welcome to this installment of hit mojo
and watch module joining is our special
guest Brad Feld I’m your host Ashley and
carbon solutions so Brad welcome to
Montreal here we are at Notman house
which is the home base of founder fuel
so let’s get right to it Brad you have a
new book out it’s called startup life
surviving and thriving in a relationship
with an entrepreneur so tell us all
about it so startup life which will be
officially out at the end of January but
probably it’s available for pre-order
now is a book i read with my wife Amy
bachelor and the essence of it is the
two of us have worked really hard over
the 22 years haven’t been together to
figure out how to be a successful
entrepreneurial couple where you know
one of us is living this crazy
entrepreneurial life and we’ve got a lot
of friends who have figured that out too
and we’ve got a lot of other friends who
struggle with it and every entrepreneur
I run into is either struggling with it
or has struggle with it and every
partner is struggling with it it doesn’t
matter what gender doesn’t matter
whether they’re both entrepreneurs
doesn’t matter age it’s just hard and so
we try to write a book that talks about
our experience and many other
experiences and give some very practical
advice as well as a lot of philosophical
advice about how to think about being in
a relationship with an entrepreneur and
how to be a couple that has that kind of
cadence in their life now so you’ve been
married for 22 years were you ever at a
like start up together like when you
were really yeah so so I actually Amy’s
my second wife so I married my high
school girlfriend and my first company
was one of the inputs into us not having
a successful relationship we ended up
splitting up after three years I had to
say we got married it was good for three
days and we eventually got divorced
three years later we had no kids it was
more like a post college breakup but you
know the fact that i was working 100
hours a week and that the startup was my
priority certainly negatively impact our
relationship Amy and I were friends in
college so we knew each other during
that period
and she actually worked for a period of
time she was a fourth employee at this
first company of mine and so she saw
before we were involved in a
relationship sort of what that dynamic
was i like to say she knew what she was
getting into but but even that wasn’t
enough in some ways we had a very sort
of crisis moment about a decade into a
relationship as i was still wandering
the line between entrepreneur investor
where i was chairman of a couple of
companies that i had co-founded as well
as trying to be a venture investor in
the middle of 2001 when the internet
bubble blow up and that was pretty
challenge that was really the most
challenging time that I’ve had my
relationship because having been
divorced I mean that was a disastrous
relationship but with Amy we’ve been
together 10 years and there was no
question that we wanted to be together
but suddenly we found ourselves in this
place where from her frame of reference
the relationship just wasn’t satisfying
it’s funny because when i started
watchmojo i asked my wife to join me
right from the get-go because i said as
my wife you’re going to have your
opinion and i don’t want to turn around
and say honey you don’t know what you’re
talking about which is strike one two
and three yeah I said you’re going to be
involved anyway you might as well know
what you’re talking about okay so as an
investor now wearing the investor hat
when you see a you know couple combo
walk in and say we’re the co-founders of
company XYZ be honest do you have a bias
against that or for that I think it’s
awesome in fact we we have one company
called Mongo lab where that’s the case
we’ve been involved in companies with
brothers and sisters I was an investor
in my uncle’s company called the Charlie
felled was his name the company was
called the Feld group so we’ve had
plenty of cases of that I think that it
does create lots of unique challenges in
the relationship and I think the
partners have to be very aware of those
unique challenges but I don’t have an
allergic reaction to it all and in fact
I have a lot of respect for the ability
for two partners to work side by side on
something they really care about so
without getting too inside baseball but
feel free to get into the X’s and O’s
what if the the couple wanted to both be
on the board or would you say that gets
a bit
too too too much or you don’t I wouldn’t
have I personally wouldn’t care about it
i think there’s plenty of investors who
who would would have an issue would
probably have an issue with them being
in the same company i I wouldn’t have an
issue with them both being on the board
I would encourage them to think hard
about the dynamics of that because I
think that you want to go into the
business relationship and the personal
relationship in parallel and be very
very clear about what your expectations
