We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Seth Levine a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Seth, appreciate you joining us today. Do you take vacations? Why or why not?
TL;DR – YES! And you should too.
Longer answer: By “vacation” I’m referring to actually taking time off. Like email off, phone shut off, off-line, totally out vacation. Everyone can do this, but so many people believe that they simply have too much going on really get off-line so they take these half-hearted vacations where they work a few hours a day. That’s an easy workday, but it’s not vacation. You can and should do better. I’ve even gone so far, on some of my vacations, as to leave an OOO on that says I’m archiving all incoming email and to write me back when I return (and I really do this – I set up a filter on my email to archive everything that comes in). That’s an extreme example, but maybe not. Maybe everyone should be able to do this. And one great side-benefit of taking time truly offline is that you’ll quickly get to see what in your organization is bottlenecked through you (perhaps some decisions that should be made by your team but get gummed up when you’re not there). And, in some cases, decisions that you would have preferred waited for your return but got made anyway. Either way you’ll have more data. And, much more importantly, you’ll have taken a real vacation!
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?
I’ve been a venture capitalist for over 20 years. First at a Bay-Area based firm (I was here in their CO office) and then as a founder of Foundry, a Boulder-based venture firm that invests in both companies and other venture funds. We manage about $3.5Bn now and have grown to 6 partners and 8 members of our investment team. Along the way my partners and I have helped get Techstars off the ground, been advocates for Colorado businesses and organizations (Startup Colorado, Energize Colorado, Denver and Boulder Startup Weeks, StartupWeekend, etc). I also founded Pledge 1%, an international organization that encourages businesses to give back to their local communities through gifts of equity, time, profit, and product (we have nearly 20,000 members around the globe and have seen billions of dollars of value go back to communities and community organizations). I also advise venture funds around the world, especially in Africa and the Middle East. Last year I wrote a book about the increasingly diverse future of entrepreneurship called The New Builders. I hope you’ll check that out!
Has your business ever had a near-death moment? Would you mind sharing the story?
One of the stories of the founding of Foundry that often gets missed is just how hard it was back in 2007 to raise an early-stage venture fund in Colorado. We’ve been fortunate to have seen a lot of success since our founding, but in truth, Foundry nearly didn’t get off the ground. For me that was a pivotal experience, especially since I had staked our life savings to help start the firm (the costs of starting a venture firm – especially then – were not trivial with all the legal and travel involved with trying to raise a fund). We started raising our first fund in late January 2007 and by May it looked like it wasn’t going to come together. We had very few investors who agreed to back us and a lengthy list of those that had turned us down. I actually remember starting to think about what kind of job I might be qualified for (not to mention how I’d build back up the money I had lost our family). Fortunately, a very large investor (UTIMCO – the University of Texas pension plan) agreed to fund 20% of our first fund in June of that year and the rest, as they say, is history.
We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.
My partner Brad Feld has been a pivotal influence on my career and my life. I was lucky to have met him, but it almost didn’t happen. In mid-2001 I was wrapping up a corporate job managing a group of businesses that I was in the process of selling for my parent company. Knowing that my job would end with the sale of the last piece of the business (and not wanting to stay on in the role the company I worked for was offering me), I decided to start networking for something new and different. Venture seemed interesting to me and I set about trying to meet the (relatively small number of) people in venture in Colorado. Of course, the top of that list of Brad. But how to get to him and convince him to take a meeting. This was 2001 – they very end of the go-go days of the internet bubble. It was hard to get anyone’s attention! I tried probably 5 different ways to get to meet Brad and was finally brokered an introduction by a lawyer that I was close to, who was also close to Brad. Brad’s assistant wrote back to tell me he was open to meeting… in 3 months. So 3 months later I made the trek up to Superior (the Softbank office was above Old Chicago’s at the time). Unsure of what to wear to meet the famously casual Feld (this was a job interview, sort of, right?) I ended up in a button down and slacks (amusing to me, even now!). To make it exta awkward, the conference room where we met had a large, wooden throne, which guests were asked to sit in. I can’t imagine a more amusing scene – Brad in jeans and a tee shirt. Me in my business casual. Sitting across from each other, me on the throne. It’s amazing If you had told me then, that we’d have a 21 year partnership and that he would become one of the most important people in my life and among my closest friends, I certainly wouldn’t have believed you!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.sethlevine.com
- Twitter: @sether
- Other: www.thewnewbuilders.com
Suggest a Story: CanvasRebel is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.