my family beyond with things way. Remember, just because you're doing a lot more doesn't mean you're getting a lot more done. Don't confuse movement with Progress. Way living, a paradoxical time where we have more comfort but less peace, more connectivity, less connection, more information, less wisdom. The purpose of this podcast is to explore these natural tensions with independent voices. Who will push our thinking tha This is the paradox. Podcast. Getting enough. You know I'm not good at it. You can learn quite a lot from experience. That's one thing.

Something after that have the will and determination to do anything about it. Everyone welcome to another episode of the paradox podcast. I'm your host, Kyle Tibbits for episode number nine. I chatted with Jeff Morris Jr. Full time Angel investor and the founder of Chapter One, who's invested in companies like Lift, Lambda School, Superhuman Roman Cameo Branch Metro's Jeff and I had a wide ranging conversation about the impact this global pandemic is having on millions of lives types of new companies and products that might be built to address the new challenges that we face and what investing in a post Kobe 19 future meant look like We also talked about career related path, dependence and times of rising uncertainty, theon, bundling and distribution of talent outside of Silicon Valley and the importance of family prior to becoming a full time investor. Jeff was previously the VP, a product of Tender. In that role, he led the revenue team to the number one top grossing app in the APP store and directed one of the top grossing products in medical history.

Jeff is a super talented investor, an operator, and I found the conversation super insightful. I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Jeff Morris Jr. Well, thanks, Jeff, for joining me on the paradox podcasts. Obviously, we're recording this from our respective Corona virus bunkers, so this is not the typical recording situation, and it's kind of hard Thio ignore what's going on around us for the global pandemic. How are you doing Just on a personal level right now?

Yeah, I'm incredibly sad for the world right now. And you, you read that the unemployment rates increase every day. The jobless claims, and it's depressing on so many levels. And then then you can zoom in to your own life and you know, person. I'm spending a lot of time with my family, which is, um, actually really amazing in so many ways. Getting through, uh, a stressful, traumatic time with my parents, my brothers,

my sisters, and we're all under one roof right now, which is really something that I haven't done since I think I was in high school. And, uh, there's a strange kind of family support system that I have here, which is bring me comfort. And we're making a lot of memories getting through this, the other, which is unique.

Yeah, and it's it's interesting because the podcast is called the Paradox podcast. There's so many paradoxes happening right now. I think the first that you mentioned is I mean, I can't imagine when I'll have, you know, weeks on end to spend directly with my family. I think this is sort of ah, strange thing that we'll all look back on and really on some level, appreciate kind of the moment for what it was, and also just be in off what an awful and destructive time period. It was at the same time, and I think another sort of paradox to that. I've been thinking about a lot is this notion of, like, I really felt more connected to my neighbors in my community, probably in the last two or three weeks,

then ever before on one level, like we're spending less time together because we're all separated. We're social distancing, were doing all these things to keep each other and the community safe. But folks, we're going around dropping cookies off at each other's doors. They're doing all kinds of things to pull together while being apart. That's kind of been an interesting, an interesting contrast as well.

Yeah, it's interesting because you can't go outside and shake their hand, but it's brought you closer together. I think on a global scale, like I've never seen like the world come together to try and defeat one thing together like this in my lifetime. I hope I don't see it again. I have a tough time finding examples in history of where we're all trying to fight this this thing together. So it's it's a unique time, and I'm sure it's hard to appreciate these moments when they're having a mother in real time. But I'm sure we'll look back on. This is being one of the craziest moments of all of our lives, and something will tell her grandkids about

most definitely. Yeah, I think with distance and perspective in the future, we'll have a whole different outlook on it as a full time angel investor through your fun Chapter one. Obviously, you're having a lot of conversations with founders in your portfolio, helping them navigate a turbulent, to be honest, totally unprecedented time period. I think we both remember 2008 on some level. I obviously wasn't up here in Silicon Valley for the crash in the early two thousands. I don't remember that part from this sort of a conceptual understanding of it, but this is truly unprecedented. I think a lot of the playbook for what you do is somewhat out the window. But talk to me about some of those conversations you're having and how founders we're feeling right now as they deal with just tremendous levels of uncertainty above and beyond. Within normally, what is a founder, which is already a high level of uncertainty?

Yeah, so last week I sent all the owners have invested in the movies seem like for the next 60 days I'm completely at your service for whatever you need me for, and that's probably a dozen phone calls. I think it really depends on the stage you're investing in Soo. For me being an early stage invest here. Most of the companies investing are still pretty small, especially through I just started a point through a new fund. Those were all like Lesson 10 people teams. And so there's not a lot of a lot of room to do play house or, luckily, not a lot of really dramatic shifts eating to make. And then you talk to some poor little me to who their businesses is doing really well in this brain, which is interesting. So you two examples are DEECEE companies. Once misfits market, deliver produce and vegetables to homes on another's public goods sell things like toilet paper and shampoo and body soap vitamins. So those companies kind of the the essentials categories are doing quite well at very much structure of my portfolio.

