On Board and On Point: Turning Feedback into Strategic Wins
- Stephanie Roulic
- Nov 10, 2025
- 47 min read
As your startup scales, your board can either accelerate your growth, or slow it down. The difference often comes down to how well you manage the relationship. From aligning expectations and preparing for tough conversations to turning board feedback into strategic advantage, this session dives into what it really takes to build and lead a high-performing board.
Recorded live at Startup Boston Week 2025, this discussion explores the evolving role of the board through the lens of founders, operators and investors - unpacking governance, communication, and collaboration at the growth stage. You’ll learn how to make your board a trusted partner in scaling, not just a reporting obligation.
Featuring insights from:
Fraser Simpson - Founder, Appex
Natalie Gil - CTO, darshana.ai
Adrian Mendoza - General Partner, Mendoza Ventures
Lakshmi Balachandra - Founder/President, Resonance Business Insights
5 Takeaways
1. Your Board Should Be Built for the Company You’re Becoming — Not Just the One You Are Today
Fraser Simpson emphasized that the first step in building a board is identifying your business’s key unlocks - whether that’s customer access, capital, or technical depth - and filling seats with people who can solve those problems. He and Adrian Mendoza both cautioned against overbuilding too early; a lean, three-person board (founder/CEO, investor, independent) is ideal until Series B. A board should evolve with the company’s stage and strategy - not become a museum of early advisors.
2. Understand the Real Difference Between Board Members and Advisors
Board members hold fiduciary responsibility, they vote on major decisions, approve budgets, and bear legal accountability. Advisors, by contrast, offer expertise and perspective but no governance power. Simpson urged founders not to hand out free equity to advisors; instead, use short-term advisory roles with clear deliverables and light equity or paid incentives. Mendoza added that founders can form advisory boards by practice area (e.g., payments, AI, government) with one-year terms to keep guidance fresh and relevant.
3. Preparation and Transparency Make or Break Board Meetings
A strong board relationship starts with trust, and that means no surprises. Founders should send materials and financials several days in advance, request board questions early, and use meetings for strategic discussion rather than information dumps. Mendoza was blunt: “If your board meeting lasts more than an hour, fire everyone.” He recommended keeping meetings short, focused on outcomes, and assigning each board member “homework” to keep them accountable between sessions.
4. Feedback Only Becomes Strategic When It’s Managed, Not Absorbed
When board members disagree, founders should come prepared with a clear recommendation and rationale, rather than open-ended questions. Simpson advised founders to “go to your board with questions, but have a point of view.” He and Gil agreed that the key to turning board feedback into wins is engaging early, addressing concerns individually before meetings, and giving your board meaningful tasks that align with company goals. As Gil put it: “Empower them, make them feel like they’re doing great things - then they’ll give you great things.”
5. Dysfunctional Boards Can Be Fixed or Rebuilt
Mendoza offered one of the session’s most candid insights: “New money fixes everything.” He explained that new funding rounds often create opportunities to restructure boards, removing disengaged or obstructive members. When that’s not possible, founders should rally other board allies or independent members to address issues diplomatically. Balachandra added that as companies mature, boards must evolve to reflect new expertise — what worked at Seed may not work at Series C.
Key Quote Highlights
All five of these quotes are direct paraphrases or lightly cleaned for readability
“Build your board for the company you’re becoming, not the one you are today.” — Fraser Simpson, Founder, Appex
“If your board meeting lasts more than an hour, fire everyone. You should be spending time building your company, not overexplaining it.” — Adrian Mendoza, General Partner, Mendoza Ventures
“Go to your board with questions, but have a point of view. Don’t make them do your job for you.” — Fraser Simpson, Founder, Appex
“Empower your board members, make them feel like they’re doing great things, then they’ll give you great things.” — Natalie Gil, CTO, darshana.ai
“New money fixes everything. Each round is a chance to reset your board, your strategy, and your alignment.” — Adrian Mendoza, General Partner, Mendoza Ventures
Parting Thoughts, Video & Transcript
The conversation made one thing clear: a great board doesn’t just oversee your company, it helps build it. From founder-led startups to growth-stage scaleups, aligning your board around shared goals, honest communication, and strategic clarity can turn oversight into a competitive advantage.
As Boston’s startup community continues to grow, these lessons remind us that the strongest companies aren’t just defined by their products or markets, but by the people sitting around the table helping steer the vision forward.
Full Transcript Below
Want to revisit a particular quote or share with a teammate? We’ve got you covered. Read the transcript here:
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:01:49,610 ]Folks and our time is also short. So what I'd like to do is turn it over to each of our panelists and I'd like them to give you their 'board bio.' So, a little bit of background about themselves and as well as their board experience. So, you know, specifically, what boards have they been on or if they've built a board. So I'm going to start actually with, I'll start right next to me with Adrian Mendoza. Is right next to me.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:02:21,910 ] Adrian, would you like to introduce yourself?
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:02:24,630 ] Hi, I'm Adrian Mendoza. I'm the general partner at Mendoza Ventures. We are a venture fund here based in Boston, office in the Bay Area. We've been around for close to 10 years. We invested AI, fintech, cybersecurity, wrapping up our third fund.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:02:41,990 ] I sit on about four to five boards. I was actually on a board call this morning at 7 a. m. director of a UK company in our case, I sit on boards because we invest and we get a deeded board seat a lot of the times we are traditionally the first institutional investor. So we are responsible for building the board subcommittees, comcommittees, InfoSec, as well as potentially advisory boards, and also bringing in independent board members. Board observers. So in our case, we literally buy a ticket to the ride, and so we're usually the startup investor that sits on the board.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:03:26,320 ] And just a follow-up question for you, Adrian. When you invest, do you require a board seat?
