Jessica Gerwin is Building the Infrastructure for Founder Community With Micro-Grants
Being a founder can be isolating. Every day you have to navigate complex problems, lead direct conversations, and make decisions amidst uncertainty. The best support for weathering the journey often comes from fellow founders, who are either facing the same issues or can prompt you to view a challenge from a different perspective.
But most founders have little-to-no free time, and bouncing around founder networking events in effort to connect with fellow founders can be exhausting.
Jessica Gerwin is building an agentic voice-enabled CRM for early-stage founders, and has experienced the challenges of networking herself. She wanted to create more opportunities for founders to connect and learn from one another in serendipitous, natural moments. So she partnered with Every to launch a Micro-Grants program and foster stronger connections throughout San Francisco’s founder community.
Micro Grants Fostering Serendipitous Founder Connections
Jessica’s program offers $25 micro-grants to help founders meet other founders they don't know well (yet!). Founders can either be paired with someone new or sign up with a founder they'd like to get to know better. All they have to do is fill out a quick form and Every takes care of pairing, approval, and payment.
Unlike formal networking events, founders can meet however they want, wherever they want. "You don't have to get coffee,” Jessica explains. “If you're a founder who only drinks matcha, or maybe doesn't drink caffeine at all, then you can do something fun, like go to tartine, or buy shoes at Mission Cliffs. You can be creative with how you want to meet."
If founders don’t know who they’d like to connect with, Jessica offers to match them with others who might fit what they're looking for, whether that's specific industry insights or a new founder friend. The program is designed to encourage informal advice sharing while reducing the activation energy required to actually follow through on meeting someone.
Building the Infrastructure for Founder Community
By offering an alternative approach to networking in San Francisco’s founder community, Jessica hopes that the micro grants program will influence others to invest in community building.
"Even if it's not through the program specifically,” Jessica explains, “I do hope that this inspires some founders to take the next step in getting to know someone new. Maybe they even have their own micro grant program, and micro grants spread within the SF community."
As a founder herself, Jessica sees community as the essential infrastructure for founders to thrive. By architecting opportunities for founders to make serendipitous connections and form genuine relationships, micro grant programs like Jessica’s create a social fabric that helps founders become the best versions of themselves.
To learn more about Jessica and her journey, you can follow her on LinkedIn. If you’re interested in connecting with a fellow founder through the micro grants program, you can sign up here.
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Can I switch to Every if my company is already set up?Yes—you can switch to Every at any time, even if your company is already incorporated and running. Whether you're using separate tools for banking, payroll, bookkeeping, or taxes, we’ll help you bring everything into one place. Our onboarding specialists will guide you through the process, make sure your data is transferred cleanly, and get you set up quickly—without disrupting your operations. Most founders are fully transitioned within a week.
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Every is designed for startups from day zero through Series A and beyond. Whether you're just incorporating or already running payroll and managing expenses, we meet you where you are. Early-stage founders use Every to get up and running fast—with banking, payroll, bookkeeping, and taxes all handled from day one. Growing teams love how Every scales with them, replacing patchwork tools and manual work with a clean, unified system.
We’re especially valuable for teams who want to move fast without hiring a full finance or HR team—giving founders more time to build, and fewer distractions from admin and compliance
- How long does onboarding take?
Onboarding with Every is fast and efficient. For most startups, the process typically takes between 3 to 7 days, depending on your specific needs and how much setup you already have in place.
If you're a new company, you'll be up and running quickly—getting your banking, payroll, and bookkeeping set up without hassle. If you’re transitioning from another system, our specialists will help you migrate your data, ensuring a smooth switch with no gaps or errors in your operations.
We guide you every step of the way, from incorporation to setting up automated payroll to handling your taxes—so you can focus on growing your business. Our goal is to make sure you're fully operational and confident in your back office in under a week.
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