Rahm kind of seven that the sins Air Masses hierarchy of needs opinion on the coming of the day, but really structured around core human needs. And that's been one of my focus is today so lightly. Nothing too dramatic happening. Do you think you know there are a couple of companies have invested in that have some sports element to them. They're either licensing my software to one's a lesson. See them? They're called possible teams. Another one is like a live sports H Q for trivia type of, and those obviously don't have. Like in the case of the content coming, they just don't have the content to create right now adjustments being made in real time. But I think that tougher conversations air probably happening more of the growth stage and become used to raise money at high evaluations, where the public cops are maybe 50% less than they were two weeks ago and 70 those companies are having. Thio, especially the ones who think about thunder, is having to make really hard decisions right now about possibly raising down rounds. But I think I'd be a lot more stress is an investor. I was maybe a gross stage investor.

Yes, certainly. I think that makes a lot of sense just given the magnitude of the challenge is those larger companies are facing, I think, for the smaller companies we know that a lot of great companies get built in downturns, and I think this actually feels more than just like a downturn, and we don't know how long it's gonna last. We don't know whether the reception will be kind of V shaped or something that's more prolonged or even something of greater magnitude than 2008. I think all those options are on the table, but regardless this feels very much like a paradigm shift in the sense that a lot of the trends that have already been maybe talking about our getting accelerated by this obviously remote work is one we have, like a forced experiment where tons of people are now doing it, albeit under less than ideal conditions. So I don't think it's really a fair experience of what remote work truly is like outside of that, I think your parents that air home, schooling their kids for the first time in realizing Wow, this is really quite challenging, especially when the technology layer is not set up and and I think one other thought too that I throw out there is that people of bash social media for being sort of a non event from an innovation standpoint,

I think the famous Founder's fund quotas were promised flying cars, and we got 100 and 40 characters. I think the thing that I've noticed, especially using Twitter as a primary source for news on Corona virus through an apology, and other folks that have been great citizen journalism is imagine going through this without those things. Imagine no Internet. Imagine no Twitter. Imagine no Amazon. This would be way worse in a sense that we weren't able to communicate and process thes

collectively. Yeah, I think you know, uh, world likes thio find fault in in the tech industry and much of it is a good times. But in this moment, you can't argue that like the citizen journalism that you saw from biology and a few others and industry is quite remarkable, even the precautions that people took. I add a meeting that interesting HORWITZ a month ago where I wasn't allowed to shake hands with anybody, and I remember how and how at the time you wonder if people are reacting when, like, that was the right response when you saw we saw this happening and trying myself was in Japan a couple weeks ago, Kind of as as it was, certainly break out. I mean, you don't believe that that these things can happen to your friends there, You know,

frankly, in the in the United States, because there's something about being in America Think that you feel like these things just can't happen to you because we're smarter, more sophisticated. But in the case of the neck and a virus, we were completely underprepared. And it's I am proud of the techniques. Recall what we've done Thio A. Okay, be give people fair warning Whether that that was received with the level of seriousness deserve is you know,

I think there's a real great points in terms of our response and being caught off guard. If you compare us to, say, culture like Japan, where I think something like 80% of folks are right mass on a regular basis, it's sort of in their cultural d n a r. Sort of set up to fight something like this more naturally than us. I think if you look at our response, it was definitely slow. Certainly at the governmental level, I think there's tons of historical ties. If you look at World War Two, we were just very slow to get involved. We had, like, a super outdated arsenal to fight an enemy like that, and it took us a while to ramp up.

But then when we ramped up, we did. I think we sort of had this false sense of security like, Oh, we're oceans apart from Japan and Germany and Italy then And I think that same post war mentality still is a factor in terms of how we view ourselves and American exceptionalism and maybe taking that a step too far and thinking that, you know, this isn't gonna come to our shores when, of course, we're a global, interconnected world, and a virus can easily enter our country through any number of airports, borders, etcetera. So I think it's been a humbling experience for all of us to realize that we're just not nearly as infallible as we as we may think, switching gears a little bit when I go into a little bit of your backstory in your background, Can you share a story from your childhood that strongly influenced who you are today?

Yes, so runabout, says the high school student, who just didn't really know what I want to do with my life. And I went thio academically rigorous high school. I was probably like middle of the pack in terms of GP and performance, But there was one teacher this getting Dr Chandler. It was like this future who I run a book called The Catcher in the Rye, which everybody knows. And I wrote a paper kind of in the voice of Holden Caulfield applied to my experience going toe high school dance and the terror. I felt going to pick up my girlfriend shaking her dad's hand, he came back after train. The difference is you're right and I said, What do you mean? He said, You're right. I think you're You could do this professionally and no,

never no teacher. Nobody would be to be so unkind above me. And I've actually never taken that little of interest in me. And it really didn't form kind of my early career path. I going to, you see, Like I said in English, you know, for a long time I thought I was gonna be a screenwriter, made money college reading scripts for production studios in Hollywood than 50 $50 to be the script and write story notes. But what that really Robin is, I felt, and I still feel a pretty creative person. And without that moment where somebody took an interest in me on kind of recognize this this type of activity, it had recognized, maybe I'd be you know,

