Welcoming Sophia Dodd to Equal Ventures
As many of you now know, we’ve evolved our model at Equal Ventures to focus on putting “3 hats on the ball” for every investment we make in our portfolio. We feel that staffing a 3-person team (comprised of a GP, a product owner / industry specialist and a high-horsepower generalist) enables us to embrace each of our unique strengths as individuals, while providing an unparalleled offering to seed stage founders in our industries.
For the last 6 months, we’ve been recruiting a generalist to round out our team. We wanted someone who shared our core virtues (intellectual curiosity, empathy, hustle, willingness to think independently), but would complement our team by bringing their own unique strengths. Little did we know that the hire we would make would have actually started her process with us nearly 2 years ago.
Sophia Dodd joins us from Touchdown Ventures, where she worked with founders and corporations in prop tech, fintech and retail. Previously, she began her career at Brookfield (in asset management and investments) after graduating from Wake Forest, where she was a D-1 volleyball player.
We initially met Sophia two years ago via a connection through one of our founders. The founder had told Sophia that Equal was different than the other firms he had met during his fundraising process and that she should try to get to know us. Sophia showed up for our first “coffee chat” having read everything we posted in the last 6 months and told me “I want to work at Equal Ventures”. Flattered, I replied back that we didn’t have anything that would be a fit for her at the time, but would love to stay in touch. So we did and Sophia continued to impress us with her persistent politeness and determination.
When we ultimately decided that we were going to take on a generalist, we were initially looking for someone at the Associate level, which unfortunately was beneath where Sophia already was at her prior firm (she had been investing there for more than 3 years with 7 total years of work experience). That said, Sophia shrugged it off and said “this is where I want to be and this is where I know I will learn and grow…where I start doesn’t matter”. We took Sophia for her word and she (unsurprisingly) wowed us through the process, so much so that we opted to bring her on as a Senior Associate.
Sophia exudes many amazing qualities that we believe will make her an amazing addition to our firm. As previously demonstrated, she’s incredibly determined and willing to go the extra mile, something that we find is in short supply in the venture business. As one reference said “If I could start a business with anyone, it would be Sophia, because I know that she would lift the whole tempo of any company she’s a part of”. She’s also incredibly team-oriented (perhaps a badge earned from her volleyball days), with numerous founders and references citing her willingness to help wherever she could. Lastly, she’s a learner. Throughout her interview / case studies, she asked questions rather than forcing answers. She learned through that process, building upon it in each stage to impress us even more in each subsequent interaction. When I told Sophia that I had been working on a book in preparation for our annual meeting, she asked if I could send her a copy. We only had a digital version at the time, so I sent it by email, expecting she might be able to glance over some of the material. 3 days later, she arrived at our meeting with a binder annotated with notes and feedback. One of our founders saw it and asked Sophia “Can I borrow your copy so I can make it through the whole thing without falling asleep?!” Sophia was already adding value :)
We couldn’t be more excited to welcome Sophia to our firm and think she will be an incredibly positive influence to our team, culture and portfolio. Please join us in welcoming Sophia to our family and reach out to her if you are inspired by her story and would like to connect. As a native Chicagoan, who’s spent time living in Washington, DC and the Bay Area, Sophia is new to the city and looking forward to meeting lots of amazing people! For those who aren’t local, please reach out to her on LinkedIn or Twitter.