Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Jeff Clavier, Founder And Managing Partner, SoftTech VC (Part 8)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: Do you require the people to have senior executive experience?

Jeff: No. Half of my entrepreneurs are first-time entrepreneurs. The youngest entrepreneur I’ve backed was nineteen, and he had already done three companies. I think the oldest entrepreneur I’ve backed was fifty-five.

Irina: What do you do about incomplete teams?

Jeff: By definition, an early-stage team is always about two or three people, and they have a lot of potential. They usually cover a lot of the bases, but they don’t have everything. Typically, it’s more like people with technology background than a business background or experience. So, you have to be ready to plug some holes, and as you scale the company and help build it up, you will help recruit the right talent. I’m always looking at the core team as the initial asset I invest in.

If I say, “Hey, this isn’t good enough for me to invest. I would have to bring in this person and this person,” then I will most likely pass. I don’t want to have to change the founding team as soon as I have closed the investment. It’s either I buy them as they are or I pass on them as they are.

What you’re buying into is the ability that team would have either implement the plan they after or figure out what other plan, what variation of the plan, what pivot around the plan would be successful.

You have to be ready to accept people as they are as opposed to how you want them to be. Working with them for eighteen months, that’s the way I think about it. Can I see them being successful as they are without fundamental changes to the team?Otherwise, it is just too much work. Not that I don’t want to do the work; it’s just too many changes, it’s not a stable platform to invest on.

Irina: What about characters of the founders? Are there any particular character traits that you are looking for?

Jeff: Startups are all about blood, sweat, and tears. I want people working extremely hard while being dedicated to and passionate about their business and who have empathy. You have to walk on water to be a successful entrepreneur, so empathy is very important.

Sometimes you just feel that people are natural-born entrepreneurs because you see they have a clear vision, understand the steps, and know how to go from where they are to the next steps. They can actually talk to people, they can convince you. If they can convince you as an investor, they will be able to convince employees or future employees to join them or future customers to use their products.

It’s not a checklist of keep of, Do I see this and this and that?Because I’ve done so many deals, I have developed a pattern of recognition based on the question: Do I feel an entrepreneur has the ingredients it takes?

This segment is part 8 in the series : Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Jeff Clavier, Founder And Managing Partner, SoftTech VC
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