Recruiting at OpenView

I realize the general perception is that a recruiter is more or less a salesperson. Instead of selling a good or service, you’re selling a candidate or a company. Although that might be true in many cases, I certainly don’t feel that applies in my situation. Recruiting for OpenView Venture Partners and our portfolio doesn’t require me to do much “selling”, especially when speaking to candidates. Sounds a bit silly at first, but when you think about it, we’re a young firm offering a unique value proposition and we have invested in some incredibly exciting expansion stage technology startups.

Look and ask around. Most venture capital firms provide the needed funds, secure a seat on the Board of Directors and monitor their investment’s progress, while hoping for the best. At OpenView Venture Partners, so much more goes on than that. We have a Labs team that offers a tremendous amount of operational support. When our portfolio needs a hand with marketing, recruiting, research, and analytics, we’re here at their full disposal. After all, they just want to focus on scaling and building the business once an investment’s been made. We make that initiative so much easier for them.

Many CEOs have specifically said that the Labs component of OpenView Venture Partners is precisely why they chose to partner with us over other VC firms. That’s where the real ‘sale’ is made. It’s a pleasure to help out as well, from a recruitment front. Like I said earlier, people are always interested to learn more about a SaaS company that originated in Denmark (Zmags), a Learning Management Systems start-up (Instructure) founded by someone who sold his last venture to EMC Corporation, and so on.

There’s a lot more to come from us too. We’re only 6 years old and we have 16 incredible portfolio companies. The Wall Street Journal is convinced we have a fantastic model in place, and for all you social media fanatics out there, we have the most klout among Boston VC firms. I’m excited as ever and as a recruiter I can’t wait to bring more good people into this beautiful picture.