# VC Fund Tracker

Venture has no on-cycle. There is no headhunter calendar and no fixed window, so the thing worth
tracking is **not a deadline** — it is a set of relationships and where each one stands.

That single difference is why a buyout recruiting tracker does not port.

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## The table

Copy this into a spreadsheet. One row per fund.

| Fund | Stage | Thesis | Offices | Route in | Contact | Last touch | Status | Next step |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| | seed / Series A / growth | what they actually back | | programme / referral / cold / portfolio | person, not a role | date | see below | one concrete action |

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## The columns that do the work

**Thesis** — in your own words, in one line. If you cannot write it without opening their website,
you do not know the fund well enough to be interviewed by it.

**Route in.** Four exist and they are not equal:
- a **named programme** (visiting analyst, associate track) with published dates
- a **referral** from a founder or an investor
- a **portfolio company** you know
- **cold outreach** with a view attached

**Contact** — a person. "Talent team" is not a contact.

**Last touch** — the date, so a gap becomes visible instead of being felt.

**Status** — pick from a fixed list so the column is sortable:
`researching` · `warm intro pending` · `first conversation` · `process live` · `paused` · `no`

**Next step** — one concrete action with a date. "Follow up" is not an action.

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## The second tab: companies

Track ten companies you would back, not just funds. Update it monthly.

| Company | Stage | What they do | Why you would back it | What would have to be true | Who backed it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|

This tab is what you talk about in an interview, and it is what turns a cold email into a reply. It
is also the honest test of whether you want the job: if maintaining it feels like homework, the
day job is going to feel worse.

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## How to use it

- **Review weekly, not daily.** These conversations move over months.
- **A paused conversation is not a dead one.** Funds hire when someone leaves, which is unpredictable
  by definition. Keep the row.
- **Ten funds you understand beats fifty you have listed.** The column that predicts an offer is
  Thesis, and it is the only one that takes real work.