This week I spent the day at one of our portfolio companies for a board meeting. The format was a bit different than usual, in that prior to the meeting we invited the entire company to join the board for lunch and spend two hours discussing whatever came to mind, it was AWESOME!
The board and management started out by walking thru our vision for the future and discussing the past accomplishments and challenges, we kept the section short on purposes. From there we turned it over team members to fire away questions, discuss thoughts, air concerns or anything else that came to mind.
As expected it was a bit awkward at first until someone broke the ice with the first question; but from there we were asked a range of questions from financing, staffing, sales, etc. They weren’t softballs either and the board tried not to skirt around any questions.
From my perspective it was great to hear the questions that came in, brainstorm with the team on potential strategies and see the whites of the eyes of the feet on the ground! From the team’s perspective they were excited to get a chance to interact with the investors and understand what goes on behind the closed doors at these ‘exclusive’ board meetings!
A follow up from the meeting was to do the meeting in more regular intervals, which we will be doing.
To often board members and VC’s deal just with senior level management and don’t take the time to meet with all the team and understand their perspectives. A few hours can really make a difference!
I also know a lot of investors who like to just roam offices after board meetings
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