I don't know. Maybe I could be like a real estate agent or something. I have no idea. What would I be doing? But it definitely would not be anything at all creative and so applied, like my life. Now I think my brothers and only investor is to find hidden talents and people of the fine hidden gems and people who are on the brink of becoming offering Ares. And maybe they have an idea in the back. There is it that still needs to pull out of them. And so I really enjoyed that really early stage Dollar, who's pre product probably is working at a large coming in, has something on the back of his head, says, like actually, just don't want to work for anybody like I want to go down thing and so costly trying to find those people, and I think without that early experiences of being told you're good at something like I won't be ableto do that. Other people.

Yeah, it sounds like that was a seminal moment in your life of this teacher pulling you aside and not just saying like, hey, you have talented like you could actually pursue this as a profession. It's so interesting to think about the path dependence. Had that not happened, what path might you have gone down? And obviously you're pointing out some of the parallels between writing and looking for undervalued talent, kind of in the Hollywood sense with investing. And I'm sure it's fascinating to think about the fact that had that not happened, Yeah, you could be any number of things differently right now.

Yeah, I love that path dependency about process because it's very top over it now, when I grabbed it, I don't want a film school at USC after you steal. I didn't take a break after underground and graduated in the last financial crisis, and there just wasn't a single job in the entertainment industry. That was like I applied for everything. I just graduated from the most the hardest to get into that they program until and literally nobody would meet with me. And it wasn't a structure sealing. I could not get a job. And so I ended up moving back to San Francisco after going through a break up of the girlfriend. I was like, I'm out of here and moved in with my parents when I was 25 ended up just like firing climb. I went a tech job, but I think right now people will be going through similar forks in the road where there industry, you're clear, policy new.

It is no longer available. So being really, really aggressive in this temper that's coming up as to what you want to do and making it really hard life decisions, I think, is gonna be necessary for a lot of people to survive. And that's probably already happening right now. Yeah,

it's It's such a great perspective that you're offering because I can't even look back in my own life like 4009. I dropped out of Berkeley temporarily, so I did. The opposite thing is you. I'm from Southern California, came up, came up to Northern California, go to college kind of like clamor my way and attack as well through a series of things. I want to get back to that with you as well, because I think that's relevant here. But, yeah, it started a company. It was really, really hard. It was. It was not even a traditional start.

I was really doing Internet marketing for small, medium sized businesses, right as the economy was collapsing and they had no money to do it. And so I tried to pivot into a real startup to do software, and I was funding at a lot of my savings account. It was it was a disaster, but it was actually amazing learning experience. And I often think, had I not gone through sort of that trial by fire, that learning experience. That's why I started learning, marketing and online marketing and all of that. Yeah, it felt kind of awful in the moment. But in retrospect, it was one of the best things ever,

and I heard in a conversation with you and David Perella that the first started the job you took with actual in Kansas City. It wasn't even in Silicon Valley, Even though you're from Silicon Valley. Sounds like you're back in Silicon Valley at your parent's house, and you ended up on a on a one way flight to Kansas City. Can you talk a little bit about speaking of path dependence, how you ended up in the Midwest to start your tech career,

So I, uh what Baxter just going? I was applying to all these companies and has, um I guess you could say bad luck or maybe worked on as it was meant to be, but I applied to be one. The 1st 15 employees, an uber. I rented a desk space of this place for the rocket space, which was probably the original. We work in Francisco, and I sat next to the early uber team, had the table next to me, and I applied to join their team, made like a 50 page jack, and they want interview me, applied to Twitter where my brother in law works. I think I would have been like a top 100 er 1 15 point there.

Didn't get that on a planet. Airbnb is like a top 50. Employees didn't get that. And so I was kind of like shit. I found a lot of good cos I wish I was in a mess back

then. But you clearly an act for identifying good cos early. That was a good sign.

That was a special time period to I would say there was more white space. But then I went to South Southwest and that this team from a company called bizarrely, which would just raise, like, a $1,000,000 a day before a a certain weekend, away from the folks that cashing picture and other people It was just a really exciting idea. I follow the hiring manager on Twitter. He posted a job. I was a first person applying to AM got on the fourth of next day. They hired me to a two month contract, depending on me moving to Kansas City within 24 hours. And I just said, you know, fuck it, I'm gonna go do this, at least hold the Yuma Tech industry, and then I can kind of figure it out from there and ended up staying there for about 3/3 years.

But that was that was my God. It wasn't. It wasn't glamorous, Adam, with the Kansas City Thio break an attack, and I think it's easy to like, See people on Twitter and think they're different from you with a It was like the pop was, like, much more obvious. But for me, it was like the police. Obvious path. Thio Getting where now?