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:03:31,560 ] Yes.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:03:32,140 ] So by virtue of being an investor, you then become a board member automatically.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:03:37,800 ] Yeah, so not traditionally.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:03:40,320 ] Normally, let's say you do a priced round or not a priced round. In some cases, I've done a not a price round and I've requested a board seat. But normally, for the founders in the room, if you're doing a price round, know that the lead investor, the person who is setting the terms, who should be writing the largest check. Should be the person sitting on your board if they're not, then that will send alerts to you if they're like, 'Oh, we have this other random person.' But always know that the board seat should not be deeded to the person; it should be deeded to the fund that invests, unless they're an independent. That's a different story. But as a fund investor, it will always get deeded to the fund. So that person in the beginning may be you, but in the future may not always be on that board long term.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:04:33,230 ] Great. We're going to come back to you, Adrian, but I would like to move on to our next panelist.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:04:40,270 ] Candice Gill is next on. Natalie. Natalie.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:04:43,980 ] Why do I write Candace? Natalie, my apologies. Natalie is next on our panel. And Natalie is going to give us a little bit of perspective as an entrepreneur as well. Natalie, if you would introduce yourself.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:04:57,640 ] Yeah, thank you. Thank you so much for having me. So I wear several hats, and I'm a tech executive. I worked for several companies— Amazon, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs— before.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:05:07,810 ] And I think I've been on boards. I was on the board of Boston Ballet, Latinas in Computing. I also presented to boards where I was a CTO for a company that was about to be listed in the New York Stock Exchange. So I wore several hats there, like presenting to a public board. Being on a board and, in addition, in the past years, I've been interviewing to be on boards because of two things. Boards need more diversity, so they need women, but also they need technical people who can also really put their good set of advice and you know thinking about how to tackle technical problems that are super relevant today. Every company, almost every company, is a tech company, so they really need our brains. So that's about me. And Yeah, I represent all those hats, but also represent diversity here. So that's what I want to give to the table.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:06:01,130 ] And Natalie, a follow-up question to that. Have you found that, when you were building your board, were you deliberate about bringing in technical expertise and diversity?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:06:11,330 ] How did you approach that? Oh, that's an amazing question, because if I'm part of a board where I joined after, maybe I can bring some perspectives, but then, when I, for the start, he is my co-founder, we put together this, we are super intentional to bring not only technical— like I'm on the board, I also bring other technical people, or I'm an executive, and then I bring, like, to this public company, I need to bring technical people. In technology, because they're technical people, you know, the thing that is going on with this company. So, yeah, I push that because even if you have an expertise, probably we need to complement it with other expertise that, in that particular time, for that company organization, is needed to go to the thing that we need to achieve. So, yeah, if I'm not the one, like, we need more of that skill or that experience. I normally push for that, or for diversity, or for technology. For even, I push like, okay, let's put a compensation here— like somebody that brings that to the table. So even if it's not like my topic, I also push to bring that, if that's something that I identify as needed.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:07:15,990 ] And one more follow-up question for you. When you have joined boards, how have you decided to join a board? And are you compensated? Yes.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:07:25,570 ] So in some cases, yes. In some cases, no. In some other cases, I actually, because there's a nonprofit organization, I put money there.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:07:33,470 ] It depends on on the role there, but there's there's a compensation in some if I am not part of the like, okay, they bring me because of my skills. Right, I'm independent, so that's that's uh that's the thing. But then, I think that's something. And this is, um, a lot of people in the stage of my career where we're being executive for companies. And I belong to one organization named High Tech with their executive, Hispanic executives in the U.S. A lot of us, we are doing that career. We're going to boards. We're going to first non-profits. There are some other boards and public boards. So we're doing that because we bring both of those things. We have diversity, cultural, and then also we are technical people. So that's why, yeah.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:08:17,610 ] One final question for you, sorry, before I bring in Frasier, because of this angle of bringing in this technical knowledge or you mentioned also being a woman. Have you found? We and there's been a lot of research on this right about the number of women on boards and how do we increase gender diversity? And this is actually my area of research: the fact that there are so few women that get funded or in the investment pool.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:08:48,100 ] How has that been? What is it like to be a woman in, maybe, a male-dominated board?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:08:54,980 ] You know, that's an excellent question because when I'm sitting in, like, I also do a lot of business in Latin America, that's a different cultural, like, how to manage that. It's like being somewhere overseas. That you see a lot of more push on. And there's few women there, so it's another type of management I need to do to get my, you know, my statement there and then to push the things that I want to push or lobby how I want to lobby. In the U. S., it's a little bit different. It's more open. There's more intention to be like open to this, but still, there's sometimes that you get this.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:09:31,010 ] Not really intentional microaggressions, even sitting on like everybody's talking and then, but it's good, like I'm vocal about that. I said, 'Oh, this is what you did.' Oh, I'm sorry. So it's good. I think they're very, everybody, even myself, that I do microaggressions to other people. But you need to be conscious about that. And depending where you're sitting in the world, the cultural element is very heavy in terms of how to manage that. So I do a lot of lobby before sitting because that's the best way to manage.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:10:01,900 ] Interesting. And so, I mean, we hadn't even thought about the global perspective, right? And what a board may look like in this country. It's completely different.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:10:11,300 ] Right.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:10:11,660 ] Either multinational or, you know, international organization.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:10:16,339 ] and and Natalie you also mentioned we also can include the non-profit board world where that requires actually contributing right yeah sometimes if I really like the cost of course I'm going to give to because I'm committed to that yes okay um thank you uh we will be coming back to Natalie as well um last but not least I'd like to bring Fraser into the conversation Fraser Simpson is on the end and he is really going to give us the perspective of the entrepreneur so Fraser love to hear your bio Perfect.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:10:49,320 ] So hi, everyone. My name is Fraser Simpson. I'm American and British, grew up in France and Canada, but now I'm a very proud Boston resident of Southie. I'm the founder of Apex, which is a mobile app studio that we scaled to just under $20 million in revenue. My career has been a mix of, call it, conventional finance slash investing at Lazard, BDT, Premier, as well as more entrepreneurship and operating roles. Helping scale some emerging market ventures, working at a whiskey company called Whistlepig, and then finally founding Apex.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:11:25,990 ] Today, I'm on the board of Apex, my company. And the board of a student-run investment fund, an advisor to several early stage ventures, and then historically I've had stints as a board member, board observer, and advisor to a variety of companies, organizations, and non-profits.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:11:46,830 ] Thank you. So I'm curious, as I'm sure others are in the room, how did you build your board?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:11:58,420 ] How do we build our board? So on Apex and the way when you think about building your board and I'd argue also it's how you build your advisory board.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:12:07,160 ] Start with what is the business you're building and what does that business need? What are the key unlocks that are going to help you win? Is it customer relationships? Is it deep technical support? Is it capital? Find your gaps and then find the people that are going to help solve those problems. At the end of the day, a board or advisors are working for you. To solve those problems. So at Apex, one of our initial non-founder board members was someone who was an expert in our business model, that of roll-ups, and had deep experience scaling these businesses, had deep relationships with the capital providers that would fund these types of things. And then, on the strategic advisor side, it was a deep operator that really understood the nitty-gritty way to run a mobile app, right? So again, trying to find the problems, right, that we need to go solve and mixing and matching.