How Yash Harlalka Broke Into Venture Capital Without Knowing Anything About VC

Today, he works in venture capital, evaluating startups, understanding businesses, and connecting promising founders with investors. It's a role many finance students don't even know exists until years into their careers.

But this story isn't about landing a dream job.

It's about how curiosity, continuous learning, and saying "yes" to opportunities outside the classroom slowly opened doors that a conventional career path never could.

From studying FRM and CFA to working closely with startups and investors, every step taught Yash Harlalka something that textbooks alone couldn't.

So, let's rewind to where it all began, in Yash's own words.

When I started studying finance, I wasn't chasing venture capital.

Like most students, I was focused on building a strong foundation through FRM and later CFA. At that stage, my goal wasn't to work with startups. My goal was simply to understand finance well enough to build a meaningful career.

Things began to change when I started applying what I was learning outside the classroom.

Studying with Aswini Bajaj Sir gave me exposure beyond the curriculum. We discussed businesses, valuation, pitch decks, industries, and how finance actually gets used in the real world. That helped me decode that finance isn't just about clearing exams. It's about solving problems.

Slowly, opportunities started coming my way, and one of them led me into venture capital. Today, my work has two parts.

The first is finding startups worth backing. That means meeting founders, understanding what they're building, studying the market, evaluating their business model, and figuring out whether the opportunity has long-term potential.

The second is helping those startups raise capital by connecting them with the right investors.

Every founder thinks differently. Every industry has its own dynamics. Every business demands a fresh perspective. That constant shift in context is what makes my career so intellectually rewarding. I am learning as much as I am evaluating.

When people hear "venture capital," they usually think it's all about valuation models.

It isn't. Finance helps, but it's only one part of the job. When we're evaluating an early-stage startup, there usually isn't enough historical data to build complicated financial models. Instead, we spend a lot of time understanding the founder.

Can they survive difficult phases? Do they understand the market deeply? Are they solving a real problem? What makes them different from everyone else? As startups grow, financial analysis becomes much more important. But in the early stages, you're often investing as much in the people as you are in the business.

That completely changed how I looked at finance. Numbers matter. But judgment matters just as much.

One thing this journey taught me is that finance opens the door, but continuous learning keeps you in the room.

As I started working with founders across different industries, I quickly realised I couldn't rely only on what I'd learnt in FRM or CFA. Every business demanded a different perspective.

That's when I developed the habit of reading beyond finance. I started reading about industries, regulations, psychology, negotiations, business strategy, and even legal concepts that affect investments.

If I'm analysing a solar startup, I need to understand government policies. If I'm looking at a technology company, I need to understand intellectual property. The more I read, the better questions I asked. And better questions almost always lead to better decisions.

Networking also became far more important than I expected. Earlier, I thought networking meant asking people for opportunities. I was completely wrong. The biggest lesson I learnt from my seniors was simple: don't enter a conversation trying to get something from the other person.

Approach every conversation with genuine curiosity, not an agenda. When you focus on learning about the other person rather than talking about yourself, conversations become more meaningful and relationships grow naturally.

If I could give one piece of advice to my fellow students, it would be this: Don't prepare only for the job you know today. Prepare for opportunities you haven't even discovered yet.

Finance gave me a foundation. Curiosity expanded it. And continuous learning helped me build a career that I didn't even know existed when I first started studying.

1. • Building a foundation is crucial before chasing opportunities: The more deeply you understand finance, the more career paths begin to open up.
   • Learning is not limited to one subject: Reading about industries, psychology, law, technology, and business has helped me make better investment decisions than finance alone ever could.
   • Network with curiosity, not expectations: The strongest professional relationships begin when your goal is to learn, not to ask for a favour.
   • Every opportunity teaches you something: Whether it was FRM, CFA, working with startups, or meeting investors, each experience prepared me for the next one.
   • A good career doesn't always mean a conventional route: Most students know about investment banking or equity research. There are countless other roles where finance can create value if you're willing to explore.
   • Depth always beats surface-level knowledge: People trust your opinions when you've put in the effort to understand the subject beyond textbooks.
   • Keep investing in yourself: Markets evolve. Industries change. The only long-term advantage is staying curious and continuing to learn.