Entreprenurial Leadership

Sometimes, there are opportunities to step back and reflect on what we have gleaned from our journeys as entrepreneurial leaders – and I recently had the chance to do exactly that with my long-time friend and brilliant VC leader, Sonali Vijayavargiya. Our paths have crossed and run in parallel for over two decades, and we have both invested our passion in building successful ventures.

Last month, Sonali and I engaged in two great conversations about entrepreneurial leadership with an emphasis on women leaders. The Founder and Managing Director of Augment Ventures, Sonali’s insight and passion for uncovering mission-driven founder-leaders who are bringing their passion and brilliance to solving real-world challenges inspires me. I have known Sonali for decades and have appreciated her rigorous mind, disciplined approach to investing, willingness to fight for what she believes in, and focus on ensuring that her portfolio company founders have what they need to shoot for the stars.

Being an entrepreneurial leader is hard. I have repeatedly tackled the challenges of being the startup CEO for multiple ventures. I now support several first-time CEOs in building their ventures as a board leader. Sonali founded her own venture firm, carved out a unique niche and approach, and is now focused on deploying her fourth fund.

As a guest on Sonali’s Augment Experts podcast, we explored some of what we have learned as leaders together.  Here are a few highlights:

• Learning to be a startup CEO involves knowing yourself deeply, seeking out peer-to-peer mentors, and gaining the confidence to be on the tip of the spear doing something new.
  
  
• Establishing yourself as a leader involves becoming comfortable with taking up space, making tough decisions, and being willing to do the hard things.
  
  
• Great entrepreneurial leaders are strong, powerful, principled, serious high-performers who are passionate about the struggle and willing to dig in and do the work.
  
  
• Leaders, by definition, succeed in recruiting followers.
  
  
• Successful entrepreneurial leaders can often point to support from both mentors and family/friends as essential elements underpinning their accomplishments.

For more, 📺 Watch the full conversation between Sonali and I here on YouTube!