Who inspires you?
One of my new heroes is Freada Kapor Klein, an angel investor and Partner at Kapor Capital. When Jason Calacanis asked the Diversity in Tech panel at the 2013 Launch Conference if he should lower the standards to increase diversity when selecting judges, Freada replied, “Well, so first of all, I find the expression lowering standards, or we’re only looking for ‘qualified’ candidates, I find those to be offensive–well meaning, but offensive. Because, as you’ve heard from this panel, I think what counts a lot is the distance traveled–not just getting to the finish line. Because we continue to reward people who start on third base and swing the bat and think they hit a homerun.” More VCs, angels, and conference organizers should take a page from Freada’s book.
Someone else who has made an impression on me is Pipeline Fellowship Mentor Eghosa Omoigui. When discussing why his VC firm partner is a woman, Eghosa replied, while coining a term, “She is my blind spot coverage.” We live in a world of intersectionality and each of us has different blind-spot biases. Are you surrounding yourself with diversity? Who, in your network, is providing you with blind spot coverage? Another person who continually challenges me is Nilofer Merchant. Nilofer recently stated in a powerful post for her HBR blog, “Recognizing that you have a bias allows you to design processes that correct for it.”
And, if you have heard me speak recently, you will probably remember one of my favorite calls to action, a bold remark by Midy Aponte, “If you don’t have a seat at the table, bring your own chair.”
Thank you Midy, Nilofer, Eghosa, and Freada for inspiring me!
What lessons did you learn during your childhood that you’ve carried with you into your career?
I moved around quite a bit while growing up–my father used to work for the U.N. We spoke Italian, English, and Spanish at home and I studied French and Russian in college. Both living in different places (Colombia, Ecuador, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic) and speaking more than one language helped make me adaptable—a skill that I have leveraged as an entrepreneur. One of my favorite tips for entrepreneurs: learn at least a second language.
What led you to develop the Pipeline Fellowship?
I launched the Pipeline Fellowship because I saw that entrepreneurs were ahead of the curve, building hybrid business models, and I realized that we needed more hybrid investors who would value these triple bottom line startups (people, planet, profits).
How did you finance your business when it was at the early stage? (Self-funded, crowd-funded, Angel Investor, VC)
We had a revenue stream from the very beginning.
What’s covered during the six month Fellowship program?
The Pipeline Fellowship is an angel investing bootcamp for women and includes three main components: education, mentoring, and practice.
The Pipeline Fellowship holds workshops on topics ranging from Due Diligence, Valuation, Portfolio Strategies, and Measuring Impact. The workshops are led by experts, including seasoned angel investors, VCs, experienced entrepreneurs, and impact investing professionals.
We match Pipeline Fellows with seasoned angel investors who share best practices and lessons learned.
The Pipeline Fellowship Pitch Summit is an opportunity for invited women entrepreneurs to present their for-profit social ventures for a chance to secure funding.
For most of the Pipeline Fellows, this is their first angel investment. They’re attracted by the program’s three components and benefit from the diversity of each cohort. Pipeline Fellows are intergenerational (ranging from late twenties to 60+) and come from a variety of professional backgrounds.
Pipeline Fellowship’s three main criteria are:
a) Meeting one of the accredited investor definitions
(i.e., US$200K in income or US$300K joint income with spouse for the past two years, or US$1M net worth)
b) Interest in group learning model
c) Passion for social entrepreneurship
What was a defining moment in your career?
One of Pipeline Fellowship’s signature events is a Pitch Summit where invited women entrepreneurs present their for-profit social ventures to our angels-in-training for a chance to secure funding. At one of the Pitch Summits, an entrepreneur paused right before beginning her presentation and made the following remark, “I need to take a moment. This is the first time I have ever pitched to an all-women panel.” Her reaction underscored for me the importance of Pipeline Fellowship’s goal to activate more women angels.
What should startups be focusing on in 2013-2014?
Would be great to see more startups focused on the elderly, as well as unemployment.
Any words of advice for entrepreneurs who are trying to get their ventures launched?
Are you an entrepreneur looking for capital? If so, make sure to secure a founding team that will help you grow and signal to potential investors that you’re serious about scaling your business.
Natalia (aka Ms. Oberti Noguera) is Founder and CEO of the Pipeline Fellowship, an angel investing bootcamp for women. The Pipeline Fellowship works to increase diversity in the U.S. angel investing community and creates capital for women social entrepreneurs. Natalia holds a BA in Comparative Literature & Economics from Yale. She has been featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, Mashable, Reuters Money, TechCrunch, The New York Times, and Fast Company’s Co.Exist Change Generation series. Natalia was named to the Forbes list “Top 20 Women for Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter,” as well as Latina.com’s “25 Latinas Who Shine in Tech,” and she was selected as a Readers’ Pick for HuffPost Tech’s “27 Women in Tech You Need to Follow on Twitter.” Women’s eNews recognized her as one of 21 Leaders for the 21st Century for 2012 and Business Insider included her on its 2013 list “The 30 Most Important Women in Tech under 30.” You can find Natalia on Twitter (@nakisnakis).
This post was created by Raine Dalton, WIM’s editorial and community innovation intern. Raine is passionate about finding creative ways to empower women globally through tech. In addition to WIM, Raine has written, tweeted, and posted for the Global Banking Alliance for Women, WITNESS, and 90.7 WFUV News. You can find her work at www.rainedalton.com or get in touch with her through Twitter @rainedalton, or by emailing raine@wim.co.