# Founders should keep VCs out of operating decisions

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/founders-should-keep-vcs-out-of-operating-decisions/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Nik Storonsky](https://realalpha.app/people/nik-storonsky/) · Nik Storonsky is cofounder and CEO of Revolut. · Co-founded Revolut, the digital bank valued at $115 billion, and founded the QuantumLight venture fund.
- Host: [David Senra](https://realalpha.app/people/david-senra/) · Host, Founders · Has read an entrepreneur's biography every week for Founders since 2016.
- Show: Founders
- Episode: [Competition, Intensity & Building a $115 Billion Global Bank | Nik Storonsky, Revolut](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/), Oct 25, 2026
- Moment: 41:47 to 49:29 of the episode (8 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/founders-should-keep-vcs-out-of-operating-decisions/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2507

## Quote

> “no voting right, **no seat at the table** at decision making, super important.”
> — [Nik Storonsky](https://realalpha.app/people/nik-storonsky/) at [44:56](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2696) · Founders

## Takeaways

1. Check shareholder agreements for voting and board rights.
2. A board seat does not teach investors to run a company.
3. Revolut put operators, rather than VCs, on its board.

## About this segment

Nik Storonsky says investors can harm a company when they have power to direct it. He describes removing VCs from Revolut’s board and rejecting an investor’s demand to fire a key employee.

From “Competition, Intensity & Building a $115 Billion Global Bank | Nik Storonsky, Revolut”, Oct 25, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[41:53](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2513) And so, we were talking earlier, because I saw this clip of you, where you compared investors to football cheerleaders. Yeah. Can you explain why you made that comparison? Well, basically, I gave this history before. So, when I saw the company was 12, 13 years ago. Back then, in Europe and in the UK, it was an extremely difficult environment to raise money. Simply, there were not that many VCs around, and then they were all more like private active guys, like extremely aggressive, extremely legalistic.

[42:26](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2546) So to raise money, you had to sign a lot of bad conditions. You know, shareholder agreement, liquidation preferences, board seats, or like, you know, reducing your voting rights as a founder and so on. So these people basically think that because of them, the company was kind of created because they gave money and that they are entitled to Lash part of its success. So that's the mentality of like, you know, There are quite a few investors that invested very early on, like in my company, for example.

[43:03](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2583) I think it's kind of leisurely wrong, this mentality, because getting money from LPs is extremely easy. Wait, getting money, you said? Getting money from, because their business is very simple, right? Okay, they have LPs, they collect money from them, and then they invest in startups. And then they have a business model of 220, right? So it's so much easier compared to building a real operational business from scratch because there never is with their own money, right?

[43:32](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2612) They don't really need to work hard. I mean, there is competition, but competition is just, you know, for getting deals. So I think their job is so much easier. That's number one. And then number two is back then there was, you know, almost no competition compared to what it is now in VC circles. and back then there was basically this opinion that we as a VC will help you run the company, the company will be successful because we'll give you advice, you know, how to run the company.

[44:05](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2645) Reality, like almost none of them, they ever build any company, right? So they just raise money from LPs, so they invested their money in many companies and sometimes they have both seats, sometimes they don't, but having a both seat doesn't teach you how to run a company at all, right? You're just an observer. As a result, you have all these people with a lot of power, right? Because they give you money, they put certain conditions in shareholder agreement.

[44:33](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2673) And then they also have this mentality that they can't tell you what to do as a founder, right? And that's, in my experience, was very dangerous. And I had many cases in the past when certain VCs, I mean, the advice was simply wrong for the company. So I think, you know, my advice to entrepreneurs also would be, even if you raise money from VCs, try to pay a lot of attention to sharehold agreement, right? And then to ensure that they're purely financial.

[45:00](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2700) The players that have no right, no voting right, no seat at the table at decision making, super important. Because if something goes wrong, right, you effectively have cheerleaders, you know, who look at the match. And then they try to play this match, you know, instead of professional players. And that's, you know, always a disaster. Why did you say some of the advice they gave you was dangerous?

[45:26](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2726) i mean one of the advices was okay you know what you need to hire experienced executive you know what now it doesn't work uh when i started first five years had probably 50 plus experienced executives or i kept only two right within one year it just doesn't work why is that why experienced executives you know almost never works or work out it's the same as football players right they have their prime like reality i mean there is a prime age and like it doesn't mean they became less good i think they they changed their priorities right plus probably became less good plus things changed times changed competition changed so people who were good before or had you know past track record of being good before they might not be good in your company for the future is number one. It's extremely naive to think so. And then number two, there is also a negative

[46:23](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2783) selection bias, right? If you think of people who are extremely good, like for example, how I hire people, I look at their track record of achievement and then they need to be top 1% compared to their peers in terms of their career progression. And then I try to pick up them when they're 25, 30 years old. So they continue on the same trajectory in Revolut. Whenever you're hiring experienced executive are relative there is a negative selection bias because people who are extremely good they already made it right uh i don't know they either probably running their own businesses or they're retired or something else and then people who never have this extreme career progression who you hire as experienced executive uh they just say no by definition that's good compared to people with extremely fast career progression who are already not in the market okay so you

[47:11](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2831) found basically the advice they gave you to be completely the opposite of what you should have been doing based on what you just said yeah exactly yeah and then our yeah a lot of advice when you know they think that certain people in the company are good because they experienced well i think completely opposite and then uh one of them he's actually quite quite a good The investor, he was forcing me to fire my best person because he was too hot-core.

[47:39](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2859) So a lot of these things... Who do they think wins? Yeah. This guy needs to work nine to five, okay. So how did this... like tell me more about this. Like you obviously fought back, the guy didn't get fired. What happened? I mean, of course, I didn't fire him. I said no, that's it. Okay, but that's it, and the guy... You take it or leave it, yeah. I'm going to fire him. Did you have a fight with the investor?

[47:59](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2879) like what happened yeah yeah and so how'd you settle it you had all the power like what happened i fight it with him and then uh yeah even though they they they had a collision of you know many investors but you know they they step back okay so how did you get them to step back well i think you know pretty early on i realized that uh like quite quite a few or vcs uh they are not very operational and they can be dangerous for the company if they have enough power so every single investment route they just remove VCs so now I don't have any VCs on the board I think that's the best you always need to have operators rather than VCs on the board, people who actually build business who know how to do things Your mindset reminds me a lot about Travis Kalanick from Uber he was on the show and I think

[48:49](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2929) one of the clips that got millions and millions of views was on this where he just actually He thinks that just doing no harm is an excessively high bar for a VC. He says something like over 90% of VCs, they can't even not fuck things up. He's like, not even be helpful. They just can't not fuck things up. And then he said like 1% in his experience have been actually helpful. And his thing, which he would tell entrepreneurs, I think he said on the show, is just like, tell them to give you the money and go away.

[49:17](https://realalpha.app/v/hT_MAAwFLIc/?t=2957) That's how you think. I mean, Elizabeth, yes, ensuring shareholder agreements, they just don't have any powers. Yeah, I will make you richer, you just leave me alone.