with each other are and having some
separation between you know
decision-making between responsibilities
in the context of the company can be
helpful for some couples it’s not what
they want but you know what happens if
you have a conflict how do you deal with
that situation and if you understand how
you’re going to deal with in advance and
you’ve talked about it that’s fine the
mistake I think people make is that they
don’t go through it in advance they
don’t really figure out how to deal with
the conflict quite true will spare my
personal experiences on that for another
day ok so now 2012 almost 2013 some
would almost say that there’s a bubble
amongst you know angel investors will
talk about that in a second you could
chime in now but I want to just go back
to when you started I’m going to assume
you were one of the first so-called
angel investors or high prominent one so
one take us through what was it that
flick for you and said I want to start
you know making early stage investment
sore I’m sure now you might be more of a
VC relative to some of the angels out
there even but just take us through that
mindset was the opportunity what was it
visa the other stages that turned you
off turns you on etc it’s also the
dynamics were I i sold my first company
in 1993 to a public company and I worked
for that public company for a couple of
years a memory I’m era data array and
while I was working for that company I
took most of the money that I’ve made
and invested it in start-up so this is
94 to 96 i made about 40 investments in
that three-year period it was a very
good time to be an angel investor
because it was the beginning of the rise
of the commercial internet and some of
the companies that i invested in
wer were big high flyers and net genesis
and critical path or two that a lot of
people in the internet we may remember
as an early investor in harmonics which
were the guys that created that our hero
and subsequently rock band for me I was
relatively young I was 28 when I sold my
first company I didn’t really know what
I wanted to do next whether it was start
a company and be CEO of a company or be
involved in a bunch of companies and so
I used this investing as a way to get
involved in a bunch of startups while I
was working for a Marid ADA in a senior
role and when i left the marrow data I
just continued this investing dynamic
and as part of that I helped start some
of the company so I looked like a
founding investor or chairman or
whatever you want to call it in a
handful of them I really love the early
stages of a company and to this day I
still love the early stages of a company
so I’ve never viewed myself as an
investor where I’m simply trying to
invest in the companies but rather I
viewed myself as somebody who engages
very very deeply with entrepreneurs in
an investor role often at very early
stages of the company’s life I also get
to a place where as the companies become
mature businesses I become less
interested my the things that turn me on
them I’m a good board member of a larger
company but it’s not as satisfying to me
and in a lot of ways it’s not really
playing to my own strengths and so I’ve
been thoughtful about that as it’s
evolved over time what’s your
recommendation should an entrepreneur go
out and seek investment from the get-go
or is it you need to first even
determine if your venture is I think it
totally depends on the entrepreneur and
the dynamics and desires of the
entrepreneur my personal philosophy is
you should make as much progress with as
little money as you need is possible to
get to the next level that doesn’t mean
zero that means as little as you think
you need and the neat thing is you get
to define all the parameters you get to
define how much you need you get to
define what progress is right i mean
that’s that’s for the entrepreneur to do
i think the mistake a lot of
entrepreneurs make is this idea i have
to raise this money to go make this
progress and that’s never true i mean my
first company was started with 10 bucks
there are many many examples of
companies that were bootstrap businesses
that didn’t ever raise any money what
did you spend the 10 bucks
the URL no no we had last week we had 10
shares of stock so I got six my partner
got three and my dad got one I mean we
needed a little bit you know you we
could have done a dollar and done 10
sets 30 sets and 60 sets right we just
need a mechanism for sharing the stock
but but that’s that’s the the struggle
of entrepreneurs getting confused about
what’s important and recognizing that
the more progress you make the easier it
is to raise money and frankly the more
the company you keep all right we’re
going to take a short break we’re
talking to Brad Feld we’re going to come
back and ask them what are some of the
more successful entrepreneurs share in
terms of traits and what are some of the
more unsuccessful entrepreneur shows
traits and whatnot we’ll be right back
