Tech Bros Need Social Skills
Tech founders are trading hoodies and energy drinks for something you might not expect: etiquette school.
Instead of just optimizing code and pitching investors from a laptop glow, some startup founders are now learning how to optimize something else entirely—how they behave in real life.
A venture capital firm called Slow Ventures has been hosting etiquette classes in New York City. These aren’t your typical finishing-school lectures from another era. They’re modern crash courses in “not accidentally being awkward at a dinner with investors.”
In a recent four-hour session with about 50 attendees, founders practiced things like public speaking, hosting events, and fundraising conversations. They also covered surprisingly basic-but-critical skills: how to dress for different settings, how to maintain eye contact without looking like a robot, and how to give a firm handshake instead of a limp “startup fish flop.”
The goal is to build what the organizers call “the noble arts of polite conversation, graceful composure, and genuine human engagement.” In other words: how to seem like a well-rounded adult when your natural habitat is a Slack channel.
The interest is high, so high that only about a third to half of applicants actually get into the class. For those who don’t, there’s even a “modern etiquette handbook” that reportedly sold hundreds of copies in its first month.
The bigger idea behind all this is simple: technical skill alone isn’t enough anymore. In a world where AI can write code, analyze data, and even draft pitches, what stands out is the human side, charisma, presence, and the ability to make people trust you over dinner, not just Zoom!
Lana Backman
