

"Who Should Definitely Not Be on Your Board"
This webinar is tailored to Pre-IPO CEOs who commonly ask advisors the question: “Who should be on my board?” But if they really want to avoid repeating the value-destructive mistakes made by generations of founders who preceded them, they should actually ask the following question: “Who should definitely not be on my board?” The goal of this webinar is to provide a frank, actionable answer…from the perspective of a former institutional investor.
View Past Webinars on Demand
May 2018 Webinar
"1-on-1 Investor Presentations: 7 Mistakes Small-Cap CEOs Commonly Make… That Drive Fund Managers Crazy”
Like many other current or former institutional investors, I’ve sat through thousands of 1-on-1 investor presentations. Though this might not be a popular thing to say, I agree with many small-cap investors that the quality of investor presentations continues to erode, in part, due to the over-reliance on technology at the expense of artful storytelling.
But, in fairness to CEOs, they face two crippling, systemic challenges which are rarely discussed: (1) dissatisfied investors rarely tell CEOs with any precision why their presentations were poor (i.e., investors simply don’t invest, or they tell company representatives “it’s not for us"); and (2) the overwhelming majority of people/firms providing advice to small-cap CEOs about how to present their companies to institutional investors… have never actually been institutional investors.
The goal of this free, 60-minute webinar is to provide some frank, differentiated, buy-side observations so that your company can meaningfully optimize future 1-on-1 presentations. Though the webinar is geared principally towards public companies, private companies seeking venture financing will be able to benefit from the feedback as well.
January 2018 Webinar
“If You Knew How Institutional Investors Actually Assess Company Websites, Yours Would Look… A Lot Different”
When I was an institutional investor, it’s impossible to overstate how many times I ruled out investing in a company subsequent to my review of their website. What’s clear to small-cap institutional investors is that most officers, directors, attorneys, investment bankers and investor relations professional don’t sufficiently understand how institutional investors review corporate websites, what they actually care about, and, almost as important, what they definitely don’t care about.
The truth of the matter is that an inordinate number of small-cap investor meetings are over long before they start… because of websites that get failing grades. The bad news in this regard is that this problem seems to be getting worse with the passage of time, not better.
The good news is that all of the systemic shortcomings are fixable. Tune in for this free 1-hour webinar for frank, actionable steps to help your (or your client’s) website be an asset, instead of an exit ramp for institutional investors.
September 2017 Webinar
"5 Most Common Reasons Why Third Creek’s Small-Cap Clients Switch Law Firms (Spoiler Alert: Billing and Service Aren’t on the List)"
Prior to my tenure as an institutional investor, I was a large-firm lawyer and in-house counsel. Consequently, I spend a lot of time discussing legal services with my firm’s clients. I increasingly see small-cap companies changing law firms, and the reasons for them leaving those mid- and large-sized firms actually has nothing to do with billing rates or service/responsiveness.
My takeaway from hearing the repetitive concerns of CEOs, and also speaking to many attorneys, is that there is a pretty substantive disconnect in the marketplace. Put differently, many of the partners with whom I speak (and the associates who support them) don’t have an accurate rendering of why their clients leave for other firms. The goal of the webinar is to speak frankly to partners and associates from mid- and large-sized firms about what I hear from my firm’s clients so that law firms can both retain and garner more small-cap corporate work.
July 2017 Webinar
“Smarter Growth Starts in the Boardroom: 5 Steps To Determining Who Should Be on Your Board… From an Investor’s Perspective”
The Problem: 75% of shareholder activist campaigns are waged against small-cap companies every year. Those investors know that existential risks lurk around every corner in your companies. They also know that when small-cap boards fail to manage those risks effectively, it can be value-destroying… quickly. That’s why investors are so fixated on your board composition. Unfortunately, when small-cap companies ask lawyers and consultants to help them strategize about boards, the answers are needlessly complex and seem to ignore the fact that small-caps have limited resources.
The Solution: The goal of this webinar is for CEOs and board members of pre-IPO and small-cap companies to receive – for the first time – frank, actionable, cost-effective advice regarding precisely how institutional investors think about who should (and shouldn’t) be on your boards. The source for the information? A former institutional investor, who literally wrote the book on small-cap boardrooms.
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