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:13:03,220 ] I would say... As you think about building your board, it advisors and board members serve the same purpose. And remember, at the end of the day, they're working for you, right? Like you should match them to problems you're trying to go tackle.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:13:21,070 ] And if they're not solving problems, then in some ways, you know, a founder's job is to constantly be communicating and building relationships. And if these folks are not solving problems, it's relationship overhead. Right. So being really thoughtful as you're scaling about who you want to bring in and report to is really, really important to get right.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:13:44,420 ] I'm going to have you go back a bit— thank you, Frazier— by the way, but I'm going to have you go back a little bit because you mentioned board advisors and board members. Can you explain what what's the difference is? I'll have a follow-up question. Why don't you tackle that first?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:14:02,689 ] Sure. So the way, and I'm going to be simplifying a little bit here, but a true proper board member is someone that has a fiduciary duty.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:14:12,670 ] To the company and also has real power in the company. They have a vote, right? So they can, you know, vote on things that matter to you and to the company. Whereas an advisor, and there's all sorts of flavors of advisor, but at the end of the day, don't have governance control or a governance say in the company. So that's the way I would differentiate.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:14:35,540 ] But I'll pause there.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:14:37,960 ] Thank you. And I'm going to come back to Adrian following up on my question to you.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:14:44,640 ] When you ask someone to be an advisor, what why would they become a board advisor for you if they don't have a vote or a fiduciary interest in your business?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:14:58,720 ] So, the part of it is there's there's a mix here, but you're effectively pitching them. If you've found someone that is really going to help drive your business forward, you know, you're trying to pitch them to come join now. For us, all of our board advisors or strategic advisors— i brought in— we had a rule that no one got free equity; everyone had to pay to play. So, even if you were an advisor, you know, you technically had to invest. So, not necessarily a large amount, but it's important to put skin in the game. I would say to all would-be founders: don't just give out free equity to folks.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:15:40,810 ] But it comes down then to recruiting them and pitching them on the idea, having them like you, right? Having them believe in the business model. But I think the other piece is really matching, you know, what they can do to the problems you're trying to solve. If someone is coming to me to be an advisor, and they have a very clear, 'Hey, Fraser, I'd love for you to come join or do this because we're really trying to tackle X. Or we'd really like your insight on Y.'
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:16:10,160 ] It's a lot easier for me to say yes to because I know what I'm getting into and I also know how I can contribute.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:16:15,520 ] So those are some of the ways that we would do it.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:16:18,330 ] Fantastic. And I saw Natalie nodding. Did you have another comment?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:16:23,690 ] No, I'm taking notes because I found that really interesting. That's what I really like from these conversations— different insights from that.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:16:31,590 ] Yeah. And that's been your experience as well in joining a board as an advisor?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:16:36,200 ] Yeah, because at some point, yeah, they asked me, like, okay, you need to have skin in the game, so you also need to put, so I invested, I was an angel investor and also an advisor, and that's how it happens, because I really believe in this, so I have skin in the game, so I also put the money and my time and everything. Yeah, that's the way it works, and I really like that model.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:16:54,410 ] Yes, so you're building both— really a vested interest, right? And so your advisor, obviously, hopefully, will give you really good advice, right, in terms of building a successful business. Fantastic. And I want to come back to Adrian for a moment because Fraser mentioned the board member, right, is a fiduciary interest and has governance.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:17:18,930 ] And so that means a vote. And so Adrian, when you join a board as an investor, what are the requirements you have in place? Is it control? Is it voting? What does that look like?
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:17:34,130 ] yeah i think it's i love the conversation about sort of bringing in sort of whether you bring in board members whether you bring in not board members part of what you guys have to remember is that if you're an early stage founder you haven't raised capital or you have raised capital You want to build the board for the long term, not like forever, but like one funding round, two funding rounds. The worst thing you can do is bring a bunch of debt equity in, a bunch of advisors that then what we as investors in the next round have to weigh out. The time versus money scenario, if there's a bunch of dead bodies as advisors or as board members, is it do I have to spend the time to restructure the board and kick all the dead bodies out or do I focus on a company that's nice, squeaky clean, that maybe they have a preliminary board where it's just the founder and it becomes this really sticky conversation, because of people like I remember looking at a company and they were like, 'Oh, it's a board of three and the founders have two seats and the investor has one seat.'
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:18:47,730 ] And I'm like, 'The answer is no.' Oh no, but we also have majority of the companies. So I'm like, 'So clearly you could do whatever you want to do and we have no vote in it.' So goodbye. And that's the type of thing, like for me, the perfect board between now and your series A is one founder/ slash CEO. One independent that's mutually chosen between the investors and the founders that represents both— and one investor— and then keeping that board of three as long as you can until you get to a series B. Because The more that you open up the aperture of bringing in bodies, the more of a distraction it is for you as a founder and more of a distraction for me as an investor. Because a lot of times what we'll do is look at your list of board advisors or advisors, regardless of whether they've written you a check, and be like, 'Get rid of this person, get rid of this person.' If you're giving away free equity, tell them goodbye, send them on their way.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:19:50,680 ] Because the worst thing is that you have. An angel, and no offense to the angel investors in the room, that have given $50,000 to $100,000 and now sit on the board. And are like, 'Oh, OK, well, that's great and all, but if I'm writing $2 to $5 million, I'm going to walk in and restructure it.' So you don't want to be too set, but you want to make sure that you're planning it off that first institutional money that comes in. It's really open to them, and you're not putting any roadblocks in front of them.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:20:23,409 ] This is such a fabulous point in terms of, you know, the first institutional money. I'm going to build on that. And I want to come back to some stories from you. So I'm putting a pin in that conversation. But I want to ask Natalie and Frazier, how did you decide when to build a board? Thank you.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:20:47,010 ] Yeah, so we build a board with a company we had before with my co-founders here. And then we run through a lot of the things you mentioned. And then right now, I think it's good that we have consistency, not only on the board, but also on the rest of the elements that are going to help us be sustainable in the longer term. So the board right now, we are thinking about that, like what we're going to put together there. What's the right amount of, thank you for the advice, because we're considering that. But that's one piece. The other piece is financial. The other piece is technology. So everything needs to be super aligned. Because if we have something very super developed and the other one not, so that's the type of thing we are considering right now. Have everything aligned so everything grows or everything evolves at the same pace.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:21:33,110 ] I guess I have a more of a philosophical angle on this, though, for you, Natalie. Why? Why do you need a board?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:21:39,370 ] Why do I need? Oh, because I need two things.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:21:44,540 ] And that's what I bring back when I say, 'Okay, I can spot right away what's going on' because I have experience on that. And this is something we've been having conversations in the past weeks. Like, I have a lot of war, like, you know, battles and everything, so I can spot that right away. And then I want people on things that I have blind spots to help me with that.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:22:08,230 ] Okay, so you're really looking for some expertise and some insight for the... And some people that have common sense.