The Platform Role Within Venture Capital

Meet Galina Ozgur. Galina is an investor, venture ecosystem builder and an advocate for startups. She serves as the Vice President of Platform and member of the Investment Committee at H/L Ventures, a venture capital firm backing early stage startups at the intersection of impact, diversity, and growth. 

Anyone that knows Galina well knows how incredibly hard she works, always going above and beyond expectations and I believe that this characteristic is fundamental to her continued success within the venture capital world. It is no surprise to me that Galina leads platform for a venture fund as she has worn pretty much every hat there is- anything in order to make sure that her portfolio companies are happy and thriving. I have had the pleasure of knowing Galina for 8+ years and I was so excited to catch up with her to discuss what the role of platform lead means in practice. Listen in to our conversation below and for anyone who may be interested in joining a startup, check out out H/L's Talent Network that will match you with incredible opportunities across many sectors within the startup space.

#TechTuesday Highlight #90: Galina Ozgur, Vice President of Platform, H/L Ventures

How/why did you get into your space?

My journey into VC was non-linear, unconventional and quite interesting, given my academic studies had focused on languages and linguistics and my professional career didn’t follow the more obvious investment banking or management consulting route. The option to consider venture capital as a career wasn’t something that was available to me or my peers during my formative years in Belarus. This may be due to the fact that investment, as a category in a country like Belarus, to this day is still a gray area and subject to a lot of restrictions by the State. So when I did start down this path many years later, I had to take a route less traveled and break through as a cross-functional operator.

I have to say there was a life & a half, and a country & a half between Minsk and New York, but when I did get to NYC eventually, my very first job was to run the accelerator program at ERA (Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator). I still consider to this day this first job to be one of the luckiest breaks I’ve ever had professionally. In 2011, ERA had just launched as one of New York’s very first accelerator programs for early stage startups. It was an exciting time when the startup scene was gaining good momentum. ERA was the place to be if you were looking to get a leg-up as a founder or as someone who wanted to fund or serve that community. I was a good generalist with immense curiosity for the world of entrepreneurship and I brought with me the immigrant cocktail of grit and resilience — a ton of can-do attitude blended with a tad of that rookie confidence. I pitched my skills to the ERA team and they took a chance on me. Little did I know there was a line out the door for the Program Manager job. I had no idea. I still have to pinch myself. Did it really happen? Was it me?

What role do you play in the tech ecosystem and why is that role important?

In my previous roles in New York and globally, I spent a decade working alongside founders in all stages of early development. At H/L Ventures, I now spend most of my time alternating between strategic and tactical advisory around critical business decisions. It means I am in the trenches with the entrepreneurs making time sensitive calls, and at the same time I’m in constant communication with our Venture Partners or the members of our Trusted Partner Network - in the flow and connection with the rest of our team - to make sure we as a firm are on top of the H/L portfolio’s needs. The other part of my job is spent building systems, strategies or streamlining processes to ensure we can track and deliver on the promises we’ve made to our founders as a value-add investor.

My job is to know what we have, what could be missing, and how to connect the dots for everyone involved. I do it well because of the amazing opportunities I’ve had in my career to observe, support, fund, coach, and build - alongside entrepreneurs and for entrepreneurs. In my role as the GM of Grand Central Tech (now Company Ventures), my task was to reimagine GCT’s startup residency program for growth stage companies and run that program with operational excellence. Before GCT I supported startups with mission-critical growth resources and strategic programming at ERA while looking at several thousand pitches a year. In between, I served as Entrepreneur-in-Residence with 500 Startups in Moscow, Scout with Aera VC (NZ/HK), a Seed fund investing in impact categories spanning the Future of Food Systems, Future of Health, Future of Climate and Carbon, and Future of Education and Work; Advisor to the growing innovation system in Serbia through the World Bank, and advisor and coach to numerous startups. 

I hope that some of these things have served a purpose in the ecosystem, and I'm working every day to make sure that's the case. 

How has technology impacted your industry and why is this important? 

2020 was an interesting year for tech and Venture Capital. It was fascinating to watch how the dominant conversation revolved around the intersection of the future of education, work, mental health and tech4good. I am glad that the industry is catching up, but as investors in impactful companies from the start, we had a head start and a thesis for companies that do good for the society and/or the planet. Getting on board with impact early has allowed us to back companies like Blocpower, Holler, CNote, among others, all diversely led, and all now serving as the leading voices in climate tech & environmental justice, conversational media & ethics, impact investing & small business. It’s important that Venture Capital walks alongside innovative tech to serve a wider circle than just investors, and funds solutions to the big things people stare at every day and say “this needs to change”. I’m pretty sure that after 2020 none of us are hung up on how to make juicers better, but I’d bet many of us see how much around us is still broken and could use some fixing in a major way.

What do you believe is the most exciting tech trend for 2021 (as it relates to your industry)?

When it comes to startup investment trends, I can’t name just one. These days I double click on the future of food systems, future of climate and carbon, future of work and education, graceful aging and elderly care, future of health and accelerated drug development.

Who is a person that inspires you in the space and why? 

Sometimes you don’t need to look too far. I find myself inspired by my boss, Co-Founder & Managing Partner @ H/L Ventures, Oliver Libby. I always intuitively gravitate towards people who don’t generalize, summarize or disregard a person within minutes, but rather take the time to investigate what makes the person tick, going deeper. Oliver is that person. He started H/L Ventures 12 years ago with impact underlying its very mission, and within a month of that also launched a global non-profit organization called The Resolution Project, fostering youth leadership development through collaborative social entrepreneurship. He’s sought for advice, looked up to in the time of crisis, and he’s always humble about that part - a VC with a very different eye for venture. He has that eye because he observes before he swings the gavel. You’ll be hearing his name more often in the industry, and I’m pleased that I get to spread my wings as a CEO whisperer next to someone who understands what that means.

What advice would you give to someone who wants to get into your space? 

If you’re young and green, don’t get hung up on VC as a title, or any titles, from the very start. Give yourself time, the opportunities and experiences to learn while soaking up all the humility that you can, too. This will allow you to gain some knowledge about the topics that might light you up, your lightbulb moment. Also make the effort to get clarity on what the landscape is, what others are building, and what seems to be on the downswing.

One of the first questions you’ll get from a Venture Firm even before you interview, is tell them what trends you could get behind and why. So do the work ahead of time and educate yourself. Have an opinion and own it. At the same time, learn to pop up in many places - and one day might just pop up at the right time and right place. This means checking industry specific channels, newsletters, following and reading VC’s and founders on Twitter, getting your Zoom game on. Apply, apply, apply for internships, jobs, fellowships, bootcamps. Check out VC University, John Gannon’s Blog, and the Venture Deals online course. If you’re looking to get into a Platform role specifically or are curious about what it means, check out https://www.vcplatform.com/, we’re a global community of 1000+ professionals across the coasts, with solid representation in Western Europe.

#impactinvesting #startups #diversityintech #womenintech #womeninvc

--------------------

Have thoughts on this week’s trends or questions for me or Galina? Post your thoughts in the comment section or share them on Twitter. Please include the hashtag #techtuesday and mention me @ScarlettSieber! Until next week. ??

You can connect with Galina on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Follow Scarlett Sieber on LinkedIn for the latest news in #fintech.