With all the talk about what's wrong with VC

Source: Technology Review

I can’t help but observe the following … after meeting with two different people who were laid off recently, from two different venture-backed start offs.

There’s a wealth of information on what’s wrong with a company available simply by listening when people talk … information that I suspect isn’t getting to the VCs. The problem maybe that the VCs in question are over boarded, meaning they sit on too many boards, and therefore don’t have the time required to listen to what rank and file employees are saying about what’s wrong with their portfolio companies. But after investing $15M and $60M in companies – as they did in these two instances – taking the time would seem like a good investment, no? And the folks I talked to were not at all bitter about getting laid off. I found their comments to be exceptionally telling about what’s wrong with the companies they just left and prescriptive about what was needed to fix them.