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:22:16,270 ] Okay. Like, you can have good, yeah. good experience or not, but common sense. Okay, we have a conversation. I know your expertise. You have common sense. Whatever you say, I think it's going to be in a good intention and with common sense. That's what I really like.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:22:31,450 ] I think there is a distinction between who you put on your board and who you put on your advisory board.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:22:37,010 ] Yes.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:22:37,510 ] So I'll tell you a good example. Like our companies, we do the board of three and then we also have an advisory board. And I'll help you to, I'll tell you guys how we structure it because I love this and you could steal my model. We build an advisory board based on practice. There's a practice lead. So, like in one of our companies, that's an AI company, there's a government advisory board. There's a payments. There is a insurance. And at the height of every advisor board, there's a practice lead, a person that wrangles the cats. And it's a limited time offer. It's one to two years.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:23:13,590 ] You get a quarter percent equity if you're helpful. If you bring in a sales lead, if you bring in, like, a customer, then you get comped for it. But then the goal of it is in two years. A lot of these people may be obsolete. So you just shuffle them out. You thank them for their service versus a board member. That is a voting board member, will potentially be there for a long while.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:23:38,960 ] So you kind of have to leverage both things that you have. So hopefully that's helpful for you to restructure it.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:23:44,720 ] And the other thing is that you're doing something very new, even like the rest of the stuff, even like, okay, you need to bring these people to the table to build this new technology. How is a compensation people, like, expert in that, like, I don't know what type of people you're hiring. Like, let me explain. Somebody asked me, okay, how do you do that? Well, you take the course. There's no course. I'm putting together the course to learn about that, like to go to market for this technology. So how do you hire that? Where do you find people that know how to compensate my team? So there's where common sense comes, because if we're building something new, not really on the, well, could be a new business model, a new market. A new technology, like to put a new technology to the market, then it's complicated because we are doing something new. So that's what we want to do. And then we need more help in terms of. Okay, I can extrapolate that you're good for that on the advisory board, on the board, like to really have that longer-term view. But then we just need to extrapolate, like this is going to be good for that on one year, two years, on this particular stage of the company or longer.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:24:48,910 ] That's the challenge that we have.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:24:50,130 ] I would also recommend building a comp committee that is an extension of your board, so that has these open conversations: how many options, who are we going to give more comp to, you know, or less comp, you know, who do we like, that we should bring in, how do we empower you as the CEO, and then those recommendations, then that's what goes to your voting board. Yeah, but that way you're not having these ridiculous conversations. They're structured in a comp committee that meets as you need it or once a quarter. All of that work— what is the cap table, what is your option table, do that work. Then, those recommendations, then you guys vote, and can move forward from there.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:25:32,110 ] Yeah, it happens for the rest of the committees too. Like, but then you know, it needs to be level up. Like, okay, this. Is what we're building. This is how we are going to evolve, and and yeah, but that's that's that's good too. We need to be like consistent with everything. No, no.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:25:46,030 ] But actually, one last point on this, Natalie. So, when you have your board, is the idea that you're bringing these people together for a board meeting and so you get this conversation. Because, you know, as we're hearing, you could just have them be advisors.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:26:02,360 ] No, no. The idea is to, because it's different, that you have like, yeah, you need to have everybody sitting on the same table because otherwise they were not aligned. Yeah.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:26:12,030 ] Great. And we're going to get into that, into those meetings in a moment. But I want to ask Frazier the same question.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:26:20,890 ] When do you decide to build it?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:26:23,110 ] And I think what's important here too, when you're thinking about founding a company, there's a company life cycle and there's, as a company scales, things are going to get bigger. And I completely agree with Adrian, number one, that small is good. right, the less stakeholders you have to manage is really, really, it's going to be a massive unlock on your time. And you want to think about things for the long term. So coming back to the advisor piece, you know, you don't need to bring a bunch of people on your board if you're pre-seed. Right, there are other ways to channel the kind of support you need because you do want to keep things very simple. You do want to keep your legal expenses to as small as possible. Right, you don't want to be spending time on governance or committees when you're barely making any revenue. Right. So, that's we're also thinking and being very intentional about what are the things you're going to need as a business to scale. Then, how do you back in to getting those experts or laying out your structure?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:27:26,630 ] Um, is really really important. Was your question on also, then, how you pick the board member?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:27:33,930 ] From how you picked, but also, but Why why did you need to have a board?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:27:38,660 ] Because, in some ways, you'd say you had to have a board that had a vote, because you have to. And part of that is when you do raise capital, the people that are giving you the money have a fiduciary responsibility to their investors, and you've also now built something that it's a little bit bigger than you. And so the Companies need a board, and it's a very important fiduciary responsibility. And so also, when anyone asks you to be on a board, that's not something to be taken lightly, because there is a lot that goes along with actually being a board member. Adrian has a fiduciary responsibility for a lot that goes on on the five to ten companies that he sits on the board of.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:28:18,660 ] It's a pretty big deal. But I would say, from the founder's perspective, the more you can keep as much control as you can, as long as it's helpful, because the moment you start introducing more folks into the mix.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:28:35,230 ] Which is also a good thing, right? Because you're getting in more capital, you're growing faster, the pie is getting bigger. There's a lot more stakeholders to manage, right? And so you want to be mindful of that.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:28:48,160 ] I want to pick up on that piece. So now you have a board, right, as an entrepreneur. And so what's involved with having a board? What do you have to do for your board now?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:29:02,629 ] So usually, if you're the founder and CEO, you are also a board member, but effectively, they are your ultimate stakeholder, right? And so you're going to have—them to be kept most informed. They're the ones to talk through company strategy with. They're the ones with whom you'll have your board meetings.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:29:21,780 ] So, I mean, we can go into that if you'd like, but.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:29:25,160 ] Natalie, did you want to?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:29:27,340 ] No, I agree that when you put— you don't need to manage a lot of stakeholders. That's crazy because then you have customers, you have your team. So you need to really be focusing to. Into that and then yeah, that's because the thing is that you you can think to do a lot of things but that sometimes you're confused like, hey where should I start like these customers, these customers, this market I have a lot of opportunities here it's a good problem to have a lot of things to do. But then you really need that, again, that common sense. Okay, not only common sense. Okay, you have your investors. This is what you need to do. This is what you need to achieve. So let's go there, right?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:30:06,480 ] Not to be distracted. So that's good that you... You have that, and you need to manage those expectations. Then everybody else, but then pointing to that.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:30:16,680 ] But I would say, you know, the board, though, is then also in some ways, your greatest asset, right? To leverage. And so, yes, you want to keep, you know, you have your vision, and you want to make sure that the ultimate test for you to win or the ultimate test for you to ace is not the board meeting, right? It's for the company to be successful.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:30:36,889 ] And if you've structured your board correctly, you've gotten the right people around the table, they are one of your highest quality assets to help you get there.