How to build conviction when investing on founders
Early-stage VC is a people game, but how do you actually know if the founder in front of you is the one to solve a particular problem?
You’ve done the market research. The market is massive and the timing looks right.
But then you ask yourself the hardest question in early-stage investing:
Is this the right person to pull it off?
This is where most investors struggle (me too sometimes) and honestly? Where most founders lose deals they should have won.
After sitting in rooms where a brilliant founder with a genuinely important idea walked out without a term sheet; not because the business was bad, but because the investor couldn’t answer one internal question with confidence:
Why is THIS person the one to do it?
That question doesn’t have an obvious answer. And “good vibes” is not a thesis.
I’ve seen partners at top funds pass on companies that went on to be category-defining, not because they were stupid, but because gut feeling is noisy, FOMO is not a thesis and oattern matching on the wrong signals is dangerous.
So join me in an analysis on how I usually evaluate how this founder is the right person to build, for example, an AI vertical software.
Why most conviction-building fails
Before getting into it, it’s worth understanding why this is so hard.
Early-stage investing is, by definition, done with incomplete information. There is no revenue to analyze. No retention curve to scrutinize. No proof that the product works at scale.
What you have is: a person, a problem, and a story.
And most investors default to evaluating the story — and a bunch of times there ins’t even a pitch deck; so the narrative and the market are the most important things. So in the end, you should be evaluating the person’s relationship to the problem and their capacity to deliver.
That shift changes everything.
A great story can be coached. A founder who is genuinely, uniquely positioned to solve a problem? That’s rare. BUT,
Here’s what to look for. 👇
