“There are two emotions a venture capitalist can project onto a founder: fear or safety,” shares Puneet Agarwal, partner at True Ventures.
Startups are built in uncertainty. Founders are constantly making decisions with imperfect information, taking risks, and pushing forward without guarantees.
And according to Puneet, the emotional environment around them matters more than most people realize, especially right now as teams build, ship, and iterate their products and workflows at the most rapid pace we've seen.
Fear creates paralysis:
second-guessing, hesitation, risk aversion.
Safety creates space:
for creativity, conviction, experimentation, and growth.