I upvoted, but I’d like to know more about your story, if you are ok to post it.
Some of my colleagues at my last company suggested that my bosses may have been jealous of my open source success. But somehow it feels like every boss I've had over the past 6 years have been like this.
I often tried to raise funding from investors and Venture Capitalists. I must have applied to hundreds of different angel investors and firms over the past decade. I even attended events which I knew some specific investors would attend and managed to secure a coffee with some big investors. I'm a developer so networking is not natural to me but I pushed myself hard anyway.
In spite of having built one of the most popular open source projects in my country, I could not even secure a seed round from any investor. On the other hand, I've watched people I knew who were running projects with almost no traction at all raise over 1 million dollars. Everyone I know talks about it as if it's easy.
Everyone around me seems to be getting opportunities without trying and without any track record. On the oher hand I always seem to get overlooked for no apparent reason. It happens over and over. Feels like the world is against me.
My ex-colleagues even told me that my ex-boss (CTO) said that he regrets me leaving the company... I had made some significant contributions. I even saw a screenshot of a message that the CTO sent which paints me in a very positive light. Yet when I try to reach out to him to do some kind of partnership or sponsorship, I get no response. It's downright weird actually.
The only time I ever raised any money (or benefited from any exit) was a $10k donation from a member of one of my cryptocurrency communities. I guess they must have taken pity on my situation. I don't even care though. Nowadays, I will take anything I can get, by whatever means or social mechanism.
> You sound pretentious, hence why you don't inspire VPs enough to follow your projects. For that purpose, being skilled in SWE is barely important comparing to relational skills. It's time to question yourself.
Instead you deflected, re-asserting your internal monologue of: it's not me, it's them. It doesn't matter what your backstory is if you're not likable. That isn't a judgment on your character -- you may be a wonderful person and friend. Likability is a skill that can be learned, and one that is arguably more important than any software skills you may have (as you may have implicitly observed).
I guess when a rich person is always surrounded with phony people who will do anything to get something from them, it must feel uncomfortable to be faced with genuine people who just tell it like it is.
It's easier to fool someone than convince them that they have been fooled. It's easier for someone to like you by telling them what they want to hear than by telling them the truth.
You might be passed over for promotions as they see you as a good IC but don’t think you’ll be good at managing. You can probably solve this by taking on more responsibility. In my experience there are too few people who want to manage teams so someone is wanting to do is a big thing.
I don’t have experience in VC but I imagine raising money is going to be like anything else sales like and require a lot of patience, persistence and tweaking. There is a lot of advice on HN and from YC.
Pick if you want to climb the corporate ladder or start a startup as they are two quite different things.
Also I would probable see a psychologist to help change your mindset. The world is not conspiring against you.