

 Are Prestigious Educations Killing Venture Capital? - prakash
http://www.pehub.com/wordpress/?p=2711

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mstoehr
This article claims that venture capital is lacking in innovation, but the
article (a) sites no evidence to back the claim (b) does not provide support
that any perceived lack in innovation might be the result of the recent
financial crises (which would be a better-supported conclusion).

The idea that people from these selective schools are too conformist to
innovate disregards the fact that most innovations are incremental.
Furthermore, if one is taking a risk by innovating in one area of a business,
it's better risk management to be more risk averse in other areas of your
business. That will allow a greater chance that the business will survive in
the longer terms and that you'll be able to test out new innovations and
really contribute something.

So, I would guess any skill in conforming would certainly be an asset in
innovation, and that this would at least counter-balance any negative effects.

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hugh
Actual numbers: a third of VCs surveyed attended one of five schools: Harvard,
Stanford, UPenn, Duke or MIT. So presumably, two thirds didn't. This doesn't
really sound like a huge degree of homogeneity, especially given that your
average VC has more than one degree.

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anamax
What fraction of college grads have even one degree from any of those places?

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pg
Very roughly, 1%.

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akd
The 1% is better than "very rough" :) Assuming 1/3 of Americans go to college,
and a life expectancy of 75 years, there should be a little more than 1
million college grads per year, and those schools together should graduate
roughly 7-10000 a year.

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dangoldin
I find that the vast experiences and backgrouns of the people going to top
schools counteract this point. That's why it's great to work with people from
different cultures and backgrounds - everyone brings something new to the
table.

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jhancock
I read the American Scholar Article
[http://www.theamericanscholar.org/su08/elite-
deresiewicz.htm...](http://www.theamericanscholar.org/su08/elite-
deresiewicz.html) . Its well written from a man who taught English at Yale for
the last 10 years. Worth a read independent of this VC issue.

This issue of lack of innovation or exclusivity in the VC and start-up
founders community comes up often. The general thesis of these jabs is that
somehow the world is "missing out" by relying on Ivy Leagues too much. My
instinct says this is true. However, I don't think it matters. Innovators from
non-Ivy Leagues will always find their way. VCs will one day loosen up and
chase the deals from these sources or they won't and someone else will reap
the rewards.

If the point is: The rich get richer and people with access get more...well,
ok sure ;)

fyi, I'm not from an Ivy League background and I do just fine as an IT
entrepreneur. I do not have easy access to capital, partially due to my non-
Ivy League background, but only a very small part. I don't lose sleep over
this. I rely on building good products and a customer base in order to attract
investment and preferably revenue. I've come to prefer this approach. Every
time I've had access to VC money early, its been a disaster.

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ericwan
Lots of the entrepreneurs we know are from these schools, and that's evidence
to prove against the article's theory. I think it really depends on the
personality and background of the person. People who stand out in the top
schools are really ridiculously smart and good.

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time_management
I wouldn't expect much in the way of innovation from a run-of-the-mill Harvard
undergrad, or MBA, for the reasons the article gives. The problem is that for
every genuinely brilliant Ivy undergrad, there are 9 who got in by gaming the
system... and in MBA programs, that ratio jumps even higher. On the other
hand, I'd imagine that MIT and Stanford CS PhDs are quite capable of
innovating. Perhaps the lesson to come out of this is that VC firms should
hire more computer scientists and fewer MBAs.

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DaniFong
In terms of ratios, it seems like there's no better predictor of future
business success than dropping out of Harvard. ;-)

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pchristensen
That's not bad - smart/wealthy/connected enough to get in, smart enough to
pursue something good, gutsy enough to leave a safe bet.

