Hunter Walk is a partner at Homebrew. He previously led consumer product management at YouTube and held product and sales roles at Google. His writing and interviews discuss seed investing, company building, product management, and career choices. — Hunter Walk Biography.

Infographic for "Lessons from Hunter Walk".

On Investment Philosophy

  1. An Investment Thesis Needs a Point of View: Homebrew looked for founders with a future it believed in and a problem that was large, urgent, and valuable. That conviction, rather than a generic search for “good companies,” guided its seed choices. — Intercom Podcast.
  2. Look for a Founder’s Connection to the Problem: Walk valued founders who understood the people and industries they hoped to serve. Empathy and a genuine connection to the problem strengthened the case for backing them. — U.S. Digital Service Interview.
  3. Test the Business Model Early: When monetization was not clear at the outset, Walk wanted seed founders to bring testable business-model hypotheses, not a vague list of possible revenue streams. He did not require revenue on day one. — Should Seed Decks Include an Exits Slide?.
  4. Back Missionary Founders: Walk preferred founders who believed their work could make the world better. That did not mean limiting investment to overtly social-impact businesses; it meant sharing conviction in the founder’s mission. — Framework Project Interview.
  5. Do Not Assume You Can Supply the Founder’s Product Instincts: Walk regretted angel investments where he assumed his own product background could compensate for founders’ weak product instincts. An investor can help, but cannot act as the startup’s product manager from the cap table. — 2½ Angel Investing Mistakes.
  6. Specify the Help Beyond Capital: Walk asked founders what they wanted from him besides a check, including domain expertise, personal support, and help with future capital. Useful investor support begins with a clear request and realistic expectations. — What Do You Want from Me Besides Capital?.
  7. Understand Bottom-Up Adoption: Walk described software that individuals and teams bring into a company before it becomes an enterprise-wide purchase. For Homebrew, that pattern was one guidepost for understanding technology opportunities. — Framework Project Interview.
  8. The Portfolio Reveals the Thesis: Walk argued that a venture firm’s portfolio page shows its actual choices more clearly than its public commentary. The investments are the practical expression of its point of view. — One Thing About Venture Capital, Part V.
  9. Concentrate Time as Well as Seed Capital: Homebrew limited its annual seed investments so it could commit meaningful dollars and hands-on time to each founder. Walk described a firm-specific support model, not a guarantee that concentrated portfolios outperform. — Seed Is a Phase.
  10. Find Investors with Real Sector Conviction: When a market falls out of favor, Walk advised founders not to keep relying on investors driven by momentum or FOMO. They should seek backers willing to understand the problem despite the changed mood. — When Investors Hate Your Market.
  11. Be a Partner of Conviction: Walk described a seed investor who commits time, capital, reputation, and sustained attention to a founder’s long-term vision, rather than offering enthusiasm only when the company is doing well. — Intercom Podcast.
  12. Ask Why This Founder Chose This Problem: Walk assessed a founder’s motivation alongside the market, product, and team. A credible answer to “why” helped him understand whether the founder could stay with a difficult mission for years. — Founders: Why Matters.
  13. Treat Founders as Customers: Walk distinguished Homebrew’s LPs as partners and its founders as customers. That stance shaped the attention the firm gave the entrepreneurs it backed without erasing its duties to LPs. — Institutional Capital and VC Firms.
  14. Know When You Are Not the Right Investor: Walk said an investor should step back when they cannot be fully committed or especially useful to a founder, even if the opportunity might make money. Fit includes the investor’s own capacity and conviction. — Framework Project Interview.

For Founders and Startups

  1. Your Company Is Your First Product: Walk urged founders to build their culture, hiring practices, organizational structure, and fundraising approach intentionally. Those choices interact and shape the company they will work in for years. — Intercom Podcast.
  2. Commit to the Long Haul: Walk advised founders to choose work they could imagine doing for a decade and to be exacting about the people they build with. It was advice about commitment and colleagues, not a promise of success. — Product Hunt LIVE-Chat Excerpt.
  3. Do Not Compromise on the Team: Walk warned that a weak or poorly matched teammate can damage a young venture. He urged founders to address a persistent people problem rather than accept it as the cost of moving fast. — Product Hunt LIVE-Chat Excerpt.
  4. A Founder’s Personal Why Matters: Walk was drawn to founders with empathy for, or a connection to, the problem they were solving. Their motivation mattered alongside the mechanics of building the business. — U.S. Digital Service Interview.
  5. Do Not Start Up Merely to Be a Founder: Walk wanted founders to articulate a mission worth years of work. Wanting the status of running a startup was not, by itself, a compelling reason to take on that commitment. — Founders: Why Matters.
  6. Seed Backing Can Include Practical Support: Walk described helping founders with operational questions, personal challenges, and later fundraising in addition to providing capital. The kind of help should be discussed rather than assumed. — What Do You Want from Me Besides Capital?.
  7. Define the Founder–Investor Relationship Early: Founders and investors should discuss the support they expect from one another, not just the size and terms of the check. Walk saw clear expectations as a basis for a more durable partnership. — Mixpanel Seed-Stage Interview.
  8. Design Company Choices as a System: Walk urged founders to treat organizational structure, culture, hiring, and fundraising as connected decisions. Intentional design matters because each choice shapes the company the team will inhabit. — Intercom Podcast.
  9. Founders Carry the Daily Work: Walk framed an investor’s role as contributing capital, time, and conviction alongside founders who devote their daily effort and reputation to the company. The investor should help without taking the founder’s place. — Intercom Podcast.
  10. Diligence Your Investors: Homebrew offered prospective founders names of other founders it had backed so they could assess the firm for themselves. Investor selection is a two-way decision. — How This VC Spends His Time.
  11. Seek a Partner, Not Just a Check: Walk asked founders what kind of personal, operational, and capital-markets help they wanted from investors. The right partner is one whose actual capacity matches those needs. — What Do You Want from Me Besides Capital?.
  12. Value Candor Over a Grin to Your Face: Walk used “grin-fucker” for someone pleasant in person who speaks badly about others behind their backs. He preferred direct, principled disagreement to that kind of duplicity. — Weathervanes and Grin-Fuckers.
  13. Let Your Care for the Product Show: Walk argued that a founder’s visible, authentic enthusiasm can help others care about the work. His point was not that everyone must be loud, but that indifference is hard to rally around. — If You Don’t Care, Why Should I?.