Yeah, the past are all non linear. On some level, I think some are more non linear than others. But I think it's important. Remember that when you see folks that look like they just overnight figured out how to do all this stuff, they may have spent some time in Kansas City in an office in Berkeley spending all of their savings as I did. What

do you think? Kansas City, When I've built consumer products, I always think about people in Kansas City, and I never think about people in terms is go and having lived there after growing up in the area. That was my perspective that I got from there, which which has stopped with me. It's just like do not build products for people in terms is go. That's like the death of consumer. This'd be for consumer people in SAS like of course, Bill pursued another great lesson that I think about that all the time.

Were there any other lessons? Whether we're spending time in Kansas City for the first started to work for coming to L. A. Working with tender for a long period of time? Were there any other lessons beyond just hey, don't myopically focused on this very narrow group of people that are affluent in a big city that you know, might want to dio uber for X, y or Z and pay exorbitant amounts of money for some premium service. Were there any other lessons beyond sort of who you build for that you pulled from just those experiences being outside of kind of the core of Silicon Valley?

Good lesson at at that 1st 1 was more of a marketplace. Last thing, which was when you launch a marketplace, make sure you have supply side figured out because the man demand will be short lived if you don't have supply. And so, in the case of of Charlie, we had, I think 40,000 requests and like our first month or something like that, we had 8% completion rate on requests on the market place. It was a similar to the task rabbit. It was a kind of a name your price, and people will do something for you to the marketplace. It's another visit, really great marketplace lesson, which I always women investing and need. Marketplace founders always thinking about supply side and really challenging their assumptions on supplies. That acquisition because, I think demand it's pretty. Obviously, you need demand that that should not get a starting point for your marketplace in most situations.

Totally your backgrounds, obviously in product what are wanted to really, really big lessons that you learned from a product perspective a tender, for example, that really just sort of stay in your brain. And when you talk to other founders, you're investing other companies. You always look kind of through this lens in terms of how to think about

products. Yeah, the biggest thing contender. A lot of people ask me for advice, some monetization, just like you have to pick the right categories so that a category that you know what that is really what matters in terms of modernization, dating happens to be a category that people monetize sins. Really. The late 18 hundreds, which was when people start taking out ads in newspapers to promote themselves we'll see these remains were paying what would not be $5 to take out newspaper as that describe themselves and then all the way up to not dot com. And okay, keep it and so many examples of people who have built subscription products in dating, which is a fantastic This is model when you have scale. And so that's the biggest thing is just making sure the category has enough willingness to pay on the on the consumer side. In that year, you're really building something that serious, one of those core given needs,

whether it's you homes, our food or love. Those are the categories. I really like war and so within social, especially within consumer. What's really tempted to say, You know, we'll get to scale and figure out how to market as users, and I think that's very to me, a very outdated way of thinking. You've been in consumer sofa. Let's just I kind of cringe when I get those pictures because I just know the sooner you think about monetization and have self awareness about your customers want Issa paid. You won't fall in this situation. One or two years in the building where you just realize your product won't work unless you have this he learned on and network on top of it, which is very hard to do so right on the product, said.

I love being close Thio revenue, and I would say that any person building product, whether it's a product of VP of products or even people who were working in marketing er our sales like having a scoreboard is so valuable to show you're impacting well. I was first getting the marketing. I was dream or more like content, marketing and community building. And what wish frustrate me was I didn't have a score. Berlin, when I kind of moved over to doing more head acquisition, was like, This is really fun because I had some budget to spend and I have a very clear follow that I can I can optimize it then they have really reviews like it's pretty clear how New Network uh, instead of just being close around New 10 year after one kind of early stages of modernization and pre Akio and was able to be part of a team that was doing over over a $1,000,000,000 of revenue per year with the help you kerf mark ins and so being close to rub new for me is really impact. It just want to be able to drive. DR is

completely, and I think your advice is sort of interconnected. In a sense, if you're choosing where to build a company, you want to pick a category that is meaningful enough that you can capture revenue and build a durable business. In the macro sense, that kind of feels like the category piece of it. But then, when you're within a company, picking a role or a part of the team, whether it's marketing our product that is closer to revenue is great. Because yet, like you said, you're going to feel the impact a lot more. I think one thing over the last 10 years of doing marketing is I as well, kind of started off doing marketing that was probably less tied to revenue outcomes, or you couldn't score yourself a closely in terms of just actual customer transactions and becoming more conversant a little bit on the finance side and just understanding how directly your efforts are attributing the bottom line of the business.

It's office just helpful in general because it's easier to quantify your impact. But I think it's more rewarding, too, because you feel like, Okay, I'm I'm helping build a real business. I'm not just driving, you know, theoretical brand aware and asked me when the product side driving engagement that doesn't lead to sort of revenue outcomes of any kind. And and so I think especially given seasonally, where we're moving as an industry where we've been moving for a long time after this really long expansionary period. But low interest rates and people could get away with doing growth, growth, growth, growth and not caring so much about building real business. It feels like your advice and your insights that are gonna become more relevant over the next 2345 years than ever before.

