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Matt Mochary at the 9th Annual Bermuda Film Festival in 2006.
- Matt Mochary coaches some of Silicon Valley's most famous venture capitalists and startup founders, advising them on everything from strategy to conflict resolution.
- The "CEO coach" appeared as a guest of Harry Stebbings on the podcast The Twenty Minute VC on Monday to share how he counsels founders and investors
- When Stebbings asked Mochary how he could better add value to the company boards he joined, Mochary cautioned him to be wary before joining a company board, because it could be the death of a great investor.
- Instead, Mochary advises that investors support CEOs by leveraging their network to make introductions and connect their portfolio companies to other investors, customers and new recruits.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Matt Mochary has taken on an unusual mantle in Silicon Valley: CEO coach.
His clients includes some of Silicon Valley's most respected investors and most promising startup founders, like Benchmark partner Peter Thenton, Sequoia Capital partner Pat Grady, and Brex's young co-founders Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi.
But the CEO coach has a controversial stance against joining a board of directors, which is typically a common occurrence for venture capitalists choosing to invest in a young startups.
"Boards are the death of every great investor," Mochary warned, appearing as a guest of Harry Stebbings on the podcast The Twenty Minute VC on Monday.
Stebbings, who co-founded and works at the European venture fund Stride, had broached the topic by referencing Mochary's clients, and asking how investors like him could best add value for the companies whose boards he had just joined.
What Stebbings got instead was a warning to avoid a career-ending move.
"If you sell [a commitment] to founders, then when they take your money, you'll join their board and be on their board forever, know that you have just ended your career," Mochary told Stebbings.
The logic is simple to the CEO coach, who reasons that board meetings simply take up too much time. A board meeting occurs at least four times a year, and can last up to a whole day, he said. And once an investor joins more than one board, its time-sucking properties multiply.
"Now you're on 4, but imagine when you're on 10, and then 15 and then 20, and you've made this commitment to be on them forever," he said. "You have zero time to look for and make new investments."
Adding more value
Joining a board of directors is also just not the best way to add value, Mochary noted.
"What's valuable to CEOs is the support they want," Mochary explained. "Usually its not strategic thinking, because you have very little information about the company," he added, noting that a startup founder knew the ins and outs of their own company far better than an outside party.
Instead, he said VCs should leverage their networks to better help startup founders.
"You have a network and they need introductions - warm introductions - to customers, to other investors, to recruits," Mochary said. "That's the most valuable thing to CEOs."
Mochary has been on both sides of the dealmaking table: he started off as an investor, and moved on to co-found and sell two of his companies.
Before Mochary's latest gig as CEO coach, a topic on which he has also written a book, he also co-directed and co-produced an award-winning documentary, and founded a non-profit that trains ex-convicts as truck drivers, to bring them into the workforce.