Family Office Association interview: VC and Disruption of the Investment Management Industry

Angelo Robles, CEO of the Family Office Association, just posted a video interview with me on “Venture Capital and Disruption of the Investment Management Industry”....

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An Investor’s Personal Social Media Tech Stack: In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 followers

What tech stack should a microinfluencer use? Most investors including me spend most of our day doing the same things people have always done in the job: in my case, due diligence, deal execution, etc.  However, being a “microinfluencer” is now also part of the job description.  In the future, everyone will be famous for...

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Venture capitalists eating our own dog food: Using AI and analytics to make better investments

  Private equity and venture capital investors are copying our sisters in the hedge fund world: we’re trying to automate more of our job.  When I was single, I registered for (a lot of) dating websites. When I met my now-wife, I realized that any technology that can find me a spouse is a killer...

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Free money for your impact tech startup

Congratulations!  You’ve decided to launch a technology-enabled startup with a positive social impact!  Nearly every major Silicon Valley venture-capital firm has now invested in a B Corp; maybe you will be one of them! Now the bad news: some venture capitalists have a bias against startups with an explicit positive social impact, on the grounds...

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Use agile budgeting to manage your business

Instead of budget approvals, monitor key metrics and give managers more flexibility Traditional budgets can be destructive and a huge waste of time. How should a growth company manage their budget?  Does the annual budget approval process even make sense in a fast-moving firm? My friends who are executives at large, established companies complain about...

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How to choose an investment banker…or replicate one

Should you hire an investment banker?  And if so, who? The good news: even if you are a small company and can’t afford a banker, you can synthetically and cheaply replicate a banker. That’s part of the value proposition of an institutional VC; I have been the (unpaid) investment banker for many of my portfolio...

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