May 22, 2024
Noah Lack
You are supposed to work at a big company, then move on to a startup, then hope that startup succeeds, get rich, and then move on to the glamorous career of Venture Capital.
This trend has held firm for decades, but now is reversing.
Former student athletes are increasingly taking Venture Capital roles right out of college to work at startups a couple years later.
Athletes are high potential employees after they have retired. They have natural sales and marketing skills learned from the sport they played, and now it’s time for them to figure out what’s next.
With that being said, smart ambitious retired athletes want to make excel professionally, but don’t have a specific skill set yet. Because they are capable, work hard, and are curious, Venture Capital is a natural transition.
For the retired athlete they leverage what is amazing about Venture Capital: getting paid to learn about how things work, really fast.
VC forces you to be a quick learner. You can’t appreciate the product a founder is building without understanding the industry they are building towards, and why it’s important. Deep dives on specific industries are impactful long term.
At the same time, they realize there’s a ceiling on their career growth. Sure VC funds promote, but it takes YEARS. Athletes don’t have time to waste! They want to move up the ladder faster. So then they go from the “darkside” to the “lightside” in a reverse phenomena, and join a startup that resonates with them and gives greater responsibility.
In short, venture gives them the prescription glasses to help see what’s next.
I started in Venture Capital, went to the startup world, and I thought it was a odd case.
Incorrect!
I see this becoming more common amongst ex-elite athletes. Look at the Linkedin bio of the junior analysts at VC firms, and look how many have former student-athlete in their bio.
Interesting right?
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