True Welcomes Vice President of Culture Madeline Kolbe Saltzman

We are immensely pleased to announce that Madeline Kolbe Saltzman has joined True as our Vice President of Culture. Madeline has been well known to us all at True for three years, as she was an integral part of growing the team at Handshake with Garrett Lord, Ben Christensen, and Scott Ringwelski, a True investment since 2016.

We’ve been lucky enough to see Madeline build an incredible culture at Handshake, and she has been an enormous resource to the True portfolio over the years by teaching at True University and other portfolio events that help founders and their team members become their best selves. 

Prior to Handshake, Madeline spent time shaping culture and building teams at Cadre, Tumblr, and Google. Her focus on fostering intentional and inclusive culture across high-growth technology companies has been exceptional. As part of the True team, this experience will be magnified not just across the more than 13,000 employees in the True portfolio, but also in the industry at large by showing others how to prioritize culture as a fundamental aspect of building meaningful companies with lasting impact. 

We started True because we believed the world needed a place that supports the dreamers and doers of today and tomorrow — a firm where people really are everything. We even embody this in our name. To ‘true’ a wheel means to bring all elements into alignment. For us, this means alignment with founders, our values, and our dreams of empowering entrepreneurs from all backgrounds, experiences, and walks of life.  

Alignment to us also means that investors must take responsibility for the VC industry as a whole and realize that who we choose to fund influences the way the world works. Excess funding in our industry has led to some shameful examples of poor culture and lax corporate governance. We need more focus on people and responsible cultures now more than ever. We can do better and we must, starting with who we hire and how we treat our people and communities. 

With Madeline as a core part of the True team and platform, we will be able to push even faster and further to make the True portfolio the home for the most humane, aware, inclusive, and creative cultures operating in the technology industry today. If you’re in this camp and are interested in joining a True team, check out our portfolio page, and feel free to reach out to one of these companies directly. 

Welcome to True, Madeline!