Welcome to The Vitalize Podcast by Vitalize Venture Capital

Building on Purpose and Operationalizing Networks with Heather Hartnett of Human Ventures

Justin Gordon (justingordon212) talks with Heather Hartnett (@HeatherHartnett), General Partner and CEO of Human Ventures, where she and her team have created one of New York’s premiere startup studios, incubators and early stage venture funds. Prior to founding Human, Heather’s venture capital career spanned across various roles at firms including Lightspeed Venture Partners, CityLight Capital, and Claremont Creek Ventures. Previously, Heather led the development and operations at the David Lynch Foundation, where she worked with some of the country's largest family offices and investment institutions. She's a graduate of the Kauffman Fellowship Program and serves on the board of Transact Global, Trilantic Capital Partners Founder’s Council, AARP’s Innovation Council, and Summit Impact.

Heather is active in the community, serving on the leadership board of tech: nyc and Transact Global. She has been listed as one of The 50 Most Influential Women in America by Hearst Digital Media Publications, is a frequent speaker at TechCrunch Disrupt, and is a regular contributor to Forbes, where she covers a range of venture capital topics.

More about the show:

The Vitalize Podcast, a show by Vitalize Venture Capital (a seed-stage venture capital firm and pre-seed 300+ member angel community open to everyone), dives deep into the world of startup investing and the future of work.

Hosted by Justin Gordon, the Director of Marketing at Vitalize Venture Capital, The Vitalize Podcast includes two main series.

The Angel Investing series features interviews with a variety of angel investors and VCs around the world. The goal? To help develop the next generation of amazing investors.

The Future of Work series takes a look at the founders and investors shaping the new world of work, including insights from our team here at Vitalize Venture Capital.

Website: https://human.vc/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heatherhartnett/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/heatherhartnett
Heather’s Forbes Contributions: https://www.forbes.com/sites/heatherhartnett1/?sh=3c2a6fa329b7
Heather with Transact Global: https://www.transactglobal.co/members

Show Notes:
-Human Ventures as a business creation platform
-How Heather and her partner Joe Marchese started as a startup studio in NYC and how it was received
-Where Human Ventures focuses their investments
-How they operationalize their network to build companies
-How Heather personally manages her network as an investor
-Being relationship driven and focusing on creating value
-How she evaluates founders’ EQ
-Their Guide to Being Human
-Some highlights of Human Venture’s portfolio companies
-Evaluating product vs. distribution
-Their Humans in the Wild entrepreneur in residence incubation program, born during the pandemic
-Heather’s thoughts on building startup and VC ecosystems
-Transitioning from an operator to an investor
-Increasing diversity in VC

More about us:

Vitalize Venture Capital was formed in 2017 as a $16M seed-stage venture fund and now includes both a fund as well as an angel investing community investing in the future of work. Vitalize has offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.

The Vitalize Team:
Gale - https://twitter.com/galeforceVC​
Caroline - https://twitter.com/carolinecasson_
Justin - https://twitter.com/justingordon212​

Vitalize Angels, our angel investing community open to everyone:
https://vitalize.vc/vitalizeangels/