YouSaid · the spoken record

Steve Vassallo

lines on the record
19
first
2018-02-26
most recent
2018-02-26
sittings or episodes
1
sources
podcast

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  1. “Service providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities, including video meetings and webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms, and persistent chat all-in-one easy platform. Plus, it's the easiest solution to manage scale and use, and has the most straightforward affordable pricing. Don't take our word for it, Zoom is a top-rated conferencing app across various user review sites, including G2 Crowd and Trust Radius. And you can sign up for a free account, not a trial, just visit zoom.us. As always, we appreciate all your support and we cannot wait to bring you our Founders Friday episode with Mariam Nefisi at Mintid.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “What a fantastic guest Steve was to have on the show, and I'd like to say a huge thank you, Tim, not only for the show, but for providing such fantastic ongoing support for me personally. I really do so appreciate that. And if you'd like to see more from Steve, then you can find him on Twitter at Vassalo SLL. Likewise, we'd love to see you behind the scenes here at the 20-minute VC. You can find us on Instagram at hstebbings 1996. As I said, it'd be great to see you there. But before we leave you today, Cooley, the global law firm around startups and venture capital. Since forming the first venture fund in Silicon Valley, Cooley's form more venture capital funds than any other law firm in the world, with over 50 years of experience working with VCs. They help VCs form and manage funds, make investments, and handle the myriad of issues that arise through a fund's lifetime. So to learn more about the number one most active law firm representing VC-backed companies going public, simply head over to cooley dot com or you can check them out at cooleygo.com. And do not forget to check out Zoom, the fastest growing video and web conference.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Steve, as I'm sure you can tell, I've absolutely loved our interview today, so thank you so much for joining me. It's been such a pleasure.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “That is just phenomenal. I wasn't expecting that. And then let's finish on the most recent publicly announced investment for you. And why you said yes?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “I can't wait for these next few questions. I've never asked any of these before, so this is interesting. How did you learn to use an oscilloscope and why is it so important?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Just you Now I would love to dive into a quick firearound with you now, Steve, but this is a very special one because I've actually had to do absolutely nothing for this because it was entirely constructed by your wonderful wife Trey. So I will say a short statement which was dictated to me by her and then you will give me your immediate thoughts. How does that sound?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Can ask, is there a paradox between this intense kind of product design focus with the notion of the Reid Hoffman of the world, you know, if you're not embarrassed of V1, then it's too late? Is there a paradox between that, and how does one balance between fast shipment and Eric Reese's lean startup methodology with perfectionist product design?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “It's easy to listen to you now then and think kind of this product centricity for you as a VC, but you've said to me before that building a great product isn't enough. I'd love to dive on this and what you mean by this and then what is enough?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Can I ask, how do we get that to change? Is that through having huge design first companies exit and provide those kind of liquid returns and seeing the realizations there? Or is it kind of just a slow-moving tide that has to make its progress?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Already conceived of to make that look prettier. And I think design has gone Well, I have to say, I didn't actually know about that time, but I'm a big fan of Ben's having had him on the show. So that's fantastic to hear. Well, I mean, what a swift transition then to one of his quotes where he said, more and more VCs value design. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on how the current crop of VCs in terms of kind of attitude to design and how they appreciate it. Do you think they're along the same tide as the progression of entrepreneurs with design?”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Ways I was thinking about kind of what it was like when I had left IDO back in the late 90s and joined my first startup. What were the resources that I would have appreciated having at my disposal? And so I wanted to create that. And that's what the weight of design really is. It's a guidebook on how to go from being a designer to becoming a designer founder, on how to really use design as a lever in your company and how to have design be a way for making much more meaningful impact and change in the world. With resources like this, with design-centric funds like the designer fund, I'm intrigued and also with the consumerization of SAS from a meta perspective. Do you feel that we've reached this inflection point in the appreciation for product design as this kind of foundation of all products, not just a benefit, so to speak? I think that's exactly right. So if you look back 20 years ago on design, and this was absolutely the case during my tenure at IDO, design was most often brought in kind of as an 11th hour styling exercise. You would kind of bring in the designers to make what the engineers had.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Who are aspiring to be great founders felt like they didn't have much in the way of practical resources to help them on the path to becoming kind of going from a designer to becoming a founder. And when I looked at the venture industry that I was now part of, most of the observations were pretty high level. So there were lots of stats out there on numbers of billion dollar design founded companies or stats on linked job openings for user experience designers or human factor specialists on numbers of design agencies that have been acquired in the last year. And a lot of that was very interesting, but it was mostly high-level industry observations. But when you looked at what are the resources out there for those individuals who may have popped out of UCLA or Carnegie Mellon's design program or spent a couple of years at Art Center, and you looked at kind of what resources were available to those individuals to help them figure out how to level up to go from becoming a designer to being a designer founder, there just wasn't much in the way of kind of practical tactical resources. So I felt like I needed to kind of go and fill this hole and in many ways.