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:30:46,899 ] But I do think, though, what one of the things that does change as you do start to have a board, as one way to also manage them, is how do you guide your board on the most important problems of tomorrow. Right, just like you and your strategy, as you're scaling, you want to be looking forward, how can you leverage and put the board towards looking forward for tomorrow's problems, right? And again, it's a different set of management versus when it was just you running things. But again, if you get that piece correctly, it's an incredible accelerant.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:31:22,390 ] Because now you're turning from, you know, making decisions on your own into now you have to get the board to support your decisions and to buy in and to vote accordingly. And so, having said that, when you're on boards, and I'm going to ask, you know, Natalie and Adrian to discuss. You know, have there been situations where you have had big disagreements, right in terms of either who should be on the board or what the entrepreneur is doing? And if you could share, you know, how did those go, and how did you handle it, or if you have an example.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:32:01,220 ] Oh, that was me first?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:32:02,020 ] Either of you. Either of you. Either of you can take it.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:32:04,340 ] I can go. I think taking a step back, your board is there for doing two things. The first thing is in the governance.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:32:12,510 ] Decisions, votes, and so perfect an example— like you raise capital—yes, everybody cheers. You have the board at a certain point, the first board meeting somewhere. You have to, someone or someone has to actually say the strike price so that it gets recorded in the board minutes. Everything you do as the board gets recorded in the board minutes. That is there to capture votes. It is the fiduciary artifact for every decision that the company makes.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:32:43,740 ] Beginning of year or at the end of the year, you have to do the AOP, the annual operating plan. That then gets approved by all the fiduciaries. Remember that, as a voting board member, you are a fiduciary of the company. What does that mean? That means you are responsible from other stakeholders, other investors, common holders for decisions that the company makes. In some cases, going back to horror stories.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:33:10,120 ] I know someone who joined the board was very excited, wasn't indemnified, the company was about eighty thousand dollars in debt, and it was payroll. So the highest, most expensive debt the four board members were responsible for the debt because they weren't indemnified. And that's what you have to remember: fiduciary responsibility really comes down to like, you are the owner of the decision. You do not take this thing lightly. Something goes wrong, you are on the crosshairs. Like right now, board members are not indemnified if there's a cybersecurity event. The board is responsible.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:33:53,960 ] So that's one side. And then there's the strategic side— the fuzzy thing— like, 'Hey, let's talk about strategy for the year. Let's talk about strategic investments.' and that will things that become to the governance side. So if let's say you decide to do an asset sale or sell a portion of the technology that has to get voted on by the board, so you always go back and forth. Anything you do on one side has a repercussion on the governance side. But also remember that though you have a board, it only structures well if you get a good buy-in from everybody. Because look, I've been doing this 10 years now. I've had to replace multiple CEOs before. It wasn't just knowing the board members and having to talk to them and whip their votes. It was also going to the majority shareholders and being like, 'We're going to do this and we're going to do this the right way.'
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:34:55,030 ] Things get done. The company's now running great. But like, that's the port of the board is to take a step back.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:35:02,600 ] So from the board member's perspective, you've got to put work on the board. You're not there for the free ride. If you're dead weight, someone like me is going to come in and throw you off. Like, I'm on a board and the guy slipped up. Board members don't make customer introductions. And literally, the first thing in my mind is, you're gone on the next round.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:35:21,560 ] For the founder, if your board members are just sitting there like bumps on a log, get rid of them.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:35:28,300 ] Your board meeting should be no more than an hour. If it goes to two to three hours, you should just fire everybody.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:35:37,390 ] They should be an hour. Hey, here's literally, this is, here's my framework. You could steal it. First slide is, hey, what's the update on the company? That's the CEO. And then be like, dude, I don't want to talk to you. Then I want to hear revenue. I want to talk to the revenue, the salesperson. Give me the alpha between last board meeting and this board meeting. What happened? Was it positive? Was it negative? Only show me things that are 50% to 75% of close. And then maybe I want to hear from the technology person. For example, hey, what's going on? Like, what's hiring plan? And then great, and then you should end it, the founder should end it with, 'Okay, here's your to do to everybody. You're not there, you all have homework.'
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:36:27,580 ] Thank you, by the way, for sharing your formula, Adrian. But I'm curious if this is a consistent formula. In other words, have you had board members who have wanted other things? And how have you managed the variety of demands from board members?
Natalie Gil
[ 00:36:51,520 ] So, if I go, especially for the hour meeting, right, because you need to get to the point and then close with action items, and everybody gets the and then you check on the next meeting or follow up before the next one.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:37:06,440 ] I mean, that's the same as any other super complicated, not super complicated, but really there's a lot of gets to things to manage on any other meeting. Like this is an important meeting, but the same important meeting that I'm interviewing someone for a very critical position in my company. So it needs to be too much. Okay, I'm nervous. No, this is what I need to do. This is how I address that. I need to explain that before to deliver the information for that hour meeting. So I deliver the information and I make sure that everybody went through that information before the meeting. So those are basic things for a meeting. That's that. Manage the communication to be clear, to go to the point, and then somebody else is like, 'I know this person is going to, so I talked to this person before.' This is the information that you need. What else do you need? That's that. It doesn't need to be complicated. It doesn't matter if you're sitting in a startup board that is early stage or a board with a New York Stock Exchange listed company. The same. Somebody taking the notes, doing that. Just do your job. So that's my approach.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:38:07,460 ] I mean, it doesn't matter if I talk to the president of a company or my intern. It's the same.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:38:12,730 ] We're bringing value, everybody, to the table.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:38:15,910 ] I think I agree with a lot of what both of you are saying. And Adrian, I also agree. If board members are not doing what they're supposed to do, they have a job to do too, just like you as the founder and/ or CEO of a company have to perform.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:38:32,460 ] It can sometimes feel daunting right to then go talk to one of your board members that's not necessarily doing what they're supposed to do, but I completely agree that if folks aren't holding up their end of the bargain, you should do something. And you know, I would say too, as a founder, it's not about being liked, it's about being trusted and respected. And at the end of the day, you are the person operating the company. You are the person in the day-to-day. And so there are going to be plenty of times, and this is what board meetings are for, to tackle open-ended questions. What should we do with this acquisition? What direction should we go here or there? I would say to the point of how to deal with dissent is you want to go to your board with questions. But I think it's very good to go in with a recommendation or a viewpoint— absolutely show pros and cons— and and you know go through the options. But have a point of view, because the worst thing you want to do is go in with no solution, with a forum of folks that are professionally trained to give their opinion, with very little information.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:39:43,090 ] Sometimes, and then suddenly have to deal with the next step— diplomacy of walking everyone back from that. So coming in with a plan is really important. I mean, a couple other little things: there should be no surprises in a boardroom meeting, right? Board members, I'm all about radical transparency, right? You're sharing things as they come up. You should be talking with your board members one-on-one before the meeting. The earlier you can send the materials in advance is important. And you can ask, and you should ask, if you're able to send it three or four days in advance, for board members to submit questions three days in advance so that you can prepare and make the most of the one hour that you have together.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:40:24,520 ] Hold your board to account. And doing things like that is another really good way to set the tone, especially if you're a first-time founder, would be a couple of the things. The other part I would say here, too, is there is this...