Yeah, I was just going to say, like, right now in 2020 where we are and in the world, make sure that you have a scoreboard, because if you don't it's going to be hard to justify your impact. And just knowing that you I can show your company your output after gets even more boring, huh? Yep,

switching gears a little bit to becoming an investor. When did you know that you wanted to become an investor? And were there any particular investors along the way that strongly influenced your thinking around becoming an investor in pursuing that direction?

Yeah, So I got into it casually, like a lot of other operators Assassin me pitching the product when I was at a company. And I like the product so much that I not only tried to bring my company but else have got on the cap table, and that was in 2013 and I really didn't take it seriously, mostly because I didn't have the capital to think it's you're sitting them. I did a couple really small checks, cut of one angel. This became a platform and had syndicates. I was unable to grow my critical LP base to a point where I could do much larger checks and I start to become comfortable that you have been best scene, you know, 100 100 k through new paychecks. We'll see if they're sending. Dixie feels

but really

fell in love with investing through that process, ended up being a scout for index ventures at one point and then got to the point in my career where I just need to make a decision. So what I want to do, uh, raise one for a chapter one Pat over 70. Opie's A lot of them were people who you know, frankly, I love and I really want to do a good job, for it seemed like being an operator and also trying to be of an investor with a large set about peace was which is not the best decision for the and so going back to actually a month ago. I was when I when I jumped off from language school and decided to be a full time investor in this school's come. Yet I invested in personally, I did my thesis on the company. I spent a lot of time with the company before I drive a team. And so after going, it was it was tough because I love what they're doing. I love my teammates, but my heart was just really in a different place,

and that was that was tough to tell my teammates and was also, you know, it's one of those things where people are gonna ask you like what went wrong, right I wrote Bloke was about like, the truth is actually nothing wrong at all. It was literally me just having to follow my heart. And I think sometimes in life you make decisions based on optics and what people I think you should do. And soon this case, like maybe seeing the one year date would have been the best linking story. But justice that in my career that I don't really care about that self and making really tough decisions quickly is what's most dear to your team and most fair to yourself. Because we all have a live in number of years or however long it is. T do what we're doing, and you should just really value your time. So that was That was what happened recently. It was yes, it was. It was bittersweet, considerate, sinless.

Yeah, I mean, it's very, very hard to do one thing. Well, it's hard to be a great investor, and there's there's investors that spend decades just becoming very good at that. But doing two things well is impossible, and I think that there's probably period where especially you were ramping up on the investing side through doing Angela Syndicate and working it tender. It was a great way to get started as an operator angel, but you reached that point where you sort of had to choose operator or angel. You couldn't continue to mash those two things together, and so it's tough to make that leap. I'm sure, on some level, because I'm sure there's there's aspects to operating that you may be missed or there's a learning curve that you theoretically would have continued on the product side. But that would come at the clear cost at the opportunity. Costs off. Continue to climb. Learning curve around Being a great investor, which sounds like is your true passion deep down at your core?

Yeah, it'll be interesting to see agree with everything you said, the tools available to be an operator in an investor and the number of scouts in the Valley, the number of operatives you have access to capital. We've never seen anything like this, and I on a personal level R was both, especially as you manage teams, and I just don't know how house Well, I think on employees like you want to be supportive of employees calling their passions outside of working the way I was, the best thing was it was actually would not like to do when I about a gamer. I don't watch a lot of TV. I like Thio. Think about investing. But you know, there's something this important, like it's impossible to do both to the best of your ability. I just don't believe unless you're like Jack Dorsey,

D N A. And you just have, like, some superhuman ability to multitask. Yeah, I want to be toward the end very, very heavy,

but yeah, no, I can totally understand I made my first angel investment. Maybe about a month ago. In fact, they just they just kind of publically launched its company, actually in the education homeschooling space. And it's just been fun, too. Again, nights and weekends jam with them a marketing and exercise my brain in a slightly different way toward a different problem set. Like you said, I don't I don't game. I don't I don't have tons of hobbies. I go running, you know, every day,

and I have a two year old daughter, so she takes up a lot of my time, which is how it should be. But I can totally see how it's not scalable to do both on. That's just literally writing the first check. And so it will be fascinating to see how the operator Angel thing plays out, particularly in this new environment that we're in right now as we're in the middle of this health and economic crisis to some level so kind of looking ahead and again, we're incredibly uncertain situation. No one knows how the Corona virus thing is gonna play out, but in terms of themes and companies that you're excited about emerging out of this uncertainty, what are some of the things that are really top of mind that you're seeing as you're talking Thio founders that you've been thinking a lot kind of independently about that you think are going to be more relevant in the Post Cove in 19 era, which hopefully that's ah sooner than we think. But what are some of the themes that feel especially relevant now that maybe felt less relevant before?

