Like many career stories, Nicole Quinn's path to partner at Lightspeed, an early stage venture capital firm, isn't exactly linear—and that's probably exactly why she excels at her work as a VC. After completing her bachelor’s in mathematics at York University in England and her MBA at Stanford University, Quinn began her career at Morgan Stanley where she worked for almost a decade. But on the side, she found herself drawn to angel investing, in part because it was an opportunity to put her energy into the projects (and the people) she believed in.

Turns out Quinn has an eye for transcendent entrepreneurs, a skill that she uses today at Lightspeed. While this may be the first time you've heard Quinn's name, you do know the genre-disrupting companies she's behind. Consider Girlboss, which Quinn decided to invest in after standing with Sophia Amoruso in her kitchen drinking tea for hours. Quinn's seeking—and funding—companies she hopes will change the way we do business, making the relationship between companies and consumers more human. And so far, she's got a killer track record. Here's how it all started:

[At Morgan Stanley, I was] doing equity research and sales, and I was actually covering e-commerce companies like ASOS. Then I moved to New York—and it was exciting times in New York—and that was when we did the Facebook IPO and the Groupon IPO. So I really enjoyed that career.

But I found, at Morgan Stanley, I was getting in at 5 am every day—so getting up at 4 to get to the desk at 5—so I could write these reports before [everyone else got in]. After finishing work at 6 pm, I then had to take clients out until 10 or 11 o’clock at night. I was exhausted. I was running on empty. And sometimes, you don’t have time to get tired, because you’re like, “Ok just go, go, go, go, go," so you don’t get tired until you actually stop. But when you stop for a second, you’re like, “Wow, wait a second. That’s not right. I shouldn’t be feeling this tired.”

I had been doing some angel investing for about five years. And that, really, was what made me think very seriously about venture capital because I loved angel investing and I thought, “How can I do this full-time? How can I make this into a career?” And so that’s how the whole thing started.

On Her Beginnings With Angel Investing

It started with friends of mine, who I thought were exceptional, who were starting great companies, and I thought—I want to (a) invest in them and (b) help them. I introduced them to a ton of people I know and helped them with hiring and strategy. Instead of speaking in headphones all day, I was speaking to founders who were creating growth, creating jobs, and making a real difference in people’s lives through the companies they were creating.

I wanted to help founders in a more meaningful way, and actually be on the other side of the table, working for myself. So I went to a fintech [financial technology] startup called Nutmeg, which is online private wealth management. I moved back to England to do that. When I came back over to The States, I met some people who were developing a wearable tech company, and I started helping them do their seed rounds. I pitched to Lightspeed and they said, “Wait a second, you are exactly what we want in the consumer space. Would you be interested in coming for an interview here?”

On Transitioning to Lightspeed Venture Partners

It's a lot about people, right? It was pretty much one specific person, Jeremy Liew [who brought me to Lightspeed]. I started to have quite a few meetings with him, interviews, and I just thought he was exceptional. His mind thinks in a very different way than most people, and he has this incredible ability to cut through the noise, get right to the point, answer tough questions...it challenges your own thoughts and makes you grow.

To be honest, he kind of makes me a better person, being around him. So I came out of every meeting with him inspired and thought, “I would love to work with someone like that." And that was it.

On What It Means to Be A Venture Capitalist

We do early-stage venture capital (VC), which is also known as angel investing. So, somebody starts a company, and usually at the point when they have an idea, you’ll get “angels” (which are typically high net-worth individuals or families of high net-worth individuals) that will invest in the early angel stage company. Seed stage VCs come in after that, and then VCs like Lightspeed come in and say, “You’re series A, series B round," and that means that they will be investing anything from $1 million to $20 million in your company in exchange for a certain percentage of ownership of the company.

Different investors have different styles—but we’re a very active investor and want to be more than just capital. We want to be your thought partner, your hiring partner, your strategy partner, even your there-for-you-in-your-tough-times partner.

So, some people see VC differently, but I see the VC as a partner. They’re there to support you and encourage you, even when times are tough. They’re also there as periphery vision to tell you what things are going on around you and about people you might want to think about hiring, but they're also reminding you that you’re the one driving the ship, so you make the final decisions.

On the Intuition Behind Choosing Companies

Faith is such a big part. Later on, when you’re looking at a Series B or a Series C deal, there are a lot of numbers, but when you’re looking at a seed, or Series A company, it’s all about your gut. It’s all about, you know, how great the person is, how great the initial product is, and you don’t have the numbers to back it up. So you’ve just got to think about it based on your own gut reaction.

On How To Make A Great Pitch

Maximize the “wow” moment, but minimize the “drop” moment.

What I mean by that is, when you’re listening to a pitch, you want to hear something that inside, makes you say, “Wow." And those might be things like, “We just launched three months ago, and we’re already doing $1 million in revenue a month." That’s amazing if a company says that. Or, “These are my experiences, the things I’ve done in my past, these are my advisors, these are the people I’ve been able to convince to come aboard and help, and they are the best advisors you could possibly get." Those elements are so important.

Then, minimize the “drop” moment. Don't tell me at the end of the entire presentation, “And, our margins are like...2%.” I’ll be like, “Oh, everything was so good until then!” It’s disappointing. So, maximize the “wow," minimize the “drop”.

Her Advice To Women Founders

It’s interesting, a big difference I see [between women and men when they pitch] is that women tend to be more conservative on their projections and their assumptions, as well as their forward-looking model. They’ll say, “Okay, this is what we think we’re going do in six months...maybe we’ll do it in a year, but we don’t want to promise anything that we can’t deliver—so we’ll be conservative on that front.” But there was once this male VP who came in [to meet with me] who gave me his "100-Year Plan,” and I was like, "Wow! You're not telling me what you're hoping to do in six months, you’re telling me where you’re going to be in 100 years!" Whenever I speak with female founders, my advice is always, “Think big and take risks.” 

...And to Women Interested in Angel Investing or Venture Capitalism

Play to your strengths, whatever those are. So if you have a computer science degree at a great university, and you feel like VCs don’t have anybody like you and your network, then talk about that. If you have worked for a really fast-growing company, like Lyft or Uber, and lots of your friends are leaving to start companies, you need to say, “Hey, I have a really strong network from XYZ companies, and I can bring that to the table. You don’t have that without me.” It depends on the person, but leveraging your experience, your network, your affinity groups, I think that’s important.