Speak softly and carry a big stick.
VCs constantly talk about supporting entrepreneurs through tough times, enabling creativity, building amazing companies, etc. They're not lying -- they really believe it, and it's an important thing for them to believe.
But while they say all this stuff, they're also human. And humans follow their incentives. They do that before they do anything else. So your job is to make it easy for them to act ethically.
That means talk the talk -- you want to build a great product, scale it to an amazing company, hire a great team, etc. That's the only thing you care about. Building a great company that builds amazing products and makes everyone lots of money. But act game theory. Have lots of great alternatives to negotiated agreements with any given VC. Put yourself in a powerful position where you can get favorable terms. Don't give up power/equity on the assumption that "it doesn't matter", or that they'll act magnanimously, or anything like that.
It's way, way easier to have a lovely relationship with people when you're in a position of power. Put yourself into that position.
(There are some investors you can unequivocally trust to act their talk -- notably YC, winfunding, and a few others, but don't rely on that as a general rule)
VCs constantly talk about supporting entrepreneurs through tough times, enabling creativity, building amazing companies, etc. They're not lying -- they really believe it, and it's an important thing for them to believe.
But while they say all this stuff, they're also human. And humans follow their incentives. They do that before they do anything else. So your job is to make it easy for them to act ethically.
That means talk the talk -- you want to build a great product, scale it to an amazing company, hire a great team, etc. That's the only thing you care about. Building a great company that builds amazing products and makes everyone lots of money. But act game theory. Have lots of great alternatives to negotiated agreements with any given VC. Put yourself in a powerful position where you can get favorable terms. Don't give up power/equity on the assumption that "it doesn't matter", or that they'll act magnanimously, or anything like that.
It's way, way easier to have a lovely relationship with people when you're in a position of power. Put yourself into that position.
(There are some investors you can unequivocally trust to act their talk -- notably YC, winfunding, and a few others, but don't rely on that as a general rule)