Village Global Podcast

Winter Mead (@wintmead), an LP formerly of Sapphire, and David Booth (@david__booth), co-founder and CEO of OnDeck, join Erik on this episode.They discuss:- Assessing fund managers from an LP perspective, and what it means to be “too diversified” in VC.- Enabling the next generation of GPs.- What it means to say that “venture capital is a human capital game.”- The impact of the current market on LPs’ willingness to invest.- Whether there will be an alternative to the ten year fund cycle.- The consequences of power shifting to founders from VCs.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Alex MacCaw (@maccaw), founder and CEO of Clearbit, joins Erik on this episode. He is a co-author of the book The Great CEO Within.They discuss:- The power of good management and the lack of a modern handbook for managers.- Why and how they treat interviewing and hiring as a science experiment.- What to know for a great reference check.- Managing conflict effectively.- Why you only really close a hire after the first ninety days of them working at your company.- How to think about compensation at a startup.- How to give feedback and his breakdown of which kinds of words to use or not.- How to think about building culture at a startup.- Common management and meeting mistakes.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Sriram Krishnan (@sriramk), investor and former product lead at Twitter, Facebook, and Snap, joins Erik on this episode.They discuss:- His experiences working at the three big social media companies and what he learned there.- Why each company is a reflection of the founder.- What people misunderstand or under appreciate about each of them.- Why he thinks that Facebook missed a golden opportunity when they decided not to build a web browser.- What he thinks each of Twitter, Facebook, and Snap should do next.- Some of his mental models for thinking about social media.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Spencer Bogart (@CremeDeLaCrypto) of Blockchain Capital and Brayton Williams (@BraytonKey) of Boost VC, join Erik on this episode.They discuss:- Their analysis of the different eras of crypto and how the thinking of the people involved in the space has evolved.- Whether the crypto bubble in 2017 can be compared to the internet bubble of 1999.- Unpacking the Bitcoin-as-programmable money thesis.- Specific problems that crypto is solving that they have invested in, as well as their requests for startups.- How crypto can disrupt VC.- What might have changed in the crypto space when looking back from 5 years in the future.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Fabrice Grinda (@fabricegrinda), entrepreneur and angel investor, joins Erik on this episode.They discuss:- What Fabrice believes about marketplaces and the trend towards verticalization that VCs don’t believe.- How they evaluate investments and the four criteria that they use to determine whether they will invest or not.- His breakdown of some of the failed marketplace startups.- What you need to know if you’re building a marketplace business in 2020.- His analysis of marketplaces for home school, child care, therapy, construction, and more.- How this intersects with the future of work and the future of food.- Why certain legacy marketplaces have managed to stick around.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Marco DeMeireles (@MarcoDeMeireles), partner at TCG, joins Erik on this episode.They discuss:- How the firm came to be and how they think about portfolio construction.- What owning the life stage means and why it makes for better businesses.- Some of the spaces they’re thinking about, including weddings, fertility, and funerals.- Marco’s thoughts on e-commerce enablement.- His other requests for startups.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.

Michael Galpert (@msg) and Greg Isenberg (@gregisenberg) join Erik on this episode. They Discuss:- What’s changed about consumer social in the past year- The rise of vertical social networks- The success and future of TikTok- The role of startup acquisitions in making a successful social network- Will there be a new social network for every generation- Will future social networks incorporate a physical element- How will consumer social be different a year from nowThanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, and is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg.

Burak Yenigun (@BurakYngn), founder of Stylus Capital (www.styluscapital.com) joins Erik on this episode.They discuss:- The problem of founder scarcity and why it exists.- The most effective levers for increasing the number of founders.- Whether we are in a bubble or not.- What founders need to know when thinking about interest rates.- The advantages and disadvantages of risk-sharing arrangements for founders, and how they would work.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

Brent Beshore (@BrentBeshore), founder and CEO of Adventur.es, joins Erik on this episode.They discuss:- What makes Adventur.es “the inverse of traditional private equity,” including why they don’t add debt to a company’s balance sheet when they purchase a company and intend to keep the existing leadership around.- What Silicon Valley doesn’t get about private equity, how it’s different from venture, and how VC and PE might interact in the future.- Some of the industries that Brent thinks are overlooked and the breakdown of some of their past investments.- The book he wrote, The Messy Marketplace, and the lessons it holds for business owners.- The state of the macro environment and how they think about it at Adventur.es.- How they evaluate potential investments and business partners, and his strategies for evaluating people in general.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.

David Booth (@david__booth), co-founder and CEO of On Deck, joins Erik on this episode.They talk about:- Why they started On Deck and the problem they were trying to solve.- Common misconceptions about successful founding teams and the type of relationship needed between co-founders.- The importance of community and how to build a positive one.- Cosign (cosign.co) and the idea of peer-to-peer credentialing.- Where it’s best to be building a company today.- How young people today can build their own syllabus and learn outside of a traditional college.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.