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:40:42,030 ] And I felt this feeling of acing the board meeting, right? And I want to have the best charts, the most expansive deck, cover all the pieces. But, you know, to me, prepping for the board meeting is more, well, how do I want to, in general, just inform my investor? What is the cadence of the investor updates I want to be sending? What are the key KPIs? What is the simplest way to report on that to my stakeholders in general and then the board meeting is an offshoot of that— it's looking at that as well as the things that matter. Again, you're spending less time on reporting right and more time getting board feedback on the things that matter. The last thing I'll say on this that I think is really, really important: at the end of the meeting, you know, write down what everyone has said. And sometimes the beginning of the next meeting is a rehash of what was agreed to. So, you know, at our company, we would buy mobile apps and, you know, one board meeting the board would say, 'Buy faster the next board meeting they would say, 'Buy slower.' Right. And you know, I learned that it's a lot better to say, 'Well, guys, wait a minute we you know ended last meeting with this plan, right?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:41:49,640 ] Because it's not necessarily the board's fault, but they might be sitting on five or six or seven plus boards. The company you're working on is your 24/ 7 job. But one of my investors actually reminded me, you know, he says that the best founders start every board meeting reminding the board with what the company does. Which again, hopefully, they'll know. But you know, they might be sitting on seven plus boards, right? It's up to you, as the founder, to create the context that's going to get the most out of the team that you have and really turn it into an asset rather than having to spend a lot of time playing catch up.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:42:29,050 ] So, Frasier, you make this sound very easy.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:42:33,170 ] Easy to do, no problem. But I'm guessing there's been some challenges, and I'm...
Natalie Gil
[ 00:42:39,050 ] Can I add something?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:42:39,690 ] Yeah, absolutely.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:42:40,670 ] And it also depends on the style how you manage because you sound like, okay, I have objectives and then you have, I don't put the slide there. I skip a slide. If I get to the objectives to do that, that's fine. There's sort of people that are more structured than us. So you need to get through the information and then otherwise they had like, I don't know. So depending on how you manage the meetings, you need to adequate to that. Otherwise, it's like, okay, you're going to just snap, right? So we have that. That's good. But then that advice is, like, whatever your style is, adequate that to the type of meeting you're facing, and then do the follow-up or whatever.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:43:16,270 ] If you just you cannot click on the boxes because you need more stuff, then do it your way. That's a whole piece of advice.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:43:23,590 ] Natalie, as you said earlier, is good meeting advice, good management advice, right? Like managing your board. And knowing, you know, we heard from Adrian, what Adrian looks for, right? Like this is exactly how the board meeting should be. You need to know your audience, yes. Right? You need to know your audience here as well.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:43:39,360 ] Add one thing to what Fraser and Natalie said. Before you send your board materials, make sure you send along the company's quarterly financials. Because the number one question every person on the board is, how much money is in the bank? How much money did we make last quarter? And so if you end up doing this whole dog and pony show and all the board members are like, but how much money do we have in the bank? How much runway like that's all we care about at the early stage— so send that ahead of time, like breakdown of financials. Because if we have to take a thing and say, 'This is great but like, what was revenue in the quarter broken down by product? And you didn't show that—like, try to get that stuff. Because again, going back to that governance check box: the minutes are there to record cash in the bank, the status of that company at that exact moment in time.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:44:34,800 ] They can tell when you're hiding something. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:44:37,780 ] And just on that, that's the part, too, where there's so many times, you know, it seems weird to think about. Early, early days of your company— maybe even before you have fully raised money or have a board— what are the key KPIs? How should I probably structure information to myself to view this business, but to any investor or stakeholder? And as you bring in and you do a round, let's say, and Adrian does invest and does come on your board, you know, sharing, this is how I like to approach the meeting. These are the key metrics that we think about. Get buy-in, get feedback. Adrian's looked at, you know, 100 plus companies. He'll be able to give you some guidance. That then again, you can hopefully, and now with a lot of tech, a lot of the reporting piece should almost be automatic. And that then also means that the board is less looking through the pages to see what is Fraser missing, right? Versus, okay, yeah, we've got the standard. Thing or you have access to the financials.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:45:38,100 ] So now, yeah, let's look at the pieces that are important. But there are so many times looking back that that wasn't the cool thing to work on. Right. When you were scaling or hiring or doing things. But those were some of the most valuable times I wish I had. Right. Because it's never easier. It'll never get easier to simplify your reporting, your KPIs, your metrics, and simple is hard.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:46:01,610 ] Frasier, before I turn it over to questions, I do want to go back to what's happened or how have you handled challenging situations?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:46:12,690 ] Jill's in the room and we used to talk about how all the advice you get from board members, you end up feeling like you get whiplash, right? Because somebody has one opinion and someone else will tell you something completely different. So how do you manage that, particularly in the meeting?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:46:29,660 ] With you know people that have a voting interest, it's a moving target.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:46:36,266 ] It's always a moving target, and again, there's lots of advice and perspectives. You'll have to match it to your your board and your context. But I would say, 'no surprises' in a board meeting is first and foremost. So, if look ahead, right— if there's going to be some important decisions that might have to get voted on at the board meeting, it's a mistake if that's the first time folks were talking about it or that you've spoken with board members about it uh going into that meeting. So, in many ways, try to avoid tension in the boardroom to a degree, because you don't want to feel like people are forced in corners and whatnot. Prep in advance, build support in advance, are some of the most important pieces, I would say. Um, but the other piece though is, you know, have conviction, right? Uh, you, you are the founder. You're not the investor that's looked at four thousand of these companies before, but this is what you're doing every day and also have conviction and don't be afraid.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:47:42,090 ] To say this is what you really believe that we should do. Now, you have to live with the consequences of those decisions, but you do have more leverage than you think you do. And at the end of the day, as a board member with a fiduciary duty in a company, you want to have someone there with conviction that is willing to put their foot down, right?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:48:04,700 ] And so that's a balance, but I'd say don't be afraid to do that. But again, the more you can do pre-board meeting, so that it's not the end of a few good men, right? That's not what you ever want to have in a boardroom.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:48:20,030 ] The fight comes up in the boardroom, yeah.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:48:22,410 ] But, yeah.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:48:25,420 ] Thank you. I do want to leave time for questions. If I see a few hands up, we'll start over here. Do we have a mic?
