A moment with Marie Geneste
From TF1 to the Lagardere Group, Marie Geneste has been working in Venture Capital and M&A in the Media and Innovation industry. She settled in London and works as a Venture Capital Principal for Edenred Capital Partners.
Working on a daily basis with startups and entrepreneurs, she took from her time to talk to SAINOO, to share her insights and vision on her role and on today’s job market.
“I like the idea of building relationships with strong minded men and women who offer products that will change the world.”
Hello Marie, thank you for taking this time with us! Can you tell us how you became a Venture Capitalist, investing in entrepreneurs and start-ups?
I started working in this business about ten years ago in investments and startups for the TF1 group [large French Media Company]. At the time we were working with start-ups, but I was actually looking to work in Mergers & Acquisitions in the media industry. I then went to work for the Lagardère Group and their internal M&A Group and audit department. I was then asked to take over the Innovation department of the group.
After this, I moved to London and worked for iROKO, the equivalent of Netflix in Africa, for two years. I was involved in fundraising and growth projects between London, New York and Lagos. Today I work for Edenred Capital Partners, a London-based corporate venture fund. It works like a classic fund and we invest in Series A and B startups mostly in Europe.
What is the favourite part of your role?
Good question …laughs…. I like to help a company to grow. We’re here alongside a business for several years.
We are not a bank so I like the idea of building relationships with strong-minded men and women who offer products that will change the world. We esteem them and believe in them so it is rewarding to work with them.
How do you source your investments?
They come both inbound and outbound. At the moment, 70% of our deals come inbound which means people contact us directly. Then, we have many networks with our partners and analysts. We also collaborate with other funds and entrepreneurs.
There are many young companies that come to us asking to work together. Unfortunately, we can’t please everyone, so we analyse each case. You also need to know the entrepreneurs. Often, we talk with them for a year before deciding to work together.
What factors make you decide to invest in a company, to work with certain people?
At Edenred Capital, we want to leverage the group’s networks and assets to help the companies accelerate their growth. Our investment strategy is focused on specific geographies, sectors and maturities of companies. Based on our strategy, the companies’ business plans must match our investment plan.
Then, once this filter is passed, we evaluate a company in relation to the size of its market and whether or not we believe in the business model. There are many factors that come into account.
Do you have to recruit people?
Yes, I have to. We are a small team of four analysts, one principal and two partners. I am in charge of the investment team in London, so also in charge of the recruitment of analysts, I do it with Sainoo.
We’ve recruited four people since I’ve been here, mostly junior analysts and interns. At the minute, we are looking for an associate with a more senior profile. For this recruitment, I use the Sainoo platform which is really intuitive.
Do you tend to recruit a typical profile of people or do you prefer recruiting different people?
We are a rather small and young team. Each recruitment is contextualized. The people we recruit today may not match for a similar job tomorrow even if it is for the same level of seniority. Everything will depend on the complementarity in the team. We have just recruited someone from Portugal who has studied in Spain and France and lives in London because we were looking for an English speaker who speaks French and can help us develop a network in Southern Europe.
If tomorrow he leaves or another analyst leaves, we will look for someone different depending on how the team is composed at that time.
We often have the same type of positions to fill, what changes are the level of experience we are looking for and the background of the person. We want our team to be like a Tetris game. Sometimes we look for typical profiles: entrepreneurs or business-minded… We test and learn from these profiles: what is their cycle in the company, their drive etc. We are looking for a balance and to develop the profiles in the team with time and experience.
How is your recruitment process like?
We’ve been working with Sainoo since I arrived. We tried to work with more traditional headhunters but they didn’t necessarily understand the profiles we needed. On Sainoo’s talent marketplace, the profiles of candidates are varied, international and often multilingual.
These profiles fit well into our multicultural team. The team at Sainoo is a very good relay and it is well adapted to our processes and our needs.
What recurring problems do you observe in the recruitment world?
Today I find it very difficult to recruit because I have the impression that people have many choices. We also see candidates who decide not to come at the very last minute. The job market is very competitive for companies today. I’ve never seen candidates running away at the last minute like that. I don’t know if it’s the market that’s like that or if we’ve been unlucky. We are as well facing competition from large American companies with more resources and that destabilize the market in terms of wages.
As for the recruitment process itself, I would say that companies react when there is a need and therefore decisions must be taken quickly. Companies are much more in reaction than in anticipation.
It would be good to be able to manage candidate pipelines upstream, meet them even if I don’t have an immediate need. That would reduce my recruitment time. Today, it takes me an average of three months to hire someone.
What advice would you have liked to receive when you started working?
I would say that you have to be much more prepared when you apply for a job. You have to stop applying blindly. One has to prepare its interviews even if it means doing less of them. Learn about the company, and ask yourself if you want to work there or not. It is not the quantity that counts but the quality.
There are a lot of interviews I failed, but if I had spent only an hour or two preparing myself I would have done better. One can’t go to an interview as it goes to have a coffee. You really have to ask yourself: why do I want to do this job? All the recruiter’s tricky questions can be prepared in advance. At the end of the day, when you go to an interview not prepared, everyone is wasting time.
We got used to apply in one click, without knowing the job nor the company. Consequently, we arrive unprepared to the interviews. So now I do a pre-interview with candidates on the phone and I can see if people are truly prepared or not, from there I do the first selection.
In short: Apply less but apply well!
What influences do you have in your professional and personal life?
The Vestpod newsletter helps me do in my private life what I do as a profession. It empowers women on private investments. Women in their daily lives are less likely to invest money, to save… This newsletter relieves women of their complexes when it comes to money.
I also like to listen to podcasts of entrepreneurs such as Matthieu Stefani’s Generation Do It Yourself, Antonin Archer’s New School which were portraits of entrepreneurs in different industries.
Thank you for all Marie! We are going to listen to some podcasts now!
…Laughs… No problem! Thanks to you too!
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