: How to Distinguish Yourself as a VC in a Crowded Market

What Scout Programs Are

• Scout Programmes (#7 edition of The Rookie VC newsletter, published on Substack by Ulysse Laroche)
  • Super good
• Established VCs turn to "super angels" to grow their network (Kia Kokalitcheva for Axios)
• Founder Investors & Scout Programs (Elad Gil on his blog)
• A view from the other side: “VCs are exploiting underrepresented people to solve their diversity problems” (Anisah Osman Britton in Sifted.eu)

Examples of Scout Programs At Established Firms

• Sequoia Capital
  • Sarah Lacy's 2012 article about Sequoia's scouting program is super good. It explains the strategy of spinning up LLCs for scouts.
  • Connie Loizos's 2019 article for TC is also very good.
• Canaan Partners
• Village Global
• A16Z
• Upfront Ventures
• Lightspeed Venture Partners (This year focusing on bringing together people from Black, Latinx, Indigenous and Pacific Islander communities)
• Accel
• Founders Fund
• Index Ventures
• Spark Capital
• First Round Capital

VC Scout Programs Today

• Indie.vc has a wide scouting program. The firm also launched what it calls a Cub Scouting program.
• Spearhead.co basically gives founders a $1M "search fund" they deploy into startups of their choosing.
• Cleo Capital, launched by former Sequoia scout Sarah Kunst, has a scout program primarily comprised of women in business

About The Co-Hosts

• Jason D. Rowley is a researcher and writer at Golden.com. He volunteers with startup outreach for the open-source community and sends occasional newsletters from Rowley.Report.
• Graham C. Peck is a Venture Partner with Cultivation Capital and additionally helps companies build technology development teams in partnership with Brightgrove and other technology development organizations.