Ben Horowitz on how startup founders should run board meetings

As Ben explains, the most valuable thing that comes out of a board meeting is that it’s a forcing function to take a step back and make sure the game plan is right.

So the first thing you want to make sure to do is come prepared with data that provides a good overview of where the company is at:

“If you do that and present that at a board meeting and then have time to discuss interesting issues, then you’re doing pretty good. Like you’re in the 95th percentile.”

Ben also advises founders to make sure you’re getting the right kind of strategy from your board:

“One of the things you’ll notice when you’re running a company is the knowledge gap between the people in the company and the people on the board starts out small and then gets big over time. So when you start your company, your VC will have all these really interesting insights.”

But after a year, you’ll know every bit of customer feedback and product decision cold. So your VC’s advice on product strategy won’t be that valuable. Where they can be useful though is asking: What are you not doing?

“One of the problems in running a company is you spend all your time and energy optimizing, tuning, refining, A/B testing, and getting really good at what you’re doing. But then there’s this whole world of stuff you’re not doing and one of those things may be something you should do.”

If you give a good board the right context, they can help you identify things you should be doing but haven’t yet considered (e.g. entering an adjacent market, buying a company, etc.)

“That’s a lot easier to see from the outside than from the inside. You want the right kind of strategy from the board, not the wrong kind of strategy.”

Full video: Kevin Rose “Foundation 23 // Ben Horowitz“ (Nov 2012)