Board decisions about headcount and expense cuts demand deep founder empathy
Rick Heitzmann · 20VC: Firstmark's Rick Heitzmann on The Rise of Pre-Emptive Rounds, His Biggest Learnings From The Pinterest Board, 2 Things VCs Can Do To Prepare Their Companies For The Downturn and Why Now Is A Good Time to Be Contrarian and Invest In Consumer · Nov 11, 2019 · at 5:17
Rick Heitzmann, founder and partner at FirstMark Capital, discusses how operating as an entrepreneur taught him that corporate restructuring involves human nuances invisible during standard board meetings.
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“Well, I think there's probably two things in that you don't really understand. And I was not a operator before when I was first in BC and then became an entrepreneur that you want, you understand that you have to have a deep empathy for entrepreneurs, right? When you talk about people and people's performance in an organization, they're just not boxes on an org chart. And when you talk about cutting expenses or changing things in a PowerPoint, there's a real human impact of those elements, and you might be having to replace somebody who is a longtime member of your team, or there might be some nuance which you can't capture in a couple hours of a board meeting or a sidebar. So you understand that the journey is much more nuanced and complex than what you get at first glance.”
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