and watch module joining is our special
guest Brad Feld I’m your host Ashley and
carbon solutions so Brad welcome to
Montreal here we are at Notman house
which is the home base of founder fuel
so let’s get right to it Brad you have a
new book out it’s called startup life
surviving and thriving in a relationship
with an entrepreneur so tell us all
about it so startup life which will be
officially out at the end of January but
probably it’s available for pre-order
now is a book i read with my wife Amy
bachelor and the essence of it is the
two of us have worked really hard over
the 22 years haven’t been together to
figure out how to be a successful
entrepreneurial couple where you know
one of us is living this crazy
entrepreneurial life and we’ve got a lot
of friends who have figured that out too
and we’ve got a lot of other friends who
struggle with it and every entrepreneur
I run into is either struggling with it
or has struggle with it and every
partner is struggling with it it doesn’t
matter what gender doesn’t matter
whether they’re both entrepreneurs
doesn’t matter age it’s just hard and so
we try to write a book that talks about
our experience and many other
experiences and give some very practical
advice as well as a lot of philosophical
advice about how to think about being in
a relationship with an entrepreneur and
how to be a couple that has that kind of
cadence in their life now so you’ve been
married for 22 years were you ever at a
like start up together like when you
were really yeah so so I actually Amy’s
my second wife so I married my high
school girlfriend and my first company
was one of the inputs into us not having
a successful relationship we ended up
splitting up after three years I had to
say we got married it was good for three
days and we eventually got divorced
three years later we had no kids it was
more like a post college breakup but you
know the fact that i was working 100
hours a week and that the startup was my
priority certainly negatively impact our
relationship Amy and I were friends in
college so we knew each other during
that period
and she actually worked for a period of
time she was a fourth employee at this
first company of mine and so she saw
before we were involved in a
relationship sort of what that dynamic
was i like to say she knew what she was
getting into but but even that wasn’t
enough in some ways we had a very sort
of crisis moment about a decade into a
relationship as i was still wandering
the line between entrepreneur investor
where i was chairman of a couple of
companies that i had co-founded as well
as trying to be a venture investor in
the middle of 2001 when the internet
bubble blow up and that was pretty
challenge that was really the most
challenging time that I’ve had my
relationship because having been
divorced I mean that was a disastrous
relationship but with Amy we’ve been
together 10 years and there was no
question that we wanted to be together
but suddenly we found ourselves in this
place where from her frame of reference
the relationship just wasn’t satisfying
it’s funny because when i started
watchmojo i asked my wife to join me
right from the get-go because i said as
my wife you’re going to have your
opinion and i don’t want to turn around
and say honey you don’t know what you’re
talking about which is strike one two
and three yeah I said you’re going to be
involved anyway you might as well know
what you’re talking about okay so as an
investor now wearing the investor hat
when you see a you know couple combo
walk in and say we’re the co-founders of
company XYZ be honest do you have a bias
against that or for that I think it’s
awesome in fact we we have one company
called Mongo lab where that’s the case
we’ve been involved in companies with
brothers and sisters I was an investor
in my uncle’s company called the Charlie
felled was his name the company was
called the Feld group so we’ve had
plenty of cases of that I think that it
does create lots of unique challenges in
the relationship and I think the
partners have to be very aware of those
unique challenges but I don’t have an
allergic reaction to it all and in fact
I have a lot of respect for the ability
for two partners to work side by side on
something they really care about so
without getting too inside baseball but
feel free to get into the X’s and O’s
what if the the couple wanted to both be
on the board or would you say that gets
a bit
too too too much or you don’t I wouldn’t
have I personally wouldn’t care about it
i think there’s plenty of investors who
who would would have an issue would
probably have an issue with them being
in the same company i I wouldn’t have an
issue with them both being on the board
I would encourage them to think hard
about the dynamics of that because I
think that you want to go into the
business relationship and the personal
relationship in parallel and be very
very clear about what your expectations
with each other are and having some