Yeah, I think some things were happening before, but they'll just be accelerated, and I guess before I one of the things that you think que tu on a founder level will be really interesting because I think a lot of people will be building coming is to solve many of these problems because now I think there's new white space to to solve which, uh, whatever the world changes the needs of of consumers and counting his fingers. But the areas that I've focused on and I think we'll have interesting moments are obviously job markets. I think we already have three million folks in the past Internet days who've become unemployed. So what do you do with that group of people to make sure they get back to earning income sooner than later and sell? That's an interesting market. I've always been religious and just re Skilling and upscaling. So you know, the Lemba schools of the world Are there different versions of that for other verticals that will now be more necessary? I think people seem the collapse of the health care system in many areas. There's been a nursing shortage in the U. S. Or many years that they you know,

we'll continue to see marketplaces emerged to fill those gaps and then, you know, I think there's probably gonna be some level of acceleration, promote work which you talked to actually a lot of companies who in my portfolio who are feeling a lot more relaxed right now because they're physical costs are so low that they just feel like they can get through this a lot easier than that means you have were centralizing, so the remote were peace will be more interesting. I also think on a company level there might be some responsibility to offer work from home infrastructure and assesses regardless of whether run a pandemic or not, because if this happens again, companies will have to be prepared. Thio offer this type of work situation again, and so I think there's very few companies in the world that know how to do remote work very well. When I dream that this school they were not fully distributive ethic, 30% team was distributed and they the processes were insane and get all these companies who have kind of laid the foundations. I have really, really figured out how to make promote were successful and so I think we'll see that continue then. I don't know how we're gonna deal with the health care system beyond train, but it feels like like that needs to be better or missive when pandemics might happen For so many of us,

this just it was a line saying that. And so, oh, especially curious The Y c Summer 20 batch, I think will be really interesting that just accepting cos this week, I feel like I guarantee you it's gonna have ah, uh, crime embarrass inspired vintage two. Plus, I'm excited to see

Yeah, I think I've seen some interesting discussions along those lines about taking advantage, more of wearable technology to see when there's spikes and temperatures and things like that. But I think you're right that there's gonna be a whole lot of things that technology can d'oh toe warn us about pandemics early to enable us to flax into more remote postures when we need to. Personally, I've been maybe relative to say, the conventional wisdom on Twitter. I maybe have been last bullish on a remote work than some folks. I think they're still gonna be an advantage, or at least a tradeoff, culturally being co located that you can't necessarily replicate with remote work. That said, I think in a world where pandemics can happen, I think it's likely that with this particular pandemic. They talk about the second wave. So you have, like,

the first wave, which sounds like Italy's may be starting to crest there wave. I think South Korea and China is on the other side of it. We're just coming up the curve. You might need to be able to to flex and be flexible around being co located or not. And so maybe we go back to work. But maybe by the fall, because of a second wave, maybe we need to spend some time. Those of us that are in cold located companies I need actually flex back into remote work temporarily right from maybe a one month duration for that second wave. So I think having the flexibility and the tools and technology to be ableto shift and be flexible will be critical even for companies that don't go full remote, which obviously many companies will and will do so successfully. So I'm excited to see what those companies look like. A Well,

yeah, Talk, thio. Uh, well, qu'est ce que that slow ventures about this a lot. And we're kind of client Omni channel work where you have the physical store from in retail that you have an online component and being able to offer both of those in the work environment being a physical location that feels like your home, where you can go have faces, face interactions and have that experience, which is very special. Well, so like like you said, being with flex out as needed. So we have a pandemic or personally sick or whatever the situation is becoming better prepared to support you. And yeah, it feels like that's where the world is going because of health reasons, but also rising real estate costs from Tom. Where was I? The globalization of technical town like there's so many shifts you could talk about our points in this direction. They were going to get there.

Yeah, and I think the real estate points get one, too, I think even for companies that still have an interest in a co located aspect to their culture and so work. If you only need to be in the office, let's call it three out of five days a week. Maybe you only need half for 60% of the real estate that you have now, and so your burn rate contracts because you don't need all this space and start ups have open for plans anyway. It's the idea that you can just have seating that's available for these days that are much more dynamic and needs lots of collaboration. But then maybe you have 12 days a week that are just very dedicated to focus work, which I think is really advantage of remote and not being distracted. So I'm excited to see where the future goes as well. On that front, you mentioned the essay that you wrote when you were in Japan. Headline versus reality. You talked a lot about the importance of family, and I could just tell,

like in this conversation when we started off before we hit the record button, that family, something that's super super important deal. Can you just talk about what family means to you personally? And maybe just a societal level, how important you think family is as an aspect Toe life?

Yeah, I grew up at one of eight kids, and we're all very different. Some of us are different political parties. Some of us I have a different personal. It's what we all really respect each other, and we all love each other. And so for me, your family is why you go to work every day. And they're the people who know the the arc of my life and respect my decisions left the most. So, you know, I think as you mentioned, like this time period has been a moment to reconnect with our families and for me, like I was born in a different generation. But you have a child yourself, so but I really think there's nothing more rewarding than than Maybe only that's That's kind of how it from trying to start a church. My free time.

