UVC: John Zeratsky from Character VC on the role of design in venture capital, the OATS scorecard, sprint methodology, and gaining an edge in VC through strategic differentiation

Understanding VC

English - July 17, 2023 16:00 - 50 minutes - 52.8 MB - ★★★★★ - 2 ratings
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Previous Episode: UVC: Rex Salisbury from Cambrian on the evolution of Cambrian community, the rise of vertical SaaS & embedded finance, and the impact of AI on financial services

Next Episode: UVC: Melody Koh from NextView Ventures on navigating early stage venture investing, empowering exceptional founders, fostering trust with founders and investing in the everyday economy

In this episode we discuss:

06:00 - The Importance of Design in VC

09:00 - Visionary Founders vs. Hypothesis-Driven Founders

15:00 - Importance of Strategy in VC

22:00 - Sprint Method and Product-Market Fit

26:00 - Hypothesis driven approach - How it can save time and money

28:00 - Introduction to the OATS scorecard system

32:00 - Longitudinal use and comparison of scores

33:00 - Reasons for not investing

39:00 - Challenges of FOMO and saying no

42:00 - Detachment and enthusiasm in investment decisions

47:00 - Name selection process and the significance of "Character"

About

John Zeratsky is co-founder and general partner at venture-capital firm Character, bestselling author of Sprint and Make Time, and former design partner at GV. Previously, John was a design leader for YouTube, Google Ads, and FeedBurner, which was acquired by Google in 2007.