In the last month I've had the chance to make about 50 new friends. I've suddenly become very popular with investment bankers and have been on the receiving end of over 50 emails that look something like the following:
"We met once a long time ago when I was with firm X. I'm now at firm Y. We are the blah blah blah best at blah blah most successful blah blah tied into blah blah working with blah blah blah connected with blah blah blah. Congrats on all the success at Company W. We are very interested in talking to them about blah blah strategic blah blah can you introduce us to high-profile-CEO."
At first I felt compelled to respond as part of my "answer every email and try to at least be polite / responsive to everyone" approach to life. After a few days, I started getting annoyed when I realized I was simply viewed as a conduit to an introduction. When I saw a few similar emails to my co-investors in at least one company, I realized that there was a complete lack of sincerity in many of these emails it was no different than a random salesman emailing me asking if I wanted to buy a random widget.
Now, I have several good friends who are investment bankers and we have a handful of trusted ibanking relationships and folks who are our go-to ibankers. These are people who have developed a long standing relationship with me and my partners, have worked with us in good times and bad, and have always been reasonable and thoughtful about their fees, especially in situations that didn't work out.
It amazes me that 50+ people could suddenly come out of the woodwork in an effort to "build a new relationship that's not really a relationship" thinking it would give them an opportunity, or even an advantage, in the context of a set of hot companies.
When I think about the relationships I've developed, whether it be with investment bankers, LPs, co-investors, or anyone else, they evolve over a period of time. They don't require boondoggles or fancy things; they require sincerity and substantive interaction over a long period of time. Then, when there are moments of opportunity, these are the people that I go to (and hopefully who come to me.)
There suddenly seem to be an abundance of "transaction relationships" out there. Entrepreneurs beware.