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:48:38,720 ] Hi, I'm gonna press on this challenge piece a little bit more because first of all, the entire panel was wonderful. Thank you all so much for all of your expertise. There were a lot of scenarios that were presented pretty cleanly. I'm thinking specifically, so as background, I have been on a management team that has had to report to a board and I've been a founder who has been a board member along with investors. I have a little bit of experience with this. Having early-stage investors, knowing that they have a finite time period and that they will likely be replaced by investors writing larger amounts or institutional investors. And they don't wanna leave. So that's scenario number one.
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:49:20,030 ] Yep, and then scenario number two is the investor I call the Brett Kavanaugh investor— who just like talks about things off in left field and is like taking the conversation everywhere.
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:49:30,620 ] How do you enlist other board members or potential investors? And Adrian, I'm looking at you because you talked about the three-person board. And if you were to come in, who has the leverage? Who has those conversations with the board members that are causing problems? Can the founder?
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:49:50,360 ] Sort of rally folks and how is that done in a kosher way in a respectful way? But knowing I've been in some of these situations and as a founder standing alone, it can be very very difficult if not impossible.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:50:03,640 ] I have a perfect way to do it. New money fixes everything.
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:50:07,500 ] So it is the new money will come in.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:50:10,380 ] New money coming in, and that way the founder, you're not like, 'oh, I'm not the one that hates you,' even though I do.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:50:18,680 ] Look. I have taken a board of five and brought it down to a board of three. I have taken out board members before in a new funding round. Sleepy people in a new funding round. And it's being honest with that new investor of, yes, this is what you're getting. Here are the personalities.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:50:40,910 ] I have a strategy to make it less dysfunctional. And I think it's making sure that new investor coming in, because the worst thing is to invite new money into a shit show. And then they're like, 'Whoa, this is dysfunctional.' So it's your job as the founder to go to that new money and say, 'Hey. You are buying 10%, 20%, 30% of the business. I would like to also do this. Like I have a company, won't tell you who it is, love the investors. We've had a rocky road. We're now doing great.' And I called the founder and said, 'Hey, these guys are really sleepy.' I think, at the next funding round, it's time to clean everybody out. And I said, 'Look, if you come in with an awesome valuation, I'm happy throwing myself out.'
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:51:38,370 ] Because again, it's all about the gains. And that's really important for you guys to, one, more importantly, is your board members are not there forever. And if you have to whip the votes to make sure that you get a good group. The other situation is I've seen it before. You've got the board member that's the seagull board member, who shows up, shits all over everything, leaves, and is not engaged. That is also a situation of rallying other board members that are friendly to you, and let's say there isn't a funding round, to get the other board members to be like, 'Hey, this person's a seagull.' No offense to seagulls. We need to do something about it.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:52:24,180 ] Because if you're seeing it, then they're seeing it because nobody wants to be on a dysfunctional board, especially as a fiduciary. If someone's making a mess and it's my name is on the door and I'm the fiduciary risk, yeah, it hurts me as a board member. But the worst thing is that the founder doesn't do anything about it. And then, at a certain point, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna have to do something about it, but it's gonna be expensive for you. But it's, again, the more that you can do to, you know, we were talking about whipping the votes and doing that ahead of time. Again, in a perfect solution, it's not adversarial. Someone says, 'Sounds great.' Sometimes it just has to be.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:53:11,920 ] I want to add one thing to your question and to Adrian's comment. The transition of new money, you can change the board. But you can also, and one thing we didn't talk about on the panel— is that boards have to evolve, right? And as your company grows, you might want to think, you might need different expertise, right? And that's what Natalie mentioned. You can look at your board and you can use that as another way to transition someone off the board.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:53:39,440 ] to say what kind of insight and expertise we need at this point i think when it when you're dealing with investor it's much harder because you have investors that have a deeded board seat to that share class and so in that case Remember that though they have a deeded seat, that seat is, they represent the majority of share class.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:54:05,550 ] So if you have to go and whip the votes with the rest of the shareholders of that share class to say, we need to elect somebody new, then so be it. It's easier when these are independents and you can say, 'Hey, thank you for your service.' Goodbye, you have to be a lot more strategic when it's a deeded board seat to a share class. And that's why I said the perfect way is a new funding round. Because now a share class is on top of said share class, that has better liquidity rights, better voting rights, and can kick someone out.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:54:39,040 ] Let's get another question over here. Yes.
SPEAKER_6
[ 00:54:41,700 ] So it's a quick question. How can I turn the board feedback into strategic wins?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:54:51,850 ] Gee, I wonder where that question came from.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:54:54,510 ] Who's got it?
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:54:55,510 ] I can start.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:55:00,750 ] Coming back to how you turn board feedback into strategic wins, board members are people, right? And they do just want to be heard, right? Now, sometimes... So part of this, and how to manage your board, you know, you want to whip them in shape. You want to give them jobs. You need to do all that. You also need to earn their respect and earn their trust and make sure that they feel listened to. And so, whether that's, you know, early on in a relationship with a new investor, having the one-on-one, what do you see in a board? Looking eminently coachable, right? Have them give you easy pieces of feedback that you can very clearly do in the next board meeting, right? Again, and this is the kind of thing where the more you can preempt these types of conversations, proactively ask for feedback, both— because it's good to get the feedback, but also— before you've done anything wrong, so to speak, right? Those are easy ways to start the dialogue proactively. Would be one thing.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:56:01,980 ] May I add one thing: is that you need to get the best of them, like empower them, like give them information, have a great conversation, not only respect, also have fun, please. That's part of the right. And then your wins are going to come in one cycle, two cycles, longer term, shorter term, whatever. But you need to have that super clear. And it's not linear. Like it's not straightforward. So you need to manage that also because you're in a startup. So you need to manage that. But then it's empowering everybody to do the thing that they need to do. And then, longer term, shorter term, it doesn't matter. And this is important, you know, facing the board. But also, need to make them feel that they're, you know, they're doing great things. So they can give you great things.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:56:43,420 ] Yeah. I was going to say, and you need to ask, right? If you know what you're looking for and what expertise you have, seek it out. Give them homework. Give them homework, yeah.
