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Levine: Put operational experts in independent board seats, not VC seats

Jeremy Levine · 20VC: Bessemer's Jeremy Levine on Why We Are In A Fallow Period For Consumer, Why It Is Bogus That Operational VCs Can Add More Value & 2 Golden Rules To Always Tell Entrepreneurs Pre-Investment · Jun 26, 2017 · at 6:18

Jeremy Levine, partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, explains why founders should avoid having operational executives hold VC-contracted board seats.

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“If you're a founder, you want to have phenomenal operational experience on your board, but you don't want to have it in the seat that's controlled by a VC because now you've made a contractual commitment to have someone on your board who for most of his or her career has been used to telling other people what to do. You don't want that. So you want phenomenal operational experience on your board, but you want it in the form of somebody who sits in an independent seat.”

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