Rascoff: Early-stage VCs were more helpful than Fortune 500 CEOs in 2008
Spencer Rascoff · a16z Podcast | How to Lead, Not Manage Your Board · Jan 2, 2019 · at 44:19
Spencer Rascoff, former CEO of Zillow, reflects on board composition dynamics during severe economic downturns.
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“I'm thinking back to 2008 when, you know, the world came to an end. The directors that were most helpful to us working through that were the VCs that had a lot of early stage experience and had seen a lot of other companies die. It wasn't the marquee, you know, Fortune 500 CEOs who are on our board who have big names that everybody's heard of. Like, it was the, I mean, I guess it's, ah, the VCs are big names also. People have heard of them too, but you know what I mean? It's people who have seen the earlier stage stuff that were more valuable there than the later stage.”
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