Venture capital is going through another round of criticism. Travis Kalanick recently argued that even “do no harm” is a high bar for a VC, and that only around one percent of investors are genuinely helpful.

It is a provocative statement, especially coming from someone who has relied heavily on venture capital throughout his career. Uber raised billions under Kalanick, and his new robotics company has again raised substantial funding from leading investors.

That contradiction is useful because it points to the more interesting question: not whether venture capital is valuable, but what founders should realistically expect from a good VC.

Kalanick uses a good analogy. The founder is the chess master sitting at the board every day. The VC is more like the chess enthusiast who occasionally looks at the position and offers a view.

At a basic level, that is true. A founder spends every day thinking about the company, the customers, the product and the team. An investor may work with many companies at the same time. A good VC should therefore not assume that a board seat automatically means they understand the business better than management.

But that does not make the investor unhelpful. It simply means the role is different.

The best investors are not trying to run the company. They know when their experience is relevant, when to challenge and when to let the founder execute. In many cases, restraint is part of the value.

The Real Value Is Pattern Recognition

Founders usually know their own company better than anyone else. Investors, however, see something founders naturally see less often: many companies going through similar situations.

A VC may have observed dozens of fundraising processes, management changes, hiring mistakes, board conflicts or strategic pivots. They may have seen companies recover from situations that looked hopeless, and others make decisions that appeared reasonable but proved expensive later.

That perspective can be extremely useful.

The investor does not need to have the better product idea or know the customer better than the founder. Their value can come from recognizing patterns, introducing the right person, helping with the next financing round or bringing perspective to a situation the management team is encountering for the first time.

And often, that value is not visible every week. It becomes visible in a small number of moments that really matter.

A single introduction can change a fundraising process. One senior hire can transform an organisation. One experienced board member can help avoid a bad decision during a difficult period.

That is meaningful leverage.

The Real Test Comes When Things Get Difficult

Where I agree with the broader criticism of venture capital is that founders should evaluate investors carefully.

Almost every VC describes themselves as founder-friendly, supportive and long-term oriented. Those qualities are easy to claim when everything is going well.

The more important question is how an investor behaves when things become difficult.

What happens when the company misses its plan? When it needs additional capital? When founder and investor disagree? When a down round becomes necessary or when a difficult management decision has to be made?

Those situations reveal much more about an investor than any fundraising pitch.

For that reason, founders should reference investors just as seriously as investors reference founders. And they should not only speak with the most successful portfolio companies. Talking to founders whose companies struggled is often much more informative.

The most useful question may be very simple:

Would I still want this person around the table when things are going badly?

One Percent Is the Wrong Number

I do not think Kalanick is right that only one percent of VCs are genuinely useful. But I do think he highlights an important misconception.

A VC does not need to be the smartest person in the room or constantly prove their value. They do not need to tell founders how to run their companies.

A strong investor can be valuable precisely because they play a different role: they bring capital, pattern recognition, access, external perspective and experience from situations the founder may be seeing for the first time. The best investors understand both the value and the limits of that role.

Founders remain the chess masters. They should.

But having an experienced person next to the board who has seen hundreds of games, recognizes when a position is becoming dangerous and knows when to speak can still make a meaningful difference.