How I Became a Venture Capitalist…

Note the “Skribit” widget below my blogroll.  Skribit is a start-up based in Atlanta.  The idea is very cool – it allows blog readers to contribute topic suggestions to the blogger…. Great cure for writer’s block <grin>. 

My first suggestion came from Lance Weatherby.  Lance is a Venture Catalyst at ATDC (Advanced Technology Development Center) here in Atlanta.  He’s got a great blog.  His suggestion was that I write about my pathway to becoming a VC.  So here’s my story (abridged version)…

I’m sure there are VCs out there who went to college with the specific goal of one day becoming a VC, still others who went to business school with the same goal.  I’m not one of them.  My parents didn’t go to college, so I had limited context for any career outside of doctor, lawyer, preacher and teacher.  After finishing Georgia Tech (where I maintained my sanity as a Mechanical Engineering major by minoring in Political Science and American Literature and working in Student Government), I became a business consultant (great job when you don’t really know what you want to do) and spent most of my first year out of school contemplating law school.  I didn’t know much about business school, but I was fortunate enough to work for a guy who would become a mentor.  Marco Bonilla, a Partner at Deloitte Consulting, allowed me to really engage with client problems (coolest assignment I had was to help the NYC Transit Authority figure out how to lease a ton of lit fiber they had pulled through their stations in the early 90s) and I learned to love business as a discipline.  He was also building the firm’s “Networking” practice which was the name given to the early beginnings of the Internet as a business tool.  I got hooked on the wave of innovation that was beginning to build in the mid-90s. 

Fast forwarding a bit – I left consulting and went to Harvard Business School for my MBA.  Fantastic experience and I finally learned about Venture Capital, mostly from the VC analysts in my class all hoping to be Partners one day.  I also learned a lot about VC from entrepreneurs in my class.  I fell in love with what it is VCs do, the role they play not just in business, but the broader world.  I had been looking for a career path in which I could pair up two passions – business and public service – and I came to realize that VC is just that.  I knew that VC was what I ultimately wanted to do, but I also knew my pathway would be very different from many of the young VCs I met in school.  I realized I would have to go down the entrepreneurial path toward a career in Venture Capital.  After all the requisite recruiting activities in my 2^nd year at HBS, I made the decision (thanks to some good advice from professors and fellow students) to take a job with a start-up in Atlanta called iXL (high flying internet consultancy in the late 90s – went public in 99)  When I met with the CEO, Bill Nussey, I just knew that this was where I belonged.  Sure, the salary was half of what McKinsey offered me, I stayed at the Holiday Inn on Howell Mill the night before my interview, not the Ritz-Buckhead I stayed in prior to my McKinsey interview, but I just felt like I had a chance to do something special at iXL.  Turns out it was the best career decision I could have ever made.  At iXL, I got to do a ton in a short period of time – going from the position of head lackey to the CEO to the GM of our office in Spain to the SVP of Corporate Development for a public company, all in less than 3 years… craziness. 

Bill Nussey became a mentor, brought me along as he transitioned from iXL to Silverpop, and convinced me to hunker down again, this time in a smaller business facing tougher economic times.  There I ran business and corporate development, worked to build our initial sales team, and learned how to pitch a product nobody had ever heard of.  He knew I wanted to eventually work as a VC (few people in Atlanta know that Bill worked for Greylock for several years before iXL), and he convinced me that living the experience within a high growth company would make me a better VC when the right opportunity came along.  Having been the bridesmaid a couple of times, I decided it was time to be the bride (ok, that’s a bit funny when I see it written out).  I built a business (Southern Direct) that provided an e-commerce platform for cable networks.  When I sold that business to Turner Broadcasting, another opportunity presented itself – I was hired to run Corporate Development there and we built a formal process to make venture investments on behalf of the company (Turner New Media Investments).  My time there was invaluable – I learned how to be a venture investor the hard way, without a lot of guidance.  Three years into my time at Turner, I felt like I was finally ready for a VC opportunity, should it present itself – member of the mgt team of two successful start-ups, founder and CEO of my own company which I later sold, corporate venture investor for 3 years. 

All of this led up to a discussion over breakfast last Fall with Noro-Moseley Partner Alan Taetle.  I had known Alan for many years, and knew NMP and several of its other Partners, too.  For me, Taetle was the gold standard when it came to technology investors in the Southeast (I’m already here, so no need to butter him up, I’m just speaking the truth <grin>).  He told me they were raising their 6^th fund and they were talking about adding a Partner.  That began a discussion that ultimately led to me joining the firm in early 2008.  When the opportunity was presented, I couldn’t have been more thrilled.  And the last year has been an incredible experience.  Our community has spoken about the dearth of Venture Capital in Atlanta and the Southeast.  During the ups and downs, NMP has always been there and yeah this is a shameless plug for our firm (like most of the last few sentences or so), but I am proud to be a part of a group of folks who have dedicated themselves for so many years to the growth of our city and region. 

Whew… it didn’t seem all that circuitous or disjointed when I was actually on the journey. For me, my arrival as a VC (in my home town – bonus) was a nearly 15 year effort.  I am thankful to my mentors, to the Big Man upstairs, to my wife, and to serendipity.  Yeah, I said serendipity (fancy word for luck)… if you don’t think luck has anything to do with accomplishing your goals in life, you need to wake up and smell the coffee.  The question isn’t whether you will need luck to accomplish your goals, the question is will you be prepared to take advantage of that good luck when it arrives on your doorstep.  OK, Tony Robbins has left the building.

Stay tuned…

Tagged as: ATDC, Atlanta, Bill Nussey, Deloitte Consulting, Georgia Tech, Harvard Business School, HBS, iXL, Lance Weatherby, Silverpop, Turner Broadcasting, Venture Capital