Citing the case of Theranos, venture capitalist Fred Wilson remarks that trophy board members rarely help and often hurt a start-up company:

I am not reading Bad Blood, the book about Theranos, but many of my friends and colleagues are.

One of the many “tells” that Theranos was not a good company was the board chock full of trophy board members.

A “trophy” board member is someone with a big name who, in theory, brings credibility and connections to your company. They are often out of the world of politics, or a Fortune 500 CEO job, or Wall Street.

I dislike trophy board members and advise our portfolio companies to avoid them. But they don’t always take our advice.