Bridget Harris, co-founder of YouCanBook.me, discusses VC fund mechanics and alignment between investors and bootstrapped founders at SaaStock.
Opinion
Harris: The Venture Capital Model Is Effectively a Ponzi Scheme
“Because that VC model is, if you were, if you're being a little bit mean about it, you'd call it a Ponzi scheme. Because people have to lose.”
Insight
Founders should exploit venture capitalists for upfront capital, not seek friendship
“And they're not your friends. You know, what they're doing is they're making money from your decision to go into business as an entrepreneur and make money. And that's a different thing, and you, my view would, oh sorry, my view would be, you know, exploit the…”
Opinion
Harris: Benchmarking remote global pay to San Francisco rates is anti-competitive
“I think it is anti-competitive, frankly, to say to people in Romania and Morocco and South Africa, you have to compete with people working on the west coast who need to pay a whole lot of stuff in, in terms of rent the one bit of leverage you have, which is yo…”
Opinion
Engineering is now the easiest core startup function to outsource
“Now I would say, actually, nowadays it's probably easiest to buy in tech Ironically, engineering, because there's so many fantastic agencies that do it. As long as you've got a very good, strong product desire, you can basically hire people to do that for you.”
Insight
Top startup performers grow internally from modest salaries, not expensive hires
“I've never experienced the idea that by going out and paying, you know, a huge salary, I'm gonna get a 10 X person to come in. All my 10 X, if you like, people who work for me now, who are on good salaries, they all started joining the company at fairly modest…”
Insight
Harris: Hire at moderate base pay and reward high performance with raises
“Reward performance with high wages, i.e. Hire somebody on a moderate, conservative salary rate. If they do really well for you, by all means double their salary if you want to. Don't do it the other way around. A six figure salary does not necessarily bring in…”