Friday, September 19, 2008

Should NV adopt Wall St. tossed execs for Startups here?

Absolutely one of the most interesting reads is underway at several venues regarding how smart it might be to hire some of the 'best and brightest' left homeless by the Big Apple-centered financial meltdown. Some Nashville tech execs and VCs complain we need a deeper gene pool here. Some well-intentioned bloggers are encouraging the migration of talent from the financial sector to relocate tri-coastally. At these sites you can read the often biting -- No, make that "acid" comments, and some sympathy from tech and other execs on this brainstorm. Is this really a wrongheaded strategy for ruining not only Silicon Valley, but the emerging NVTN tech community? Lots of comments at The New York Times. More details at Startuply.com, LeaveWallStreetJoinAStartup.com and AVC.com. Penny for your thoughts.

2 comments:

Venture Nashville Connections said...

Owen Entrepreneurship Center Co-director Bruce Lynskey wrote in response to this post: "FYI, if the Wall St. layoffs create a bumper crop of IT types, anyone should go after those folks. They tend to be outstanding. As far as the actual investment bankers go, yes, they are supposedly ‘the smartest people in the world’ but, in spite of that honor, they have an abysmal track record working in start-ups. The same is true with (former) management consultants. One of the obvious reasons for this is that start-up land depends 100% on deft execution and operational expertise. Investment banking and management consulting are two businesses that are more of less void of ‘operations’ - and this creates a huge problem when you drop these folks into start-up land – smart as they are."

Ed Dodds said...

I wonder if they might do more good by taking the C-Suite roles but remaining in NYC for the possible business development networking. Results-Only Work Environments know that overemphasizing geography re: day to day management can lead to cutting edge 1980s business models but deal making and glad handing still seems to require face 2 face time.