On Product Management

  1. Serve the Product and Its Builders: Walk described good product management as service to both the product and the people building it. Authority is not the purpose of the role. — Mixpanel Career Interview.
  2. Collaborate Without Requiring Consensus: Walk saw product work as collaborative, with clear decision makers and room for different perspectives. A PM owns some decisions but not all of them. — Mixpanel Career Interview.
  3. Ask Rather Than Feign Technical Expertise: Drawing on his nontechnical background, Walk urged PMs to be technically curious, build trust with engineers, and ask for the information needed to make good product decisions. — Intercom Podcast.
  4. Use Questions to Help a Team Decide: Walk said a PM should know what to ask engineering counterparts to obtain needed data and help the team think through choices, without pretending to make every technical call. — Intercom Podcast.
  5. Show Why the Product Helps Users: Walk praised a founder who spoke passionately about the value a product offered its users rather than simply promoting himself. The enthusiasm was grounded in usefulness. — If You Don’t Care, Why Should I?.

Career and Life Learnings

  1. Prioritize Impact Over Easy Tasks: Walk observed that effective people resist filling their days with easy, gratifying, or newly arrived tasks. They first address work with the greatest impact, including decisions that unblock others. — The Bad Habit of Productive People.
  2. Learn What High-Performance Teams Feel Like: Walk argued that time at a fast-growing company can teach what motivates exceptional colleagues and how strong teams operate. He also warned that pedigree is not proof of talent and big-company methods may not fit a startup. — What Google Alumni May Know.
  3. Choose Work That Matters to You: In recounting his own career choices, Walk favored products he cared about, people he could learn from, and a chance to influence outcomes over a tempting quick-rich route. — Graduating into the Dot-Com Crash.
  4. Judge Career Moves by the Problem and Exposure: Walk suggested weighing the kind of problem a role lets you solve and the exposure it offers, rather than assuming a higher title or management role creates more impact. — Mixpanel Career Interview.
  5. Act on a Persistent Career Mismatch: Walk advised first trying to change the parts of an unsatisfying role that can be changed. If the mismatch persists and cannot be resolved, leaving may be the honest next step. — Go Ahead, Quit.
  6. Know the Work You Assign Others: Walk argued that leaders who have never done unpleasant operational work may lack empathy for the people doing it and can unintentionally create more of that work. — S**t Shoveling.
  7. Recognize Encore Anxiety Without Misattributing It: Walk credited Anu Atluru with describing “encore anxiety,” the fear of failing to repeat a previous success. He said he had seen that pressure among repeat founders and early employees of breakout companies. — No Notes: The Fear of a Second Success.
  8. Contribute Beyond Your Portfolio: Walk said Homebrew wanted to improve the early-stage ecosystem, not only invest successfully. It shared free resources that could help founders beyond the firm’s own portfolio. — Guide to Startup Compensation Strategies.
  9. Assess Your Own Strengths Honestly: Reflecting on product leadership, Walk described asking what he should stop doing and where his skills could have the greatest impact. He saw honest self-appraisal as part of choosing the right role. — Mixpanel Career Interview.
  10. Delay Nonurgent Reading: Walk saved nonurgent articles for a dedicated reading period and discarded low-value items rather than reacting to each piece as it appeared. Urgent, actionable material was the exception. — Productivity Tip #1.

Learn more:

  1. Hunter Walk — About
  2. The Framework Project — Hunter Walk Interview
  3. Intercom — Hunter Walk on Product Management
  4. Hunter Walk — Should Seed Funding Decks Include a Potential Exits Slide?
  5. Mixpanel — The Hustle of Hunter Walk (and His Advice to Seed-Stage Founders)
  6. Hunter Walk — Founders: Why Matters as Much as What and How
  7. Ryan Hoover — What Investors Look for in Startups & Founders
  8. Hunter Walk — For Startups, Your Culture Starts with Your First Hire
  9. Hunter Walk — What Do You Want from Me Besides Capital?
  10. Hunter Walk — Ode to a Non-Technical Product Manager
  11. Mixpanel — The Career Dilemma: Hunter Walk’s Advice to Product Managers
  12. Hunter Walk — What People Who Worked at Google Know That You Probably Don’t
  13. Hunter Walk — No Notes: Near-Perfect Posts
  14. Hunter Walk — S**t Shoveling