I’m just back from the inaugural 2009 Nittany Lion Venture Capital Conference at Penn State.  The conference was explicitly designed to bridge the gap between angels, venture capital, and academia.  It was a terrific event featuring a day’s worth of panelists exploring topics such as the current state of early stage venture capital, building relationships between angels and venture capitalists, and new models of early stage venture funding.  One major theme cutting across most of the panels was current and future impacts of the economic crisis on all aspects of early stage venturing.  In this context several people on both the entrepreneur and the venture capital sides of the growth equation mentioned that one of their plans for moving forward during rough economic times was to be sure to work with people they knew, people they had worked with in the past.  This approach has several aspects of interest and a bit of concern.  It certainly makes sense to work with team members who know, and especially trust, each other.  The past experiences provide the foundation to know each other’s strengths and weaknesses in areas of expertise and ways of working with each other.  This would hold true whether the venture was a raving success, an ok deal, or even a bust.  Perhaps even more so if the deal did not work as well as expected.  The concern lies in those not already in the current loop - especially for women entrepreneurs.  We already know that women are less likely to be in networks connected to the more sophisticated means of venture funding.  If the existing networks are going to close ranks for the time being, this is certainly a point of concern.  Emerging and growing small businesses are certainly going to be at the heart of the economic recovery.  We need the country’s best talent focused on job and wealth creation.   Not just half of the talent.