When VC Funds Become Firms, Part 1 | Lisa Cawley, Ben Choi, Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters

“There’s this amazing, amazing commercial that Michael Phelps did, […] and the tagline behind it was ‘It’s what you do in the dark that puts you in the light.’” – Lisa Cawley

We’re doing a three-part series with some of our fan favorites over the last three seasons on the LP perspective of succession-planning and VC firm-building.

Lisa Cawley is the Managing Director of Screendoor, a highly respected LP of GPs, investing in firm-builders by firm-builders, with a unique model for partnering with allocators to access the emerging manager ecosystem.

Ben Choi manages over $3B investments with many of the world’s premier venture capital firms as well as directly in early stage startups. He brings to Next Legacy a distinguished track record spanning over two decades founding and investing in early-stage technology businesses.

Jaclyn Freeman Hester is a Partner at Foundry. Jaclyn helped launch Foundry’s partner fund strategy, building the portfolio to nearly 50 managers. Bringing her unique GP + LP perspective, Jaclyn has become a go-to sounding board for emerging VCs.

You can find Lisa on her socials here:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/31mml/
Screendoor: https://www.screendoor.co/contact

You can find Ben on his socials here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/benjichoi
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bchoi/

You can find Jaclyn on her socials here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jfreester
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaclyn-freeman-hester-70621126/

And huge thanks to this episode’s sponsor, Alchemist Accelerator: https://alchemistaccelerator.com/superclusters

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also watch the episode on YouTube here.

Brought to you by Alchemist Accelerator.

OUTLINE:

[00:00] Intro
[02:03] The job that goes unseen by others at a VC firm
[09:01] The psychology of curiosity
[11:12] The story of Charlie Munger and Robert Cialdini
[14:17] Lisa’s perspective on the intangibles of firm-building
[17:41] Heidi Roizen and why glassblowing builds relationships
[21:09] The people you surround yourself with
[23:06] Jaclyn’s perspective on the intangibles
[26:23] Examples of how to communicate strategy drift
[27:34] Ben’s perspective on the intangibles
[33:19] The metric many LPs don’t use but should use to evaluate GPs
[36:16] Thank you to Alchemist Accelerator for sponsoring!
[37:17] If you enjoyed Part 1, and want to see Part 2 and 3 sooner, leave a like or a comment!

SELECT LINKS FROM THIS EPISODE:

• Screendoor
• Next Legacy
• Foundry Group
• Why an LP of GPs is Uniquely Valuable | Lisa Cawley | Superclusters | S3E5
• How to Build a Multi-Fund VC Firm | Ben Choi | Superclusters | S1E6
• Qualitative Signals to Look for in Emerging GPs | Jaclyn Freeman Hester | Superclusters | S2E9
• BlackBerry
• Andreessen Horowitz
• Scott Belsky
• The Messy Middle
• George Loewenstein
• The Psychology of Curiosity by George Loewenstein
• Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini
• Robert Cialdini
• Charlie Munger
• Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger
• Myers Briggs Type Indicator
• Michael Phelps
• “Rule Yourself” commercial with Michael Phelps
• Heidi Roizen
• HBS case study on Heidi Roizen
• Union Square Ventures
• Founder Collective

SELECT QUOTES FROM THIS EPISODE:

“The job and the role that goes most unseen by LPs and everybody outside of the firm is the role of the culture keeper.” – Ben Choi

“You can map out what your ideal process is, but it’s actually the depth of discussion that the internal team has with one another. […] You have to define what your vision for the firm is years out, in order to make sure that you’re setting those people up for success and that they have a runway and a growth path and that they feel empowered and they feel like they’re learning and they’re contributing as part of the brand. And so much of what happens there, it does tie back to culture […] There’s this amazing, amazing commercial that Michael Phelps did, […] and the tagline behind it was ‘It’s what you do in the dark that puts you in the light.’” – Lisa Cawley

“At the end of the day, the job is to take a pile of money from your LPs and give them a bigger pile. And giving them back a really big pile is the legacy thing. […] And consistently insane returns are hard. That, to me, are the firms that go down in history.” – Jaclyn Freeman Hester

“In venture, LPs are looking for GPs with loaded dice.” – Ben Choi

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