How the load gets lighter
TVF alumni, Stanford affiliates, and warm connections carry sessions that would otherwise fall entirely to the core team.
I keep a set of sessions prepared in advance, so a speaker cancellation becomes a substitution, not a hole in the calendar.
Masterminds and peer sessions let the cohort teach itself with minimal support, and double as ready-made contingency slots if a speaker falls through.
What I bring
"I care about the program: TVF filled a gap I badly needed filled last year. I want to stay involved to keep learning, and to give back so the next cohort gets the experience I did."
Captures each Fellow's background, what they want from the program, their founder-versus-investor lean, and vertical interests. This is what lets the team tailor guest selection and route office hours before the year begins.
The cohort meets, sets its norms, and gets oriented to the year ahead. We open with a plain-language introduction to venture capital and to the Fellows program itself, so everyone starts from the same foundation regardless of background.
Where good companies actually begin. Emily walks Fellows through sourcing, pressure-testing, and validating an idea before a line of code or a dollar of capital is committed.
Guest option: Scott Brady, who teaches Research-Driven Innovation, the discipline of finding an idea, at the GSB.
The legal scaffolding every founder needs early: entity choice, founder agreements, equity splits, and the documents that prevent expensive problems later.
Led with: instructors from the Stanford Startup Law Clinic.
How early financing actually works. Tess covers raising equity, reading a cap table, and the moments when venture debt belongs in the mix rather than further dilution.
A quick read on what is landing and what Fellows want more of. It also locks the vertical interest that shapes Spring's guest lineup.
The work between an idea and a real business. Emily covers customer discovery, the signals that distinguish traction from noise, and what product-market fit looks like before and after you have it.
The first commercial motion. A current VP of Sales unpacks early hiring, building a repeatable sales process, and standing up a go-to-market function from zero.
Led by: a current VP of Sales at a Series B/C company, ideally a Stanford-alum operator.
Fellows hear from TVF alumni who have gone on to build, then stay for an informal meet-and-greet. The session doubles as the cohort's first real entry into the alumni network.
Reputation is a founder's most durable asset and the easiest to spend carelessly. Heidi draws on decades in the Valley to cover how reputations are built, protected, and repaired.
The single most useful skill almost no one teaches. Heidi breaks down what makes a cold email impossible to ignore, drawing on her own widely-shared framework for getting a reply from nearly anyone.
Capital, talent, and customers all follow a clear story. This session covers narrative structure for founders: how to make an audience care, remember, and act.
Stanford is one of the densest startup ecosystems on earth, and most students use a fraction of it. This session maps the labs, clinics, accelerators, and capital available to Fellows, and how to actually reach them.
A practical introduction to modern AI for founders and investors: what today's tools can and cannot do, how to cut through the hype, and where the real leverage is. Fellows leave able to evaluate AI companies and put the tools to work in their own.
Structured brainstorming where Fellows put their hardest problems in front of the cohort and leave with concrete next steps. A high-value, low-overhead format that lets the group teach itself.
What a fund actually is. Emily opens the investor's half of the year with fund structure, the math of management fees and carry, and why those incentives shape every decision a VC makes.
With: an LP voice, for example Chris Douvos of Ahoy Capital, on what limited partners look for.
Tess's home turf. A clear-eyed tour of venture debt, where it sits in the financing stack, and how founders use it well or badly.
With: a founder who has used venture debt firsthand.
A practical guide to turning Stanford's research and resources into companies. Jasper covers the labs, clinics, faculty, and capital sources that Fellows can tap, alongside a founder who has done exactly that.
With: a Stanford spinout founder.
The job changes as the company grows. A late-stage CEO reflects on how the role evolves from founder to operator to leader, and what tends to break along the way.
Led by: a Series C/D CEO, ideally from the Threshold portfolio.
How venture actually makes money. A look at exits and M&A from the inside, and the uncomfortable math of what it takes to return a fund.
Led by: a boutique M&A banker or a recently-exited Stanford alum.
A second pulse-check on the investor's-craft material so far: what is landing, what to reinforce on the retreat, and which connections Fellows still want from the alumni network.
How investors decide what to chase. Emily covers building an investment thesis, sourcing deal flow, and the pattern recognition that separates real conviction from hindsight.
What investors do after the check clears. Heidi draws on decades of board service to cover governance, genuine value-add, and the hard conversations that define a board seat.
The mechanics of a deal. Fellows work through term sheets, valuation, and the levers that matter in a negotiation, then put it into practice in a live simulation.
The retreat closes with an open AMA. Fellows put anything to the full team, from career pivots and fundraising scars to the unwritten rules of the business.
TVF alumni now working in venture share how they broke in and what the job is really like, followed by an informal meet-and-greet to grow the cohort's network.
The cohort closes the year together: reflections, what comes next, and onboarding into the alumni community that future Fellows will rely on.
Feedback for next year's teaching assistants, plus onboarding into the alumni network the next cohort will rely on.