There is a lot of talk in the San Francisco Bay Area about the difficulty tech companies are having when it comes to hiring the highly-skilled people they need to grow. But it turns out that the talent crunch isn’t just an issue here in Silicon Valley — it’s a problem that they’re feeling literally on the other side of the globe, in Israel.
So it was interesting to have the opportunity to chat about this and much more with Michael Eisenberg, a general partner at venture capital firm Benchmark Capital who helps lead the firm’s Israel operations. Eisenberg, who is based in Benchmark’s Tel Aviv office, stopped by the TechCrunch TV while visiting San Francisco this week. He has a really interesting blog called “Six Kids and a Full Time Job,” where he talks about tech, VC investing, the Israeli startup scene, and his very active family life (which now actually includes eight kids) — so it was fun to be able to hash out some of those topics with him in person.
In the video embedded above, you can hear Eisenberg talk about how the tech boom is playing out in Israel, why now is a “golden age” for Israeli venture capital, how Israeli entrepreneurs are different from their Silicon Valley counterparts, and why he doesn’t believe in the concept of “work/life balance.”