Cultivating Your Personal Board of Directors: Investing in Yourself to Accelerate Your Startup Success
Session Content Summary:
Through an interactive workshop format, this session will offer students a step-by-step guide to creating their own personal board of directors (BOD). The goal of this workshop is to go beyond seeking the typical mentorship/startup advisor relationship an an early-stage founder which centers around professional advancement to identifying the support that you need for all of the different professional and personal roles that you fulfill and will grow into (e.g. founder, collaborator, friend, sibling, partner, etc.). Drawing from the idea that your life is an ecosystem, the better you are doing in all aspects of your life, the better and more resilient you are overall, and the better you will be at leading and growing your company. The Board of Directors help provide a mirror, accountability, honesty, and resources inflows to help you achieve better balance. The workshop is structured around active coaching, small group discussion, and a customizable action plan so that students can start building their board right away.
Session Learning Objectives:
This session aims:
- Learn to map the network you have and build the network your want to support you as a person (not just a founder) by creating a personal board of directors
- Real talk on the reality of being a founder representing an identity that is typically underrepresented and/or marginalized in business (e.g. BIPOC, LGBTQ+)
- Gain insights into how to identify the support that you need as a young entrepreneur for all the roles you fulfill in your life so that “founder” becomes part of your identity while you remain your authentic self.
- Work-life balance is a myth! Discover the tools for getting feedback on your work-life integration plan and supporting your mental health and overall wellness while growing your venture.
- Strategies for maximizing the value of your Yale network to continue thriving when you leave campus after graduation.
- You will be provided with a template and guides to use during and after the workshop, and a complimentary 30-minute coaching session to work on your BoD or generally discuss your startup strategy with a fellow Yalie who gets it.
Speaker(s):
Lauren Graham, Founder at Velvet Frame
