🔝 5 Venture Capital Podcasts
Stoked to share my TOP favorite podcasts from VC space. And if you struggle where to start — I'll recommend my most favorite episode for each one of them. If you're a nerd on venture and where the ecosystem is moving, you should definitely know about these:
1. The Full Ratchet
One episode per day before I started working at Credo Ventures.
Nick Moran dedicated his podcast to demystifying Venture Capital and Angel Investing. The Full Ratchet is really funky way on how to name a podcast about VC space. The full ratchet = antidilution or the other way VCs take more money of your startup's equity.
Basically, it means an anti-dilution provision that applies the lowest sale price as the adjusted option price or conversion ratio for existing shareholders. It protects the early investors by ensuring they are compensated for any dilution in their ownership caused by future rounds of fundraising. If you want to learn more about this mystical term, you can read more here (Techcrunch, 2017).
One of my most favorite episodes (and I am not the only one) is the interview: How the Economic Theory applies to the VC with Mark Suster. I really liked the discussion of growth vs. profitability. It's interesting to see their trade-offs in theory and then in practice, right? Investors value growth above all else, in general. But over time they have to see a way that it will be profitable growth. It's ok to sacrifice short-term profitability for long-term growth.
2. The Twenty Minute VC
Harry Stebbings came with an amazing format, short & sweet 20 mins episodes with the most prominent entrepreneurs and investors in the world today.
And yes, of course, what I enjoyed the most (in the world) the interview with our resilient Hubert Palan, founder, and CEO of Productboard. He is sharing his interesting (maybe overrated? 😀) insights and challenges from starting a startup in Silicon Valley and also about product management excellence. And also, it's clear, that Hubert obviously read the Good Strategy Bad Strategy.
Last but not least, I love that Harry himself calls Hubert “One of the most charismatic and energetic guests” he ever talked to. And he spoke with Ashton Kutcher too!
3. Notion Capital
So I may be biased here since I am a huge fan of Maddy Cross who came with plenty of interesting research papers about hiring. One example can be that she came up with interesting findings of what makes Unicorns — Unicorns. And of course — the most critical attribute is people. But she has shown that their seniority and the exact time when they join, matters.
That's why I really appreciated this interview with a former Talent Partner of Notion Capital, Maddy.
4. Intangibles
Intangibles is a podcast hosted by Steve Berg. Steve speaks with various leaders from diverse backgrounds — VCs, entrepreneurs, and many many more. I really like that Steve gives each episode a name with a different trait or behavior.
The episode I was recently listening to is the one on negotiation with Larry Chu, a partner at Goodwin. He gives his strategies for negotiating difficult things. I really like his take on how you can control the negotiation — the rhythm, cadence, and timing of the deal. It's great to have a playbook ahead at the very beginning.
5. A16z
Sometimes I go here and listen when I want to keep myself up to date with the latest tech trends. It always meets my expectations!
This podcast episode is all about rebel behavior with Harvard Business School Professor and HBR author Francesca Gino. I like the shift in the approach here. There are highlighted specific examples we can learn from the disruptors and not only look at them as negative trouble makers.
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Not enough? Come for five, get two free! 👋🏻
There are other, very insightful podcasts from the VC world. You can check out:
- GoingVC Podcast — You can uncover total new paths into VCs. I like they feature so many inspiring female leaders.
- European VC — to me this is a new interesting community. I lack data, insights from our region, so I really appreciate this initiative. Thanks, David!