Yeah. No, I fully agree. I think you're preaching to the choir, and sometimes I feel like I was born in different generation as well, particularly in San Francisco. I'm sure L l is very similar in terms of of the culture around family. I think that the great thing about family having your own family been connected to siblings and parents, is it just like you said, It gives you a much greater sense of meaning and purpose. I think that's sort of just built in. You don't have to go find it. It's just right there and it's all around you. And especially since we had our daughter who's now, too. I think parenthood has just been a tremendous journey and a tremendous adventure. And I know you mentioned in your piece that something that you're looking forward to also pursuing and prioritizing in the future.

And I think it's just it just amazing because, yeah, this is This is now the reason why I goto work. This is the reason why do X, y and Z is for my family and this little human being that's depending on me versus just, you know, like you said, updating your Lincoln profile, which is much less important. That really doesn't matter. What's an issue that you care a lot about personally, but rarely get the chance to talk about?

I'm definitely mental health. And so I think Luckily, the public conversation has made it almost cool to talk with metal, and I love that. So I saw my first therapists when I was 20 years old and I was in college. I was so embarrassed

to tell my friends

that I was seeing a therapist. It was really for me, left me within, I think, six seconds completely changed my perspective on life and the fact that you have open conversations where people like Come on, athletes are supporting my talk on and then you have mental helping offer a zit benefit in the workplace. I think at times is as entrepreneurs and dollars. Yeah, you described how hard this is mentally and certain company is most drained up and down a venture that I think you could do professionally. And so, yeah, I'd like to talk a little more and to try and get other people to know about it, because I think for me it's been left like a mental health is now coaching

sort of synonymous at this point?

Yeah, there's different credentials and really just people sitting in a room talking to someone trying to thio, sort their lifestyle a little bit or get get some adjustments toe change their view of of their life circumstances. I would encourage every single founder Thio see a coach or a therapist on a regular basis, and it also encourage people who are married thio relationship if they if they need it, because because all the things that are so beneficial and it really changed my life.

Yeah, I agree with you that this openness and authenticity around mental health has been one of the best trends. Probably in the last, maybe 2 to 3 years. I remember sort of earlier on in my career here it fell of your in this era. It was very much around the optics. So it's How is this fundraising announcement gonna look on TechCrunch? How is it gonna look if we signal X, y or Z? And I think just acknowledging. Like you said, that building a company is one of the hardest, sometimes loneliest and certainly one of the most psychologically and emotionally grinding journeys you will ever go on. And just openly talking about it, I think, is very positive. I mean,

I think even on the employee's side, there's obviously a lot of stress too involved in building company and great athletes have great sports psychologists. There's no negative stigma on that. I think it's viewed as a weapon in their tool kit or part of their support team, and I think that for founder's operators, family members, spouses, it's the same thing. I think it's a very, very healthy thing that we moved in that direction and not to pull it all about to Corona virus. But we're going through a very intense, stressful time period that I think is probably exacerbating and really stretching people's mental health and a produce significant way. And my hope is going back to kind of really part of our conversation that folks will continue to build tools, company's products that make mental health and easier thing to deal with. I mean, certainly when I think of telemedicine,

one of the most obvious examples of telemedicine working well is speaking with a therapist or a coach or a psychologist. I mean, that's something that's very easy to d'oh with technology without having to be co located. So I think hopefully we'll see much, much, much more of that.

Yeah, maybe six months ago, I was shocked to find out that in half the ZIP codes in the US there isn't a single mental health professional in that zip code. And so speaking that telemedicine there's that infrastructure and that that software to seize its existence for a lot of people, I'm trying todo again go back in the city like trying to get people all across the country to have that little support because that we take for granted in a lot of places in the U. S. S actually don't have access to those professionals.

Yeah, but we have mental health Deserts and technology can very easily start to solve some of those problems, especially if the culture right continues to become more open around this and people feel more comfortable. You know, having those conversations and trying some of those products. The last part of the podcast and we're in the final few innings. Here are questions that I ask every guest and you can take it in any single direction that you want. There's obviously no right answer. The first is just a riff on the now famous Peter Thiel interview Question. What's something you believe that most people don't?

This is such our question. But I always believed deeply on bundling of Silicon Valley and a special talent set of probably worked with a couple 100 maybe 304 100 people from up work in my career and so many of those people in like if you lived in well, Sam, just like you, you would easily be the most horrible person, and I just fully believing the embodiment of town across across the world. And so I don't know if that's controversial, but I think those people all across the world who are just assaulted is that people who live in and scientists go, and if they just had access to now the same opportunities, I think I think I think they would be amazing employees. And so that's something I'm promoting actively and have hired for the possible.

Yeah, that makes sense. But one thing that I've talked about with a few folks is this idea that maybe the actual location of Silicon Valley and you're from the Bay Area. So maybe you have a better insight in this and me. Maybe it becomes almost like a university town. Maybe it's like a lot of the ecosystems there. A lot of the great companies were there. It's maybe you go there, you do a tour of duty and you you bounce out and go to Kansas City or something to build a great company. Do you think there's any credence to that to that potential philosophy?

