She identified three things in the first month that needed to change immediately. The first was a structural issue in how deal flow was sourced—the team was relying too heavily on established relationships and missing early-stage companies that were moving faster than the relationship network could track. The second was a communication gap between the research team and the investment committee that was causing good analysis to arrive too late to inform decisions. The third was a cultural one, harder to name but clear when she looked for it: the team had developed a habit of agreeing with each other in meetings and disagreeing quietly after them, which is the habit of a group that has learned to manage upward rather than think forward.
She addressed the third one first.