VC Lifestyle Myths
This year’s holiday card from Blueprint Ventures totally made me crack up. Like all things that are comic genius, there’s so much in it that resonates as true.
Gary Snowman is a successful entrepreneur who fantasizes about the decadent and jetset lifestyle he imagines venture capitalists lead. Ah, yes, Venture Capital is a ‘lifestyle’ job, but as he says towards the end of the video, “Life as a VC isn’t exactly as I expected.”
Disappointingly for Gary Snowman, it turns out that being a VC involves long hours, lots of hard work, and a lot of hustling. His assistant interrupts his reverie with, ”I have your itinerary for your trip. You have a 6:30am to Boston, an 8pm to Minneapolis, a 10am to Chicago, and a 2pm to New York. And business class was too pricey so you’re going all coach.”
This is funny because it’s so true. It made me think of my typical week here, which basically involves running from meeting to meeting to meeting. Here’s what my average week has looked like:
And lest you think it’s because I’m the newest person of our team, I would have to say that the partners here work even harder. It reminds me of my days as a cofounder of a startup – you’re fighting for market share in a ruthlessly competitive environment and ultimately, the company is no more and no less than what YOU put into it.
There is also this interesting dynamic – all of these meetings on my calendar are with other people – with entrepreneurs, potential portfolio company hires, potential partners of some kind – so I spend the bulk of my day socializing with other people, yet as Seth Levine has noted, it can still be somewhat of a lonely business. Fortunately for me, it suits my personality type and interests well, but it is an interesting dynamic. More on this later.
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Thanks for sharing that video, Susan. Total riot. — Giff
Can’t agree with you more. I work with VC ecosystem as well, unless you know well how to balance your work-life it can be very lonely and less lucrative.
Good Blog
Great blog. Got you on my ‘feed’… -Mac
Very funny video, Susan.
–matt
I’ve descrambled your screen shot…..I call bull. 45% of those so called meetings were to go shopping for cheesy poofs! 20% were conference calls about the “relative merits of Pirates Booty vs. Cheetos”….while 10% we’re dedicated to “Paper Air Plane Aerodynamics” I can only assume you are totrturing innocent Exec Summaries…..heh..
Have a Good Holiday!!
Oh btw…that video was great
My schedule looks the same except 90% of the items just say “write code”
[...] Susan Wu: VC Lifestyle Myths [...]
[...] were to attempt to read even a few pages from each plan, they wouldn’t have much (if any) time to do anything else. So naturally, they prioritize. Entrepreneurs and business plans referred by others who have, in [...]
Sure, VCs are busy, who isn’t? The VC lifestyle is hardly a myth otherwise the term wouldn’t be part of the popular vernacular.
VCs make easy money considering the fact that so few have ever cashed a carry profit check. That means VCs are driving expensive cars, own vacation houses, fly (mostly) business class, and regularly drink vintage bottles of wine . . . on base compensation alone.
That said, I just found your blog and have added it.
Hi Bill,
It’s true that the venture industry as a whole has garnered a ‘lifestyle’ reputation because of some subsection of the industry being focused on ‘money management’ rather than ‘asset creation’ – allowing them to live posh off of management fees, rather than being focused on generating returns. But I wanted to point out that this lifestyle myth isn’t uniformly true across all firms – some of us are trying to make an honest living. And I have some hope that the structural inefficiencies will work themselves out.
Susan,
Thanks for the response. I agree, the myth is not uniformly true, but it’s a hard myth to dispel. I’m glad to hear that you’re more focused on generating returns (by growing companies). Let’s hope the VT’s (venture tourists) visas run out sooner than later.