Resource:How to secure a startup career with Venture for America

Hey Candidates! Welcome. Thank you for collaborating with your fellow interviewees to create a resource that helps student changemakers for years to come. We created a very simple template for you with section headings that your should swap out for your own, picking from the template we provided you here. Use the text editor or OR click on Show wiki text editor (highly recommended) to use the very simple text interface. To add photos, you must create an account by clicking 'Log in / create account' under 'Personal Tools' menu to the right. Wait 12-24 hours for access. Don't forget to write down your username and password. If you have any questions, visit this page or contact team@universityinnovation.org. Delete this paragraph after building out your page.

Overview

A startup career is not for everyone. However, if you are a multidisciplinary person who enjoys collaborate with other people but has no problem flying solo on a project, you might want to consider working for or building a startup firm. This page will give you a detailed instructions and advice on how to land a startup career with Venture for America, a fellowship program that place talented college graduate in startups in struggling cities. The information is separated into four sections. The first section - Determine your passion - emphasizes the importance of understanding what interest and motivate you before choosing your career path. The second section - Application to Venture for America - walks you through all the necessary steps for your application to the fellowship program. The third section - Maximizing Your Chances and Utilizing Your Resources - offers advice on the application process. The last section - Future after Venture for America - paints a picture of your future once you graduate from Venture for America’s program.

Applying to Venture For America

Venture for America has a highly competitive application process. In order to become an esteemed fellow, one must complete a rigorous application. The process is split is into three parts: a written application, a phone interview, and an in-person meetup with competing applicants. The application is basic, merely consisting of three pages. The first page is personal information, such as your name, contact information, and details regarding your school or institution. The second page is broken down into three sections, a description of your accomplishments, two personal essays, and a description of your skills. These three sections should be used to convey why you would be a great fit for the Venture for America fellowship. The third page asks for demographic informationregarding your age, gender, and student loan debt. Based on the written portion of the application, if the review committee sees you as fit to be a potential fellow, the applicant can then move onto the second round, the phone interview. The phone interview is typically held with an existent Venture for America fellow where you discuss your skills and qualifications for being a fellow. The interviewer is looking to see if you will fit in with the VFA environment and to ensure you have the skills needed to be in the competitive environment of a startup. If successful with the phone interview you move onto round three, the in-person meetup with all of the applicants. All applicants send a time together and go through a series of group activities, interviews, and simulations to determine which should become a fellow. The interviewers are not looking out for technical, they are observing to see if you have the appropriate communication, leadership, and teamwork skills needed to succeed at a startup company. The overall process is rigorous, however there are many ways you can get ahead with your application.

Maximizing Your Chances and Utilizing Your Resources

It may sound very daunting and peculiar, but utilizing your resources is key to success while starting a startup career with Venture for America. While you may branch out looking for resources elsewhere, utilizing your resources at school and getting involved with the local startup community is critical and should be a preference regardless. Being a university innovation fellow can be helpful too, as you can use the fellows’ network to share ideas, discuss potential initiatives, and receive useful guidance. In order to maximize your chances of being successful, you should also look to friends and your other social groups for resources.

One common misconception that often deters many applicants is that they tend to think some past working experience related to the selected fields is required for the interview round. Applying for Venture for America is not like applying to a specific company of your choice, rather, Venture for America takes talented, passionate individuals based on their written application, interviews and connect them to different startups in different locations. Qualified applicants’ strengths and characteristics are extracted during this process and used to determine which company they will fit best in. So essentially, the admission process is more like making a good match than making a selection. Furthermore,  a startup is an extremely social environment where everything changes rapidly; employers typically prefer likeable people who can work well with others and adapt quickly to changes than people who has the skills to do the job, because they will train you how to do the job once you get in anyway. So it is in your best interest to show interviewers that you’re a sociable, passionate, intelligent hard worker who has strong communication, presentation skills and can work well under pressure and changes. But with this being said, it is obviously much more beneficial if you had some related work experience, but it is certainly not the determining factor whether you’ll secure the position or not.

Section 4

Sample text