I love that, Uh, now you come to Silicon Valley for three or four years, you great your network. That's core people who will be a part of your professional life forever. And you work really hard in those four years to build meaningful relationships. Then you can really go wherever you want because you have taken all the exists in New York CEO Austin, Arizona really all over. And so I think they're So if you've been doing for years living in terms, it's good you can't do anywhere else if you were gonna attack and so I would encourage everybody to spend some time assuming a successful making they can make it happen in the area. And then, you know, uh, counting other counties will want these employees are in the Bay Area to be distributed because it'll just be frankly cheaper for them. You know, the the flexibility on the floor said it's just gonna be unlike anything we've ever seen. People can leave when they when they want

to. Totally last question. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?

So this retail exec gonna Rob Johnson opened all the Apple stores. Steve Jobs hired him, and he spends a known for a long time, but he came in and give a talk at one of my last companies, and there were 40 people in the room on as he was the speaker. I think I was interviewing him and it was long story. Sure, people would ask questions and he would ask their names. And even as the talks started, everyone went around and just envious themselves really quickly. And at the end of the talk said one more thing, I mean it. I'm sure you'll likes it down in retail. And he went around the room and he named all 40 people's My Gosh. Keep in mind. He was also being asked questions. So people were,

as they were, asking him a question. You would ask them to say the name. Yeah, and he was able to know the only thing was answered, but also memorize their names. And he said, very simply, remember people's names. And so when I stopped it to meet people or shake their hand at parties, either wherever I try to remember that because it is very powerful,

it's a superpower. It's one that I lack quite frankly, but it's it's amazing if you can do it.

Yeah, I think we all like it But I think that's just extensive. Just being a very empathetic person where you can take the time to know Sal's name for you invested in that in that conversation. And I think only someone who worked in retail for 25 years of 30 years could build a superpower.

Yeah, that's awesome. Well, Jeff, thanks for joining me on the Paradox podcast. If folks particularly early stage founders want Thio reach out, what's a good way for them to get connected with you?

Yes, it's that Chapter one BC or Jame Day on Twitter is probably the best way. And I'd love to talk to anybody who's starting companies and generally speaking and try make myself available. So let me know.

Awesome. Thanks so much for joining us. And yes, folks, go follow Jeff on Twitter at Jam Jay. You will not be disappointed. He has great sweets almost every single day way. Appreciate you taking the time to join us for this episode of the Paradox podcast raining for commute length conversations with original thinkers that will push your perspective and pull you into the marketplace of ideas. If you're new to the podcast, we encourage you to check out our previous episodes. In episode number eight, I chatted with Gun Road CEO So Hill of India about his failure to build a $1,000,000,000 company escaping our ideological bubbles by engaging people We disagree with moving to Provo, Utah, from San Francisco, and we're deeply appreciating complex problems to take away some of the political stuff and use like a tech example. Yeah, it's similar to like this happen around Christmas time,

Jason Freed said. You know, if you're being asked work nights and weekends, they would basically try to make you work all the time you had. This is a crappy situation, and then this other person said, You know, people that don't work six years That's right. So hard work debate of December 20 everywhere that huge. Yeah, it's kind of funny how big it became. Actually, I guess that's what happens on holidays. No one. No one wants to talk to the family. But,

uh, it was interesting because the same thing, like they actually were not arguing. No tortilla, fundamentally different things. Someone was saying, If you want to be successful, you're gonna have to work really hard work 60 hours a week what he actually said was. Anyone that's been successful has worked six years week in their twenties, something which is probably true. Yep, also, everyone agreeing with that said founders and CEOs, or at least early employees, have equity and whatever. Sure,

building right Jesus Frieda had said nothing about them, he said. If a employer asks you to work nights, weekends, if there was more time, they would ask you to work that no equity, no ownership work. It's just fundamentally different. They're separate, mutually exclusive ideas that actually don't even necessarily conflict. But they got actually conflicted. I got turned into two narratives, and it was like there was work hard. Yeah, 60 hour weeks side. And then there's that,

you know, 40 hours or less or anything else is evil. But actually no one, in my opinion, it was basically a bar fight, but no one was fighting. It was just like everyone agreeing over here and everyone agreeing over here and this, like tension, existing. Yeah, and I just see that all the time. It's kind of the same thing. I feel like they're people think there's a fight happening. Sure, I don't know the answer to this. I was thinking about writing an essay at some point call.

How did disagree on the Internet or software people for people who disagree, and I literally couldn't figure it out. That's a hard challenge. A Quick Housekeeping note. We just launched a new Web site for the podcast at Paradox podcast dot Co, which will have all episodes and everything you need to know about the podcast. If you enter email address and subscribe, you'll get new episode sent directly to your inbox 1 to 2 days early, and you can always drop us a line on the contact form. We read every single message and really value constructive feedback. That's a wrap for this episode of the paradox Podcasts. If you'd like to connect, you can follow me on Twitter at Kyle to bits. If you enjoyed the episode, please rate of us and iTunes to spread the word until next time.