We tend to be minority investors, which means that at least at the outset we (potentially together with other investors) own less than 50 percent of a business. That means we do not have control in the traditional sense. On the vast majority of issues, the board simply cannot just tell the founders what to do. But it does not mean that we lack influence. We tend to spend a lot of time communicating with founders by email, IM, phone and in person. We combine examples from other businesses, analysis of trends and a sense of outside perspective to try to gently move positions and guide decisions towards outcomes. Coming more from an operating and early stage startup background that has been a real learning experience for me. I believe that many managers and especially founders should also frequently look at what they really need in a particular area of the business is control or influence. Too much control becomes a bottleneck. We certainly could not handle two dozen plus portfolio companies if they were all control investments.
