Thank You, Jerry
Earlier this week, one of the true gentlemen of venture investing, Jerry Neumann, penned his “resignation letter”.
I was first introduced to Jerry in late-2011, when we were raising Glean DataHero’s pre-seed round. At the time, we were struggling to find investors outside of our personal networks who understood our vision for cloud BI. Jerry was introduced to me as “one of the most thoughtful angel investors in NYC.”
I had never heard of Jerry Neumann before (though I immediately loved his name). I wasn’t familiar with any of the companies he had previously invested in, nor was I aware that he was the author of one of the most thoughtful blogs on venture investing. I entered the call as I had many others, with high hopes and low expectations.
Within a few minutes, I realized that I had just met someone special.
The exact details of those early calls are long since lost to the cobwebs of time, but somehow we convinced Jerry to invest. From day one, he was one of the most involved and supportive investors we had. Yet it wasn’t until a few months later — when Jeff and I went to New York for TechCrunch Disrupt — that we met him in person for the first time.
Fun fact: In those days, the startup “competition” at TechCrunch Disrupt was shamelessly and disgustingly rigged
The night before we were to meet Jerry, Jeff and I went to a networking event for TechCrunch Disrupt. It was your typical NYC startup event: lots of people and lots of ego. At one point, a particularly confident individual with an investor badge approached us and asked about our startup. After hearing our pitch, he asked if we had raised any money. Jeff proudly answered, “One of our angels is Jerry Neumann!”
The investor shook his head and responded, “I don’t know why you would waste your time with that guy” and walked away.
We were both in a bit of shock. I don’t know which of us said it first, but the words “what an asshole,” were definitely spoken. It didn’t make sense to us.
The next day, we finally met Jerry. He was even more awesome in person than on the phone. Thoughtful. Humble. Inquisitive. Supportive. The previous night’s interaction still didn’t make sense to us.
It was only years later that I realized this particular asshole belonged to an entire category of investors. A group of cocky investment bankers and management consultants-turned-VCs who, having never benefited from the type of thoughtful, non-judgemental support investors like Jerry provide to founders, are completely dismissive of who they are and how they operate.
As the years went on and the challenges we faced building DataHero grew in scope and complexity, I was increasingly grateful to have Jerry in my corner. I can’t tell you how many calls we had at all hours of the day. Whenever I had a particularly hairy problem, he was one of the first people I called. And he always picked up.
In the years since DataHero was acquired and I moved to the investing side of the table, Jerry has continued to be a mentor and teacher to me. In fact, he even helped me to be a teacher. When I started teaching entrepreneurship for the Beedie School of Business a few years ago, Jerry shared a dump of all the lecture notes, slide decks and supporting materials from his course at Columbia (so if you’ve ever been in one of my courses, you’re benefiting from Jerry’s many years of experience!).
There are so many more things I could say about Jerry and the positive ways that he’s impacted my life and the lives of so many others. But for now, I’ll just say thank you.
And strive every day to provide founders with the type of thoughtful, inquisitive, non-judgemental support and encouragement that you’ve provided me for all these years.
P.S. If you’re a founder, you should read his book, Founder vs. Investor
P.P.S. If you’re an investor, you should read his 2015 post, Power Laws in Venture (and pretty much every other post he’s written)
Thanks Uncle Jerry!