This paper studies the issue of “overboarded” directors for venture-backed IPO firms, a setting for which the costs and benefits of busy boards are likely to be substantially different than for seasoned firms prior research has examined. While we find evidence that busy directors are beneficial for IPO firms, we find no evidence that they are costly: our results demonstrate that busy IPO directors are more experienced, qualified, and committed to their firms, but the results provide no evidence that busy directors harm firm performance. Consistent with the view that firm insiders, who bear the cost of suboptimal governance at the IPO, believe that the benefits of busy boards outweigh the costs for them, we find that 49% of venture-backed IPOs have busy boards. Indeed, we demonstrate that busy boards are substantially more common for IPOs than for seasoned firms. Current recommendations to limit the number of “overboarded” directors could impose substantial costs on firms contemplating IPOs, making it difficult for them to find and keep the most valuable board candidates.