Rarely see hires these days for investing partner roles out of banking / consulting analyst programs. Common entry point would be their legacy corp dev team (now called capital network), which is essentially an internal investment banking team at a16z that helps portcos with follow-on fundraising and M&A. At some point way back believe these guys handled most of the diligence work for late-stage growth deals as well. 

Anyways, take the gig if you're interested in venture doubt you'll regret it.

 
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I have a close friend who used to work there on the investment team (he is still in venture, just at a different firm with a bigger title and more responsibility) and I've interacted socially with a number of their current General Partners. In terms of culture, well, their credo is they only do first class business and only in a first class way, which sounds more fitting for a stuffy consultancy or white shoe firm, but everyone I've interacted with at a16z (save for one person who was possibly on the spectrum) was indeed first class.

Hours and your overall experience will probably depend on which general partner / vertical you will be working under. My friend who used to work on the investment team said his hours were usually 8:30am to 5pm or 6pm. Occasional work on weekend (self-imposed, not because he was required to, but because he wanted to). I visited their office on Sand Hill Road on two separate occasions and it struck me as a very laid back atmosphere. People take their work seriously, but don't take themselves too seriously.

If you want to do VC, you absolutely cannot go wrong with a16z.

 

Such a hot firm... someday maybe. 

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This is so incredibly varied based off on which partner and investing group (crypto, gaming, consumer, enterprise) you're in that unless you are speaking to someone who has worked there I would take everything else with a grain of salt. 

I know someone who worked there who did NOT enjoyed their experience and felt like they were a glorified sales rep and spent time going through decks/responding to cold inbound for a year. Admittedly his/her experience sounds rare because the other two folks I know personally have had positive experiences though one's hours are worse than the other. 

They pay under market by 20-30% in cash comp compared to comparable firms, but that data is a year old and they are on a hiring spree. Just sharing my 2 cents of knowledge.

 

Not to hijack, but what’s market comp for top VCs like a16z, Sequoia, etc? And is 8:30-5 standard hours in vc?!

 

As Deo et Patriae mentioned above, hours and experience will vary with vertical and stage coverage. 8:30 to 5 or 6 sounds light. That individual was maybe quoting when they're in the office. You most likely need to be online for a few hours in the evening, more if you're on a deal that's farther along. If you're not bringing a company in on Monday, pretty good chance you have minimal work on the weekend. Overall for the industry though, just given the pace of dealmaking that's been going on in the last 18 months, I doubt anyone at a good firm is only working 8-9 hours a day during the week.

As someone else mentioned, it's pretty rare for A16Z to hire someone 2-3 years out of IB/Consulting. You can see this by going through their investor team page. Virtually all the investing "partners" previously worked in operating and/or at another investing firm. Maybe more feasible for their growth fund, but those people look like they were part of PE analyst programs, as opposed to IB/Consulting.

Comp is really hard to benchmark across the industry because firms are both opaque about it and there's wide standard deviation across the industry. Given the market environment, there are definitely growth funds that are paying as much as PE these days, which I'm sure folks on this forum don't want to believe =]. Early stage comp will tend to be lower than growth.

To second Deo et Patriae, if you have an offer from A16Z and you're interested in venture, doesn't seem like you can go wrong.

 

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