00:14:48 · Jason Calacanis, Molly Wood
[00:14:48] S0: this happens Who [00:14:48] S1: did an when interview and when?
00:14:50 · Jason Calacanis
[00:14:50] S0: It's when a big influx of money comes in, Because people see that scorecard and in certain people, it triggers entitlement. When certain VCs raise a bunch of money, when they have a big exit, you see all of a sudden on their... You see this happen with VCs, right? Oh, their company went public, it became worth a lot of money. I got to write a book about it. Oh wait, that's me. You know, all of a sudden they're a genius and everybody needs to listen to hang on their every word because they're the third or fourth investor in Uber or whatever it is. Or, you know, they start taking pictures of their jets and all this stuff, right? And they just get obnoxious and they get full of themselves because in our world, for better or worse, money is a scorecard. And that's Siri with that ding telling me I'm That was one ding for correct, it's okay. So, it's accurate. And I think that's what happens, you see it all the time, a founder raises $50,000,000 $25,000,000 and they go off the rails. And other ones are just like, okay, got that money, let me get back to work, I'm product focused. But it can be a distraction, it can also be an eagle lift. So I think when the influx of money comes in, that's when a discussion should happen with the founders. I tend to do it as a board member on a regular basis, but I'm actually now thinking maybe I should incorporate this into founder university or the accelerator. Like we incorporated planning, we're bringing accounting because we did like two year planning and we realized people don't know basic accounting. Yeah, mean, it makes sense, You're starting a company and building an app.
00:16:24 · Molly Wood, Jason Calacanis
[00:16:24] S1: It's amazing that we have that built included because you know, how would you, it doesn't mean it's your skill set just because So you're a [00:16:31] S0: I'm literally going to have one of our portfolio companies come in and teach basic accounting, just chart of accounting, like here's how you categorize bills, here's why you do it, here's how you can have a P and L, you know, and do reporting. Just so they don't do it, you know, run the company for two years and then never do their accounting right and have to do a bit cleanup job later. So I do think maybe talking about morals, ethics, perception, you know, and acting with, you know, a high moral authority, you want to have the high ground in how you make decisions, think is very important. [00:17:06] S1: I even think you could frame it as just intentionality. Like you're being intentional about how you're building your business and you're considering bad outcomes early so that you can try to head them off, think is really, really valuable. It's interesting because that's so every time Elizabeth Holmes comes up and people would interview me as a journalist and now even at once as an investor about it, the question was always like, shouldn't the VCs have done something and [00:17:31] S0: blind spots, [00:17:32] S1: but also if there has, if they make it part of our mandate to say, as you're planning for your growth, are you being intentional about the potential bad outcomes? That seems really valuable.
00:17:32 · Molly Wood, Jason Calacanis, Alan Chang
[00:17:32] S1: but also if there has, if they make it part of our mandate to say, as you're planning for your growth, are you being intentional about the potential bad outcomes? That seems really valuable. [00:17:44] S0: Yeah, unintended consequences blind Yeah, I think it's, there's a category of things that could derail a startup and you know, going down that list of things that could derail it, is a nice way to look at a value proposition for an investor. Yeah. It's like here are... I always tell people like, I could tell you what's around the turn and what speed to take that turn. You still got to drive the car, but I can tell you like, if you're going into a hairpin turn, you know, most people would take it at 30, you want to try 40 or 50, great. You probably don't want to try 60, 70, because you're probably going to slam into that wall or flip the car. And that's typically how I say to people like, you know, that's a flip the car scenario. You want to burn... You want to have six months of runway instead of eighteen, man, you know, there's not a lot of room for error there. So you're going to be taking a... It's like going up the PCH and whipping around turns. It's like, yeah. Could be fun. You could get there quicker. You can get to your destination ten minutes quicker. You could also go off the rail. And, you know, they they don't have guardrails on the PCH. I don't understand this. You ever drive the PCH, Molly? Let's Yes. See we can [00:18:49] S4: the PCH.
00:18:49 · Alan Chang, Molly Wood, Jason Calacanis
[00:18:49] S4: the PCH. [00:18:49] S1: No. You... It's exciting. I'm so sorry. I apologize. He breaks through the... My son is home sick today and it breaks through the do not disturb. [00:18:56] S0: As he should. As he should break through the do not disturb. So just in wrapping. [00:19:00] S4: I a [00:19:00] S0: priority. I don't drive the PCH. Don't drive it. Don't drive it with my kids, I don't drive it myself. Why? I like to drive fast. I like to take the turns fast sometimes, and they don't have guardrails up there. And I just don't, every time I drive that thing, especially since I had my daughters, if I'm going up to like one of those beaches in Northern California, and there's a way to go up and then over, as opposed to go on the PCH, I'm taking the long way. I'm not taking the scenic route. I don't want that scenic route with no guard rails. I got very important people in that car. I'm not even thinking about myself. If I was driving up there, I'd be in my Corvette with the Tiptronic, you know, revving that engine. But with those daughters in there, heck no. [00:19:47] S1: And honestly, that's how you should think of this as a startup founder. [00:19:50] S0: Exactly. If you want to be a solo founder, you're a consultant, you're a podcaster, you want to go crazy, feel free. But once you got those passengers in the car, you got those LPs money in the car, you got your team in the car, it's the higher responsibility. [00:20:05] S1: Responsibility, yeah. [00:20:06] S0: Just take it serious.
00:20:06 · Jason Calacanis, Molly Wood
[00:20:06] S0: Just take it serious. [00:20:07] S1: All right, well we have a great This Week in Climate Startups coming next. [00:20:11] S0: What do [00:20:11] S1: you got? Yes, Exactly. Sunday show. Big Sunday show. This is so interesting. Alan Chang is the founder and CEO of Tesseract Energy. Previously, he was the CRO at the fintech company Revolut, and basically was like, how can I apply my kind of understanding of disrupting payments and finance to energy, which is such a complicated space involves tons of payments and finance? And this company Tesseract's goal is to generate affordable renewable power. So they are actually building financing through the sale of tokens, renewable energy projects. They wanna generate a terawatt of renewable energy capacity, and then they're doing two things where they are allowed. They sell that energy direct to consumers with no middle person. So it's like, oh wow. A fraction of the cost of buying from a utility where they're not allowed. You can buy the token, which is a representation of excess energy and then sell that excess energy back into the grid. You just offset your power cost at home. Really interesting, very challenging, but super disruptive if it works.