The Independent Director Initiative

A 2-Day Program for Directors of Venture-Backed Private Companies

The UC Hastings Center for Business Law is proud to be an Academic Partner for the new Independent Director Initiative, a two-day program designed to train, and help place, individuals from backgrounds underrepresented in venture capital, to serve as independent directors on the boards of venture backed private companies. The inaugural cohort of the Independent Director Initiative will be hosted in Berkeley, California on August 16-17, 2022.

Candidates may include academics, corporate executives, and other experienced professionals with substantial financial, governance, operational, policy, regulatory, scientific, social, and/or technical expertise relevant to service on a corporate board.

Applications are due by July 5, 2022 at 5:00 PM PDT and applicants will be notified if they’ve been accepted by July 12, 2022. The program is free of charge, however, travel expenses to and from Berkeley, California, are not covered. There is no virtual option, however, we expect to host future iterations at locations across the country.

Please contact vcuniversity@berkeley.edu with any questions.

If you, or someone in your network, might be interested in serving as an independent director on a venture-backed board, we hope you’ll apply and/or spread the word.

Academic partners of the Independent Director Initiative include Berkeley Law Executive Education; the Berkeley Law Center for Law and Business; the Ira M. Millstein Center for Global Markets and Corporate Ownership at Columbia Law School; UC Davis School of Law; UC Hastings Law Center for Business Law; the Institute for Law & Economics at the University of Pennsylvania; the Silicon Valley Executive Center at Santa Clara University; the Rowling Center at SMU Dedman School of Law; the Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University; the Stanford Center for Racial Justice at Stanford Law School; and the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law & Policy at UCLA School of Law.
Organizational partners include Ascend; BLCK VC; HBCUvc; Him for Her; the National Black MBA Association; the National Venture Capital Association; and Venture Forward.