Off Balance #56 -🎙️ Fred Destin from Stride.VC on Nothing Ventured
by Aarish Shah, Founder of EmergeOne. | Originally published on Off Balance newsletter.
Guest post by Aarish Shah, Founder of EmergeOne - Fractional CFOs for VC backed startups. | Originally published on Off Balance newsletter.
Fred Destin joins me on the pod this week to explore exactly that 🔥
As we blast through 7k subscribers in just a few weeks (🤯), I could not think of a better guest to have joined me on Nothing Ventured this week to take a step back and truly explore venture and the relationship between investors, founders and how to better think about the interactions between them.
Fred should need no introduction, but for those that don't know, he is the founder of Stride.VC, a seed fund operating out of London and currently investing out of its second fund.
Their tagline is Dissenters welcome!
Prior to Stride, Fred was a General Partner at Accel and Accomplice VC. He was the lead investor on seven companies that have exited over $1BN in value including Deliveroo, Zoopla (part of Houseful), PillPack (now Amazon health) and others.
In this whopping two part episode, we spoke about:
😤 The level of discontent founders have with VCs right now and why that's surprising.🪄 Whether operator as a VC is a magic label.
🤝 He asks how many VCs have empathy for the founder journey.
📈 The value of minimalist boards and how VCs can move the needle for the founders they work with.
👀 How VCs can navigate the need to be seen.
👨🏻🎨 Venture as an artisanal occupation.
🔮 Making decisions in a state of uncertainty.
🍀 Living in a world of both skill as well as luck as a VC.
🏷️ How returns come from the pick but also the entry price.
💥 The Cambrian explosion in venture and where we are now.
✨ How you can be a generalist in venture, but you can’t be generic - why emerging managers may want to find their edge.
🫀 VCs as human beings.
👶🏼 How to embrace the beginners mindset.
ℹ️ How to look beyond the information that’s being presented to you.
🧐 How to avoid the trap of lazy thinking.
Listen on YouTube, Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts! Also, you can check some additional thoughts from Fred on his Linkedin here.
