Students are sometimes are rightfully tempted to get back in touch for follow-up questions about class discussions and sometimes career/business advice.
My shortest
answer is to decline politely, usually after sharing the following thoughts ;-)
- VCs do not take many interns because they do not
need much number crunching. They do not take many juniors in permanent
position either.
- VCs may not be so formative, including as a
first job, but I acknowledge it is very attractive
- to the idea that one wants to be a VC to become
a good entrepreneur, I view it as a reverse causation issue (i.e. good
entrepreneurs can make good VCs, the opposite is not clear)
- to the question "what could be a good
training to become a VC" (hey, VC is a very honorable job, so why not
shoot for it ;-), I would remind that
- a) good entrepreneurs can make
excellent VCs
- b) VCs need deal/execution
skills, so investment banking jobs are common training grounds for VCs
(hopefully, not producing 100% banker VC teams), as is corporate law.
- And what if I really want to start being a VC *now*:
well, that’s legitimate but then consider you’re committing yourself to
the “private equity” industry in general (not entrepreneurship!), and then
you should enlarge your view towards IB because there are many positions
there, with excellent training that lead to a more employable profile than
a first position in a VC fund. Large private equity funds do need
interns/juniors because number crunching is justified on big deals on
mature firms, so go for it.
- Hopefully, some of you will still fight to get a
job in a VC fund and succeed at it. My congratulations to them (that’s a
feat, really!) and say Hi to my many friends there J
- One last word: if the question is about getting
a VC job in Silicon Valley, stack up the idea that US
corporate world does not practice much this “intern” things as the French
do. So, if you make that miracle happen, let me know, you’ll receive my
sincere admiration.
I have an idea/project I'm working on, can I meet you with my co-founders to discuss it with you?
A: Getting (good) advice is a key activity for entrepreneurs (and any human being for that matter). However, like many things, there are constraints, including the fact that quality people who can provide advice are usually strongly time-constrained. So, here is a good approach you can consider, and I will usually ask my students to follow it when asking advice from me.
I. make a short first contact (ie send a short email), and try to ask a specific question. Do not just assume you’ll get the person to allocate you 1 hours “on demand” (you can be innocent to believe it, or you can be bold to ask it, but be realist, it is not too likely)
· If you have specific subject, state it and the question.
· If your question is general (i.e. “what do you think of my idea”) then … summarize your startup in such a way that the informed reader will understand roughly where you’re aiming. Summarizing does not mean sending 30 slides BP, but something like 1-2 paragraph max, explaining the product/market, stating your stage of progress (team? funds? Etc.), and be upfront how your idea compares/contrast to the closest existing thing in the market. So, say you want to do a “match.com” for blind people (whatever!), mention match.com in that quick summary and why you believe you can provide something that will substitute them for your submarket ("visually challenged persons").
· In both cases, shoot for your contact to provide a short answer (i.e. to your specific question, or a first gut feeling about the idea)
II. If after that, if you feel you could extract further information, try to enlarge question/elements provided
· The person might, at that stage, invite you to chat, but again be reasonable and already happy that the “conversation develops”.
· In that second phase, it might become reasonable to have a phone conversation, which impacts less the agenda of the busy person
* it may also happen that the conversation naturally dies out. Be sensitive about it: insistence can be a quality for an entrepreneur, but you don't want to systematically alienate your contacts by assuming they have to suffer beyond their point of confort...
III. If the conversation continues (i.e. the question/answer seems productive), it could naturally come that you guys meet
As far as *I* am concerned, demand for advice on business plan is too plenty that I can not provide it outside of my former students.
Concerning my former students, I expect them to go up those stages, and assume that not all contacts will go to third base (so, asking for third base immediately might sound to me a bit “brusque”). Here is the summary the stages:
Base I: send a well thought email with precise question and expect an answer
Base II: continue that exchange, maybe planning for a phone conversation
Base III: end-up planning for a formal meeting face-to-face