SPEAKER_4
[ 00:56:55,720 ] Hopefully this is pretty quick. So hearing from you, there's a variety of ways in which you can manage a board. A board can be effective. I'm just curious, less on specifically the 'how,' but what to look for— like what are the key characteristics of a high-functioning board so you know what good looks like, even if there's a variety of ways of doing it? Thanks.
SPEAKER_4
[ 00:57:19,710 ] Who's got it?
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:57:20,450 ] It depends. Yeah. This was on our agenda, by the way, but we... Go ahead.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 00:57:26,190 ] As long as you have outcomes. If, you know, going back to the first point of 'give board members homework.' If you have a board meeting, and a quarter later, when you do the next board meeting, nothing has happened. You're like, 'Dude,' and then nothing happens again. Like, you need to this is you on Founder to drive the process, drive the homework, and get the results, and see if they're worth it for you.
SPEAKER_2
[ 00:57:51,230 ] Do the research, ask the questions, talk to other founders, you know. How many board meetings do you have? How do you do reporting? Right. It seems very daunting, but once you talk to folks that have been in your situation, or others that are on the investing seat, right? Just ask and look, and that's also a great way again. The more you can think about this stuff early— before you've raised money, before you have a board, before you have team members— the better. and thinking is a really great and obviously the plan is going to change as you scale and do different things, but it'll never be easier to think about that than before you start, right? And so those are the questions you should also be asking yourself.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 00:58:34,950 ] And I will add that you don't necessarily want to rely on optics, right? Just a nice, happy-go-lucky, yes, yes, yes board is not going to give you the impact and the strategic wins and the pushback that you should probably be getting.
SPEAKER_5
[ 00:58:53,750 ] Hello, thank you so much. My name is Vivian. My background is in management consulting and I'm hoping to be on a board as an observer first and then later as an advisor. One of the things that I tend to notice when we have meetings with execs is obviously there's different social styles, right? So we have the drivers who kind of want to make a decision right there, and then we have the analytical who kind of want to take time, look at the data, and then we have the expressive. All of them are really important in the meetings.
SPEAKER_5
[ 00:59:24,340 ] During that first meeting when you're starting the board, do you follow specific structures as far as setting expectations on how you're going to handle that diversity of thought later? I'm wondering if there's anything specific that you usually follow.
Natalie Gil
[ 00:59:41,220 ] May I say something? Like, you cannot, like, achieve every perfect single meeting. So maybe there are some people that you need to take, like, five, many meetings to get to, like, this is good for me. And there's one that you can manage right away. So especially those that are analytical, they just keep thinking about that for months.
Natalie Gil
[ 01:00:00,840 ] Then you need to deliver them like longer-term, like care. So it depends on the people, again, like it depends. But then, if you have those, you said you're with management consulting, right? You've been sitting with that type of customers different, so you know how to manage that. That's a super great skill.
Natalie Gil
[ 01:00:21,490 ] The part of many expectations also is say, I won't cover your topic right away. Like this is not what we're gonna cover today. So you need to be upfront with that. And then if that doesn't help, like, I mean, you need to manage one of the things that, okay, you're out because then you're not really helping me to get there.
SPEAKER_2
[ 01:00:39,700 ] I mean, to me, when it comes, how do we get to the best answer fastest, most efficiently? How do we go from, minimize the amount of time going in circles on something versus actually moving towards objectives, right? because it'll depend entirely on the industry the types of personalities you have and whatnot but that's how i would always use my initial framework and also when you're managing with dissent or pushback or things how do you take out emotion take out perspective but bring it back to business outcomes right it's another way to manage the but you were coming at it as well from the perspective of let's say as an observer right so you're not in the driver's seat For me, the thing I would most love to hear as a founder is you see a problem, let me go tackle that problem, Fraser, and come back to you with some ideas, right? It would be a very easy way to get. a founder's attention, right?
SPEAKER_2
[ 01:01:40,680 ] Because they're always being bombarded with perspectives and this and that versus actual solutions. So that would be if that's where you were going.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 01:01:49,160 ] I think we have one last question.
SPEAKER_8
[ 01:01:53,740 ] Hi, I'm a first year honors student at Suffolk and I hear many of my friends they keep talking about they want to make their own company and I was wondering, when they make their first board, what are the most important advice you could give? Because they want to be successful, of course.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 01:02:15,330 ] I think good tail end to my response that I was going to give up there. When you create that first board, and let's say it's you, an investor, and you're going to choose who the independent is. Find someone that can live between both worlds.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 01:02:33,500 ] Connected to the investor, but also is there as a resource for you. That board—indigenous, those board members, and to be clear, the board members that you bring in that are non-investors, they should be there to support you and to help you. Like our first company, where I was a founder, I didn't bring in like I brought in a CEO and we had the investor and it happened to be we found a guy as the independent who had served on another board with the same investor and who at once was the boss for the CEO that I brought in. And it was really perfect because they had both sides. And I'll tell you, pre-board meeting, we would meet with this guy like a couple of times a month and talk about strategy and use them as resources. So by the time we got to the board meeting, nothing was new. Nothing was like, 'Oh, my God, why is this happening?' It was they're there for you.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 01:03:34,630 ] And that's the important thing: that whoever you bring in, whether it be advisory board, independents, they should be there for you. You should not be spending all your day talking to everybody, but they should be helping you as advisors.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 01:03:49,830 ] Figure out if you're going to bring something challenging to the board, how to do it.
Lakshmi Balachandra
[ 01:03:56,780 ] I think that's our time. So very nice ending question and thinking about building boards. Our panelists will be here for a few more minutes if you have questions and want to come up. But thank you for your time.
SPEAKER_3
[ 01:04:13,960 ] Thank you. Thank you for all the questions and the amazing session. So the next session we have in this room is a panel talk on team building or team leading. That's at 1 o'clock. And we also have an ecosystem fair that's going to be showcasing over 20 resources at 6:30. So see you at the next session.
Natalie Gil
[ 01:04:34,460 ] Oh, yeah, yeah.
Adrian Mendoza
[ 01:04:35,560 ] A little sentence picture. Yeah.
