The story so far
I have been representing OMERS Ventures for over a decade. When I started out as an associate at a large Canadian law firm, my practice was a mix of M&A, public securities and venture capital work, which included OMERS Ventures transactions. In 2016, I was lucky enough to be asked to join the OMERS Ventures team for a few months on secondment and I liked it so much here that they haven’t been able to get rid of me since.

After an ill-fated first year in the pure sciences (ask me about it), my undergraduate degree at McGill University in Montreal was entirely devoted to the social sciences and I loved every second of it. I am fascinated by the patterns and symmetry that can be found within the apparent chaos of social interactions. However, after graduating in 2008 with an honours degree in sociology and minors in economics and anthropology, I very quickly discovered that I had no marketable skills in a recession so I followed the well-trod path of the underemployed liberal arts grad: I went to law school (University of Toronto).

My love of the social sciences continues to provide the lens through which I approach my work. When a venture capital fund makes an investment in a company, it can feel like an ending. For both the investment team and the founders it often marks the culmination of a lengthy and intense fundraising process. However, it is, more importantly, the beginning of a years-long social and business relationship. One of the reasons that VC investing is so interesting to me is that a venture-backed company can often look like a microcosm of a larger society: a group of people with disparate backgrounds and motivations but shared optimism for the future working together towards a common goal.

Since no one person (founder or investor) entirely controls a venture-backed company, at its most basic, most of the legal documentation that comes with a VC investment is just setting out the rules of engagement for this little society. The clearer and more comprehensive this documentation is, the less friction the parties will experience as they navigate their lengthy relationship with each other. Put another way, if the VC/founder relationship is a marriage, I’m writing your wedding vows.

What should founders know about me?
If you’ve worked with me, you know how passionate I am about my job. My role, as legal counsel, is to make sure the legal documentation is as clear as possible so that the parties can focus on the success of the company instead of continually navigating the terms on which they are supposed to work together. I am mired in the details so you and our investment team can focus on the things that actually matter. If you are a big picture person – as any good founder should be – this lawyerly obsession with details can, honestly, fall somewhere on the spectrum from pretty annoying to downright frustrating. My promise to you is that there is always a reason behind what we request. I recognize that what I do can be technical or opaque and, if you aren’t familiar with legal jargon and documentation, it can sometimes be intimidating. I am always happy to explain our legal asks to founders in plain English. The more everyone understands why we need the things we do, the quicker and easier it is to get things done!

It’s also important to remember that OMERS Ventures isn’t your typical VC fund – we’re the venture capital arm of OMERS, a large Canadian pension fund. I grew up in Guelph– a small city about an hour’s drive from Toronto. I know how much OMERS pensions matter to regular people in Ontario. When we invest, it isn’t a game. We aren’t playing with a billionaire’s fun money. We have been entrusted with the most important assets of over half a million Ontarians and that is a responsibility I take very seriously.

What do I do in my spare time?
I’m a new mom and I very quickly learned that what I thought were well-honed negotiation skills developed over a decade of legal practice are actually useless against a tiny demanding person. On any given weekend in the summer, you are likely to find my little family cheering on the greatest baseball team of all time (no need to look it up) - the Toronto Blue Jays - or swimming in the often-frigid waters of Georgian Bay.