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “To your point, you get to work with some really, really compelling individuals who are going to inevitably hit some great moments and also hit some snags. And I think it's those white knuckle moments that we as investors sort of pride ourselves, I think, in helping entrepreneurs stay calm to stay focused on the most important kind of one or two issues. And even the best companies go through those moments. And so to be in a position of being an advisor, being a trusted partner at some times, being a therapist to help these folks through these kind of difficult times is something that I find very rewarding. Absolutely. But I do want to start today with a theme that we don't actually often discuss on the show being the theme of design. And you recently wrote the book The Way to Design. So let's start with that. And why did you feel so compelled to write the book? And do you not feel we have enough design-led founders? Well, what I'd say is, so after 10 years in venture, you know, I've met a lot of product and product design-oriented founders over the last decade. And what struck me was that so many of these young designers”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Of substance. So it's certainly delivered on that, I think, more than anything. And then you mentioned the fun element being the second thing I want to dive on. My partner Fredaway says he derives the most fun from being on boards and helping board management. Where would you say you derive the most fun? What's the optimal state of enjoyment for you in the process? The most fun for me is meeting with entrepreneurs every day is the sense that getting to step into their shoes for a couple of minutes understand what it is that makes them so excited about this opportunity in front of them. And even if you choose not to invest, and we say no to 99 out of the hundred things that we might see. And so even if you choose not to invest in these companies, you can't help be excited about what it is that they're doing, the enthusiasm that they've thrown out, this, the commitment that they've had, that number of people that they've had to convince in order to make this thing possible. And so it's very stimulating in that regard. And I think you kind of can't help but be taken up by their enthusiasm in that process of meeting them and doing diligence on these projects. And then in terms of the board work,”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “So it's been a little over 10 years. Can I ask kind of two subsequent questions from that? First, was VC everything that you maybe thought it might be in a preconceived notion? Let's start with that. So I didn't have a lot of expectations around venture capital. I didn't know much about it. My wife had been in a venture firm for a little while, so I had a little bit of a perspective through that experience. But for me, I think I understood every one of these firms to be a little bit different. And so I thought that if for whatever reason I was a fit at foundation capital, then it would be great when the windows open and you're next to it, jump through it. But I wasn't of the mind to kind of go and try to sort of get a venture job, or I think a lot of folks today think about venture in that regard. And my sense is it's a much more phenomenological path. I think people end up in these positions for lots of different reasons. I think there are very few folks who sort of follow the same path. So for me, I think my expectations were to meet really interesting people working on some amazing adventures and to hopefully help them on the path to building something.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Steve, it's such a pleasure to have you on the show today. Having heard so many great things from Neil at Defy, so thank you so much for joining me today. Great to be here. Thanks, Harry. I'd love to start their day with a little on you and how you made your foray into what I always call the wonderful world of venture capital. So what was your start? Well, I guess I'm a bit of an accidental venture capitalist, so I found my way here actually to Foundation Capital as an entrepreneur in residence. So I had started my career back in the early 90s as a product designer and roboticist at a company called IDO based here in Palo Alto. and then worked in a couple of startups running engineering and product and found my way to foundation after meeting a friend of mine at a TED conference back in I think it was early 2007 and I came in and was on the path of starting a company and the team here said well you keep bringing these cool projects in why don't you think about investing and I was pretty insistent that I wanted to start my own company and then a couple more months went by and I realized I was having as much fun as I ever had in my career and so decided to give it a go and that was the end of 2010.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Video meetings and webinars, collaboration enabled conference rooms, and persistent chat all in one easy platform. Plus, it's the easiest solution to manage scale and use and has the most straightforward affordable pricing. Don't take our word for it. Zoom is a top-rated conferencing app across various user review sites, including G2 Crowd and Trust Radius. And you can sign up for a free account, not a trial, just visit zoom.us. But it's now time to start the show and I'm thrilled to welcome Steve Vassalo, general partner at Foundation Capital.”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Steve published The Way to Design a Guidebook for becoming a designer founder and building a design centric company. It really is a fantastic read and if you haven't read that out do check it out in the show notes. I do also have to say a big thank you to Steve's partner Ashu Gog for the intro to Steve today without which this episode would not have been possible. However before we move into the show today, Cooley are the global law firm around startups and venture capital. Since forming the first venture fund in Silicon Valley, Cooley's form more venture capital funds than any other law firm in the world with over 50 years of experience working with VCs. They help VCs form and manage funds, make investments and handle the myriad of issues that arise through a fund's lifetime. So to learn more about the number one most active law firm representing VC-backed companies going public, simply head over to cooley.com or you can check them out at cooleygo.com. And do not forget to check out Zoom, the fastest growing video and web conferencing service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities, including”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “We are back for another week on the 20-minute VC with me, Harry Stebbings, and you can find me and see all things behind the scenes on the 20-minute VC on Instagram at hstebbings 1996. As you all know with 2Bs, it would be great to see you there. However, to the show today, and there are some guests where very quickly you can just tell there's this really special rapport and engagement that will not only make for a special show but a great relationship going forward. And that was definitely the case with our guests today. So join us in the hot seat. I'm thrilled to welcome Steve Vassalo, general partner at Foundation Capital, where he sits or has sat on the boards of the likes of Pocket, acquired by Mozilla, private court acquired by Facebook, Sun Run, Sentient Energy, and many more. Prior to Foundation, Steve was a senior vice president of products and engineering at Ning, the social platform he helped launch in 2004. Before that, Steve was a project leader at IDO, where he developed more than a dozen successful products for companies including Cisco, Nike, BMW and McDonald's. In addition, this year's”

    2018-02-26 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Why The Current Crop Of VC Does Not Understand Design, Why Product Market Fit Is A Liquid Not A Solid & How Graduates Can Optimise Their Career for Personal Development with Steve Vassallo, General Partner @ Foundation Capital · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source