Inside a VC Board Room

As you are admitted in from the virtual waiting room, what’s awaiting you is the ‘Flare Capital Board Room’ participant - all of Flare’s team (10+ people) together in their office in the Prudential Center tuned in to learn about you and your business. Ready, set, go!

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Before this past Monday, I had never been a part of a VC Board Room so this would be quite the intimidating experience if I was on the ‘pitching side’. As part of the Flare Scholars program, I had the opportunity to join the Flare team in their Board Room for their Monday Partner Roundtable. I got to hear 5 different companies pitch their business to the Partners to get a true behind the scenes look, and it was wonderfully eye opening. Here is what I learned on the inside and some important lessons founders should keep in mind while pitching:

1. The boardroom is not a Shark Tank. By the time any of these companies are actually pitching to the group, it’s probably been several engagements and iterations with a Partner. And, you aren’t getting a yes or no at the end of the 45 minutes. The decision to invest is significantly more than the pitch and will be a culmination of multiple meetings, lots of diligence, and a very fair process to ensure it's the best fit both for the company and for the VC. It feels very much so like the deal sponsor is doing everything to help you get to this point and beyond - ultimately, they want you to be successful.
2. Clear and concise communication is critical. I just had one day of hearing 5 different pitches, but VCs live this every day. Once you get the floor for your pitch, it's all yours to make an impression. I noticed the best pitches I heard had a few important qualities:

• they had a hook (perhaps a personal story or a ‘why’ for their business)
• their messaging and slides were crisp and clear. If you fill the slide with too much, everyone will spend their whole time reading instead of listening
• they were confident, but not arrogant. It’s expected to have a strong hypothesis and active testing / experimenting about your business model. And on the flip side, it’s ok to not have all the answers figured out and be learning and refining as you go along.

1. A good team is important, but as a company scales, factors such as sustainable competitive differentiation, business model, and customer pipeline grow in importance as well. However, not having a good team can be the hold up VCs have if you have not been thoughtful in building the company with the right talent. Encouragingly, team formation was clearly an area VCs like Flare try to help with.
2. The conversation will be steered by how you organize your pitch. Deliver the core messaging upfront and consider pre-empting questions VCs may care about to guide the conversation. You will receive questions throughout the pitch, and before you know it, there will be 5 minutes left and you'll have 20+ minutes left of prepared content!
3. Don’t take a shotgun approach to business models. Coming in ‘testing business ideas’ may be ok at early stages, but it will definitely question if you have an investible idea at later stages of company building. Do the founders feel like they have a path to product-market fit? Do they understand their competitors or alternatives in the market? There is almost always an alternative that your target customers may have to solve the pain point you are tackling. So, it’s more thoughtful to discuss those alternatives and why your approach is better or what your customers appreciate more about you.

Thank you to the Flare team for welcoming me in. It’s clear Flare has built a diverse, curious, and collaborative team, and puts great thought into all stages of their investment process. It’s enlightening and reassuring to see the level of diligence they take to make sure we are investing in the best version of tomorrow’s health.