separation between you know
decision-making between responsibilities
in the context of the company can be
helpful for some couples it’s not what
they want but you know what happens if
you have a conflict how do you deal with
that situation and if you understand how
you’re going to deal with in advance and
you’ve talked about it that’s fine the
mistake I think people make is that they
don’t go through it in advance they
don’t really figure out how to deal with
the conflict quite true will spare my
personal experiences on that for another
day ok so now 2012 almost 2013 some
would almost say that there’s a bubble
amongst you know angel investors will
talk about that in a second you could
chime in now but I want to just go back
to when you started I’m going to assume
you were one of the first so-called
angel investors or high prominent one so
one take us through what was it that
flick for you and said I want to start
you know making early stage investment
sore I’m sure now you might be more of a
VC relative to some of the angels out
there even but just take us through that
mindset was the opportunity what was it
visa the other stages that turned you
off turns you on etc it’s also the
dynamics were I i sold my first company
in 1993 to a public company and I worked
for that public company for a couple of
years a memory I’m era data array and
while I was working for that company I
took most of the money that I’ve made
and invested it in start-up so this is
94 to 96 i made about 40 investments in
that three-year period it was a very
good time to be an angel investor
because it was the beginning of the rise
of the commercial internet and some of
the companies that i invested in
wer were big high flyers and net genesis
and critical path or two that a lot of
people in the internet we may remember
as an early investor in harmonics which
were the guys that created that our hero
and subsequently rock band for me I was
relatively young I was 28 when I sold my
first company I didn’t really know what
I wanted to do next whether it was start
a company and be CEO of a company or be
involved in a bunch of companies and so
I used this investing as a way to get
involved in a bunch of startups while I
was working for a Marid ADA in a senior
role and when i left the marrow data I
just continued this investing dynamic
and as part of that I helped start some
of the company so I looked like a
founding investor or chairman or
whatever you want to call it in a
handful of them I really love the early
stages of a company and to this day I
still love the early stages of a company
so I’ve never viewed myself as an
investor where I’m simply trying to
invest in the companies but rather I
viewed myself as somebody who engages
very very deeply with entrepreneurs in
an investor role often at very early
stages of the company’s life I also get
to a place where as the companies become
mature businesses I become less
interested my the things that turn me on
them I’m a good board member of a larger
company but it’s not as satisfying to me
and in a lot of ways it’s not really
playing to my own strengths and so I’ve
been thoughtful about that as it’s
evolved over time what’s your
recommendation should an entrepreneur go
out and seek investment from the get-go
or is it you need to first even
determine if your venture is I think it
totally depends on the entrepreneur and
the dynamics and desires of the
entrepreneur my personal philosophy is
you should make as much progress with as
little money as you need is possible to
get to the next level that doesn’t mean
zero that means as little as you think
you need and the neat thing is you get
to define all the parameters you get to
define how much you need you get to
define what progress is right i mean
that’s that’s for the entrepreneur to do
i think the mistake a lot of
entrepreneurs make is this idea i have
to raise this money to go make this
progress and that’s never true i mean my
first company was started with 10 bucks
there are many many examples of
companies that were bootstrap businesses
that didn’t ever raise any money what
did you spend the 10 bucks
the URL no no we had last week we had 10
shares of stock so I got six my partner
got three and my dad got one I mean we
needed a little bit you know you we
could have done a dollar and done 10
sets 30 sets and 60 sets right we just
need a mechanism for sharing the stock
but but that’s that’s the the struggle
of entrepreneurs getting confused about
what’s important and recognizing that
the more progress you make the easier it
is to raise money and frankly the more
the company you keep all right we’re
going to take a short break we’re
talking to Brad Feld we’re going to come
back and ask them what are some of the
more successful entrepreneurs share in
terms of traits and what are some of the
more unsuccessful entrepreneur shows
traits and whatnot we’ll be right back
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