Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy
· Josh Kushner, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S1: The ambition of Thrive has never been around the scale of the assets that we have. I think we're just very focused on the input orientation of what we're doing every day. “Do we have the best culture? Do we have the best process? Are we creating the best possible product for our founders?” I think for us, focusing on a particular number will ultimately lead to the wrong outcomes. We're not looking to write these very meaningful checks, it was very much in service of the opportunity. There will be moments in time where the opportunity does not exist to write very large checks, and we won't. [00:00:00] S0: The distortion you mentioned earlier of praise. Now everyone wants to work at Thrive. How do you protect against the inverse problem? How do you make sure that you still select for the same kind of people that got you here?
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Josh Kushner
[00:00:00] S0: The distortion you mentioned earlier of praise. Now everyone wants to work at Thrive. How do you protect against the inverse problem? How do you make sure that you still select for the same kind of people that got you here? [00:00:00] S1: One of my favorite books is Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, and he has this incredible concept early on in the book about this idea of the “same man”. You should be the same man in both good times and in bad times. And one of the things that I'm most proud of, of the organization that we have, is that people were somewhat unfazed over really a decade and a half of being criticized for our strategy, the construction of the team, the size of the team, some of the types of investments that we made, the size of the investments that we made. We feel very grateful that these things have worked out and people have paid attention to them, but also not to be taken away by these things and to continue to keep our heads down, have humility. It's really important that as an organization we continue to be open-minded to the idea that some of our convictions might not be right. Humility and self-awareness are the most important characteristics of any organization, any individual. And I think it's important that we just continue to think of every single situation with an objective lens. [00:00:00] S0: How do you interview people differently – if at all – to make sure you're not getting people that are there because it's Thrive, a cool brand, versus the type of person you love, when you personally are doing the interviews?
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Josh Kushner
[00:00:00] S0: How do you interview people differently – if at all – to make sure you're not getting people that are there because it's Thrive, a cool brand, versus the type of person you love, when you personally are doing the interviews? [00:00:00] S1: We still look for the same things. I really want to understand who people are, where they come from, what motivates them, what drives them. What they feel like they owe the world as a result of what their experiences have been. How grateful they are to be in the position that they are in. I was interviewing a candidate about six months ago and they said to me, “Why is everyone at Thrive so driven and so motivated?” And my quick off-the-cuff comment was, people are either first generation at Thrive or from the most hated state in the country, New Jersey. I think there's this incredible chip on people's shoulders at the firm. Insecurity is the greatest driver of innovation. It's the greatest driver of progress. It's the thing that jumpstarts everything, but it can't be the end goal. If that is the place that you're operating from in perpetuity, it's a very dangerous thing because it's a never winning game. There can always be more. We've done a very good job of building an organization of people who come from certain places or have certain backgrounds who feel a sense of responsibility or gratitude for the positions that they're in. But also at the same time, if you're operating purely from a place of, “I have something to prove to the world”, just at least speaking from personal experiences, the world doesn't actually care.
· Josh Kushner, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S1: We still look for the same things. I really want to understand who people are, where they come from, what motivates them, what drives them. What they feel like they owe the world as a result of what their experiences have been. How grateful they are to be in the position that they are in. I was interviewing a candidate about six months ago and they said to me, “Why is everyone at Thrive so driven and so motivated?” And my quick off-the-cuff comment was, people are either first generation at Thrive or from the most hated state in the country, New Jersey. I think there's this incredible chip on people's shoulders at the firm. Insecurity is the greatest driver of innovation. It's the greatest driver of progress. It's the thing that jumpstarts everything, but it can't be the end goal. If that is the place that you're operating from in perpetuity, it's a very dangerous thing because it's a never winning game. There can always be more. We've done a very good job of building an organization of people who come from certain places or have certain backgrounds who feel a sense of responsibility or gratitude for the positions that they're in. But also at the same time, if you're operating purely from a place of, “I have something to prove to the world”, just at least speaking from personal experiences, the world doesn't actually care. [00:00:00] S0: To the extent that you have, how do you help usher people from the spark of motivation that comes from insecurity to the more abiding source of motivation that comes from passion or joy?
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Josh Kushner
[00:00:00] S0: To the extent that you have, how do you help usher people from the spark of motivation that comes from insecurity to the more abiding source of motivation that comes from passion or joy? [00:00:00] S1: Just from personal experiences, I've seen a couple of times – whether it be through some of my family's troubles or association with politics – that external validation can be very dangerous and it also can be very fleeting. What is the point in trying to prove something to someone else or caring about what other people think in reality, if they don't really care that much at all? A lot of the people that are at the firm I think have made that transition. They all started with this desire or feeling like they had to prove something to someone else. One of the things that I've been able to impart on people is you'll never win if that's the ultimate goal. [00:00:00] S0: Maybe a click more about the culture of Thrive. It's so interesting that Miles was with you from the beginning, went to one of the other great venture firms, Benchmark, came back to Thrive. I'm so curious about the ways that you can keep the culture to its most essential elements.
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Josh Kushner
[00:00:00] S0: Maybe a click more about the culture of Thrive. It's so interesting that Miles was with you from the beginning, went to one of the other great venture firms, Benchmark, came back to Thrive. I'm so curious about the ways that you can keep the culture to its most essential elements. [00:00:00] S1: We've always believed that artists like to live in artist colonies, and it's our job to ensure that we have the right people within the organization that are constantly pushing us forward, and pushing us to learn as much as we can. The things that we look for in the people that are at the firm are very similar to the things that we look for in the founders that we hope to partner with, which is self-awareness, humility, drive, ambition. One of the things that I'm most proud of within the organization is this incredible open-mindedness to the idea that we have just a tremendous amount to learn. Many people view vulnerability as a sign of weakness, but if you are willing to say, "I don't know the answer", that is actually the most extraordinary sign of confidence. We've always had this orientation that the only way to have a team is to have a small team, and the only way to have a small team, is to have a group of people that everyone mutually respects. If you respect everyone else around the table, the conversations are really oriented towards trying to get to the right answer. It's impossible for us to make the right decisions every time, but we can ensure that we have the right conversations.