This is a seriously prime time week for me.
On Friday, I'll participate in the Finals Match Day for the Carolina Venture Fellows program. Essentially, I'm competing for the opportunity to interview and possibly land a summer internship at a local venture capital firm.
Match Day is a bit of a cattle call. VCs from several local firms will be on campus and herded into a room. The finalists - there are 10 of us - will each get 5 minutes to give a pitch to the room. No notes, no slides, no handouts. While some are worried about the rules of the pitch, I think that they actually play in my favor...
After the song and dance, the VCs rank whom they wish to interview and we rank the firms with which we wish to interview. Once the matchmaking magic happens, there are 4 15-minute interview slots lined up back-to-back. Kinda like speed dating for an internship, right? (Obviously, one would arrange for subsequent interviews if all goes well on Match Day. )
I feel like I have a pretty good shot. I've already met VCs at my 3 targeted firms and feel like I'm differentiated enough from the other (very qualified and very smart) finalists such that I'll be able to make a pretty compelling case to the firms that focus on early-stage technology investments.
Immediately after I'm done with the Venture Fellows process, I'll hit the road for Day 2 of the Darden Innovation Challenge in Charlottesville, VA. My team has prepared marketing concepts that we'll pitch to executives from American Express and Hilton. I like what we've got and think that we stand a reasonable chance at taking down the $20K prize.
(I broke my snare drum this weekend, so I need the money...)
Word on the street is that Google is sponsoring the event after party. Should be cool to hang out with some real, live Googlers.
To top it off, I have a Macroeconomics mid-term and Marketing case brief due this week as well...a handful of lunch meetings...and an IM basketball game...and the Heels' season opener.
As much as I tend to whine to Kelly about being busy, I hope that I can continue to make forthcoming weeks just as action-packed.
On Friday, I'll participate in the Finals Match Day for the Carolina Venture Fellows program. Essentially, I'm competing for the opportunity to interview and possibly land a summer internship at a local venture capital firm.
Match Day is a bit of a cattle call. VCs from several local firms will be on campus and herded into a room. The finalists - there are 10 of us - will each get 5 minutes to give a pitch to the room. No notes, no slides, no handouts. While some are worried about the rules of the pitch, I think that they actually play in my favor...
After the song and dance, the VCs rank whom they wish to interview and we rank the firms with which we wish to interview. Once the matchmaking magic happens, there are 4 15-minute interview slots lined up back-to-back. Kinda like speed dating for an internship, right? (Obviously, one would arrange for subsequent interviews if all goes well on Match Day. )
I feel like I have a pretty good shot. I've already met VCs at my 3 targeted firms and feel like I'm differentiated enough from the other (very qualified and very smart) finalists such that I'll be able to make a pretty compelling case to the firms that focus on early-stage technology investments.
Immediately after I'm done with the Venture Fellows process, I'll hit the road for Day 2 of the Darden Innovation Challenge in Charlottesville, VA. My team has prepared marketing concepts that we'll pitch to executives from American Express and Hilton. I like what we've got and think that we stand a reasonable chance at taking down the $20K prize.
(I broke my snare drum this weekend, so I need the money...)
Word on the street is that Google is sponsoring the event after party. Should be cool to hang out with some real, live Googlers.
To top it off, I have a Macroeconomics mid-term and Marketing case brief due this week as well...a handful of lunch meetings...and an IM basketball game...and the Heels' season opener.
As much as I tend to whine to Kelly about being busy, I hope that I can continue to make forthcoming weeks just as action-packed.