Resource Stories: Terell Sterling, Go Paladin

As the founder and CEO of Go Paladin, Terell Sterling serves as a bridge between historically excluded founders and the world of tech entrepreneurship and VC funding.

In this interview, Terell shares Go Paladin’s origins, mission, and his hopes for founders of color like himself.

When did you see the need for Go Paladin?

I started Go Paladin because of the frustration I was having in the tech industry.

I’m originally from California, and my mom moved us to the Bay Area to give us better opportunities. We lived in affordable housing, and I was very fortunate that my parents put us in diverse communities. My background speaks to how education affects the trajectory of one's growth: it’s all about who and what networks you have access to.

When I first got into entrepreneurship, I was working for a startup and was very fortunate to meet with these venture capitalists. And I would wonder: Why aren’t there people that look like me in these conversations? Why is it traditionally just older white men helping younger white men engage and build capital?

I was frustrated. So, I thought, I'm already in the room; let me just build that ladder. What if I created a community focused on underrepresented founders like me, people who came from the other side of the tracks, to whom some people wouldn't give the time of day?

Where does the name Go Paladin come from?

Paladin comes from the Latin word “Palentus”: to be a champion for a cause. Also, the Knights of Charlemagne were Paladins – and if you’re a nerd like I am, the Paladins were the knights in the World of Warcraft. 

At our company, we define Paladins as anyone that is underrepresented in the tech and entrepreneurship ecosystem. Entrepreneurship has been presented as this exclusive country club with a big gold plaque that says, “members only” and anyone that doesn't look like the incumbent entrepreneur is turned away.

The Paladins in our community are ambitious and amazing entrepreneurs who are “trailblazers”: we are comprised of LGBTQ+, people of color, immigrants, female founders, and folks that are neurodiverse.

And I don't exclusively say that we're only Black or Latina/o because I think that is a fallacy. Growing up, my parents intentionally raised us in diverse communities; I know that there's a lot of power when you get different kinds of people into the right rooms. So, I wanted to make sure that our community was inclusive: we have traditional incumbent white male founders, and we connect them with the Afro-Latina founders. Then they build that relationship. They start to build and engage with one another. So now when that incumbent founder is talking to their venture capital investor, they're saying, hey, I know a diverse female founder or I know an LGBTQ founder that I want to connect you with.

A Paladin is anyone that believes that there needs to be a change in the industry, and we're doing the work to ensure that they have access and the right resources to be successful.

What do you offer your members?

We are a community of people dedicated to being the change we want to see so folks apply for membership. We interview the founder to understand what they're trying to do: where are they,  what are their immediate needs, what are they thinking about for the future, and what do they need to get established? 

Our team focuses heavily on understanding where the founder is: Do they need to get into an incubator? Are they looking for a co-founder? Do they need someone to help them with their marketing or writing assignments? Are they looking for a good mentor and advisor? After we take in all that information, we then connect the founder with our vast network of mentors and advisors.

Once the founder joins our community, we add them to our channels and networks, including different affinity groups. We also have a weekly happy hour, offer mental health support, and offer meditation to anyone interested.

Then founders are brought into our programming. We offer classes on public speaking and pitch deck reviews, and on the development side, we have an investor relations team that sits with the founder to understand who they're trying to get investment from. For example, we may ask, Do we need to get you in front of Fortune 500 companies that could use your technology?  And then, we curate demo days for the investors based on the founders’ need.

How long do you work with founders and how many founders do you support?

We are with the founder from the moment they have the idea to the moment they exit and anything in between.  We're like the executive vice president of the startup. We have about 340 companies in our portfolio today and helped them raise over $88M in funding.

Where will Go Paladin be five years from now?

We're very fortunate that we've got folks like Village Capital, Salesforce, Intel, Apple, Operator Collective, and others who continue to support us through grants and programs like Resource. But now we're excited to get more active in helping to train the next generation of entrepreneurs and fund them at the very earliest stage of their journeys. In the next year, we want to start developing our own fund, because we want to start investing in these companies directly. And we're also beginning projects to educate people on things like personal branding, NFTs, crypto, career development, and personal credit.  

What is your hope and advice for founders of color like yourself?

I want our founder to know that we can all win. We don't have to live in this mentality that there's scarcity and a limit to success. In reality, there’s an abundance that we can all have access to.

When I think about founders of color and founders where this is their first go – they need the mental fortitude of an Olympian. You have to be able to turn on strength and turn into yourself for strength because most people will write you off and won’t believe in you.

I want our founders to know that we can all win. We don't have to live in this mentality that there's scarcity and a limit to success. In reality, there’s an abundance that we can all have access to.

When I think about founders of color and founders where this is their first go – they need the mental fortitude of an Olympian. You have to be able to rely on yourself for strength because many people will write you off and won’t believe in you.

When I think about my experience growing up in low-income housing, I always felt like it was a superhero training camp. I felt like at times I would have to hide my true identity from people who didn’t think much about where I came from, and when a crisis would occur I would already know how to solve the problem. At the end of the day, I'm just a passionate individual who was very fortunate to build my network and be open to sharing access to the networks first.

If I could get somebody to fund me, I would turn affordable housing into the next YCombinator and turn out the amazing talent and entrepreneurs. I would do that in a heartbeat.