So the first question is a rather provocative question about harsh realities. And the question
really is, what do you think the average investor or the person raising capital would, what very
surprising perspective that you would share with the audience? So I guess we have a lot of sponsors
and they're pitching private deals and we also have investors. What's the harshest reality you can
think of that people find surprising and valuable? Go ahead, don't kiss ass.
Dan,
we should really have just a panel because for Dan, he's really cool. But yeah, there you go.
Well, you heard it. Okay, we'll start maybe with Mark. So the harshest reality is what I said
before. The vast number of companies, no matter how excited the entrepreneur is,
will fail. When I say fail, that doesn't mean the company will fail. It means the investment will
fail.
uh so we have to find entrepreneurs that know how to change know how to pivot before they run out
of money not after they run out of money and that's probably the harshest reality is they have to
understand our perspective and portfolio i'll get a sale in a minute but uh can you elaborate dan
on on the uh don't kiss ass uh this investors want to make money and they're greedy generally and
that's what you should probably appeal to but when you're as an investor when There's a way you
approach them and just believe in yourself and fight for yourself. Don't let people belittle you
and you're over there begging. If you have a good business and you can run it, it'll come through.
It's so difficult, but it's also one of the greatest skills to really master is to say no to
yourself. Because especially if, I mean, I'm a Lego kid, right? I'm a builder. I constantly find
myself in a position where my vision and ambition far exceeds my own operational capacity.
And I'm constantly having to restrict myself from going down paths that I would love to go down and
actually do have proper value, but maybe two or three years down the line where there are certain
pieces of infrastructure that um that i can build in the meantime um it's so it's it's very very
very difficult to find an opportunity that you really find valuable and then to say okay i'm the
person that's going to miss uh problems with this the most can i get someone else to kind of check
me on that Just kind of admitting that to yourself. I mean, they say on the 12 steps,
right, the first step is to admit that you have a problem. Just admitting you have the problem
could sometimes be the biggest step.
Yeah, I'll second that. I mean, it really takes a village, and there have been a lot of...
comments in other panels about mentorship, about developing relationships, about having a deep
bench of people that you trust that you can rely on. And I think also just be a risk taker and
think outside the box. Be a critical thinker with it. It's a measured risk always,
but you're de-risking it by applying your mental models, your critical thinking,
and then running it past people that you trust. You're de-risking it. So most people,
firstly, they don't even show up. So they're not in rooms like this. And then those that do show
up, unfortunately, there will be some even in this room who just kind of go about their day. It's
like, oh, conference is fun. Yeah, yeah. But those of you who are really engaged and you're working
it and you're thinking about everything and the content and the connections, you can't help but
have something come out of it. And I've been involved in this group for many years. many years, and
there hasn't been an event that I've come to that didn't result in something, whether it was a
connection, it was a deal, but just be a go-getter.
And I love this energy from Alexandra. Every time I see you, it's like, I want to hear what she has
to say. It's always a positive, but also very realistic. Jeff. Yeah, so I think the reality is that
most of the deals that we look at as a family office are great. they all look spectacular so how do
you differentiate yourself from every single deal that looks so great and i think the key is to
understand your audience understand what they're looking for and not every investor is the same so
for instance impact is huge for us right so not only do we want obviously the highest return in the
shortest amount of time with the least amount of risk but what exactly is the greatest impact that
we're going to have globally right and so know your audience and speak to your audience and it's
also the harsh reality is that you have it's about relationships right so we invest with whom we
trust and who we respect and who we know are going to have the greatest positive impact globally
right but who are also going to be able to deliver and have a track record of delivery so I think
those are some of the key points Hi, I'm Richard C. Wilson. Our community has closed over $1
billion of transactions. We have over 16 million registered members across 100 plus LinkedIn
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