The Glass Slipper: VC's Brutal Cinderella Test

How to be a great vc

The venture capital industry demands a unique blend of financial acumen, strategic vision, and relationship-building skills. This learning plan equips aspiring and early-career VCs with the essential knowledge and practical frameworks needed to identify promising startups, structure favorable deals, and build a distinctive edge in a competitive landscape.

Think like Peter Thiel or Don Valentine

This plan distills the unconventional wisdom of Silicon Valley's most successful contrarian investors into actionable frameworks. It is essential for aspiring venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who want to stop competing and start building dominant, system-driven enterprises.

The Venture Capital Engine

This learning plan is essential for founders and aspiring investors who need to decode the complex machinery of private equity. It provides the tactical toolkit required to navigate high-stakes negotiations and align incentives between entrepreneurs and backers.

Mastering Startup Idea Evaluation

This learning plan provides a comprehensive framework for identifying, validating, and pitching startup ideas, grounded in the philosophies of Paul Graham and Y Combinator. It moves from the internal mindset of 'living in the future' to the tactical execution of finding 'hair on fire' problems and navigating the complex world of early-stage fundraising. Learners will explore why organic ideas—those born from personal pain—consistently outperform 'made-up' concepts, and how to apply the 'Urgency-Depth' graph to measure market potential. The plan also covers the critical transition from idea to product, emphasizing the importance of talking to users and doing things that don't scale, such as the door-to-door approach used by Airbnb. Finally, it provides a strategic map for fundraising, teaching founders how to manage investor psychology, avoid common pitfalls like 'valuation sensitivity,' and maintain momentum by accepting offers greedily.

VC pro in 90 days

Venture capital is one of the most competitive and misunderstood fields in finance, where the right knowledge and network can accelerate your career exponentially. This learning plan is designed for aspiring VCs, angel investors, startup operators looking to transition into investing, and entrepreneurs who want to understand the investor mindset to raise capital more effectively.

The Paul Graham Guide to Startup Ideas

This learning plan distills Paul Graham's definitive frameworks for discovering and evaluating startup ideas, drawn from over two decades of essays and Y Combinator experience. It moves from the foundational philosophy of 'living in the future' to specific psychological filters like Schlep Blindness that prevent founders from seeing billion-dollar opportunities. The plan covers the critical distinction between organic and 'made-up' ideas, the 'Well' test for initial demand, and how to navigate competition and unsexy industries. By the end, learners will understand how to prepare their minds to notice problems that are recently fixable and worth solving.

From Idea to Seed Funding

This learning plan is essential for aspiring entrepreneurs who want to transform a raw concept into a fundable business. It provides a strategic roadmap for founders to validate their market fit and master the high-stakes mechanics of venture capital.

The Venture-Backed Startup Playbook

This playbook is essential for aspiring founders and early-stage operators who need to understand the rigorous standards of the venture capital ecosystem. It provides a strategic roadmap for scaling a company from a raw idea to a successful exit, focusing on the high-stakes decisions that define startup success.