Mandy Cole at Stage 2 Capital brings unusually deep hands-on experience scaling revenue engines from very early to large scale, having taken companies like LivingSocial from $5M to $750M in revenue and built sales teams from 20 to 200 people across multiple high-growth B2B marketplace and SaaS companies. She founded Rise Accelerator specifically to help Series A companies build go-to-market systems and produces detailed GTM and AI playbooks for founders, positioning her as both an operator-turned-investor and a dedicated builder of concrete sales systems and workflows.

• Focuses heavily on scaling sales and accelerating startup revenue. Regularly highlights strategies for building strong sales organizations and frequently shares hiring opportunities for high level sales roles at B2B and SaaS companies. For example, cohosted an event dedicated to the playbook for growing and scaling sales teams and shared advice on how startups can improve revenue in tough environments without simply relying on generating more pipeline.
• Values empathetic and people centric leadership. Often emphasizes that true leadership involves genuinely caring about your team and focusing on professional development. For example, shared the perspective that if you focus on helping employees become better at their specific jobs, overall business success will naturally fall into place.
• Prioritizes resilience and maintaining a positive growth mindset. Frequently posts motivational thoughts about working hard, dreaming big, and overcoming challenges as a startup founder. For example, promoted a founder summit centered entirely around the theme of never giving up and noted that the main difference between winners and everyone else is a willingness to do the difficult tasks that others simply avoid.