Ruchi Sanghvi: My Job Interview with Mark Zuckerberg; Deep Dive on DAOs | 20VC #895

1. 0:00 – 1:53

   What was it like working at Facebook and Dropbox?

   1. RSRuchi Sanghvi0:00

      (beeping) Three, two, one, zero. You have now arrived at your destination.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings0:09

      Ruchi, I'm so excited for this one. I heard so many great things from Avatar and from many other people before, so thank you so much for joining me today.

   3. RSRuchi Sanghvi0:18

      It's great to be on the show, Hari. I've been a fan, and in the last couple of weeks alone, of the 3,000 episodes that you've done, I think I maybe heard four or five. (laughs)

   4. HSHarry Stebbings0:28

      I mean, that is fantastic. Uh, and you have many more that you can listen to if you have-

   5. RSRuchi Sanghvi0:32

      (laughs)

   6. HSHarry Stebbings0:32

      ... some free time. Uh, I do wanna start though, pre-South Park days, and, you know, this is very unusual. Normally, we start with, you know, how you made your way into investing, but you have such a fascinating background, I wanted to kind of decouple it a little bit. So you were the first female engineer at Facebook and the first female exec at Dropbox. What was that like, first? Let's start there.

   7. RSRuchi Sanghvi0:52

      (clears throat) You know, I joined Facebook right out of college. I was optimistic, raring to go, working 24/7. I didn't really understand the concept of a ceiling. Everything was possible, and I wasn't afraid of anything, let alone being the only female engineer. Um, at Dropbox, I was a grownup who was hired to scale the company. So if you recall the world from Pulp Fiction, you know, he was the fixer. And that was my role at Dropbox. I managed functions like recruiting or marketing that didn't really have leaders. I created or built new teams like communication and international, and eventually hired people to run these functions who were experts. So the goal really was to work myself out of a job. Um, so the roles were quite different. Um, in one role, I was a kid. Um, you know, the, the individual contributor. Um, and in the other role, I was the manager who was brought in to manage all the kids.

   8. HSHarry Stebbings1:49

      Can I... Sorry. (laughs) Uh, one thing you learn is that I never stick to schedule.

2. 1:53 – 2:34

   Was it difficult to make the transition?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings1:53

      Was it difficult to make that transition? I've had to. It's not been easy. Was it difficult to make that transition?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi2:01

      It was extremely difficult, um, to make the transition. You really have to pull, um, on a different set of skills. But the key, when you come into an environment that has already been built, um, and that has, you know, a core culture to it, the key really is to listen and understand and internalize before going in and bringing the lessons you've learned or, you know, bringing your success m- rubric to the organization, but to really adapt to the organization's culture.

3. 2:34 – 4:48

   What were your takeaways from FB and Dropbox?

   1. RSRuchi Sanghvi2:34

   2. HSHarry Stebbings2:34

      So if we look at the two, we've got Facebook and Dropbox, obviously, two very iconic companies. Uh, if you were to i- (laughs) Again, this is so hard on me, but like, if you were to isolate one or two takeaways from each-

   3. RSRuchi Sanghvi2:45

      Mm-hmm.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings2:45

      ... what would they be, and how did they shape your mindset?

   5. RSRuchi Sanghvi2:51

      So one of the core values at Facebook in the early days, which gained some notoriety, was move fast and break things. Are you familiar with that one?

   6. HSHarry Stebbings3:02

      Of course. Absolutely.

   7. RSRuchi Sanghvi3:04

      Yeah. And, and you know, when you think about Facebook's product back in the day, it was about building a network. The product was only as valuable, um, to the user if the user's network was present, um, on Facebook itself. So the key was to really build a network as fast as possible, hence the value move fast and break things. At Dropbox, on the flip side, the, uh, one of the core early values was sweat the details. And at Dropbox, we emphasize quality above all else, even speed. And the two values were diametrically opposite, but when you think about it, you know, you use Dropbox to store your most valuable and precious things. So if your data's corrupted or it doesn't work on some random version of iOS, you're, you're shocked. You, you, you start losing faith and trust in the product. Hence quality above all else, including speed, um, was really important. And when I first arrived at Dropbox, I was really frustrated. I was like, "Why can't we move faster? Why can't we experiment more? Why can't we build more products? Why can't we launch things faster?" But, you know, after sitting at Dropbox, and like I said, absorbing the culture, understanding their values, understanding the product, h- that's when I realized that the same set of values didn't actually apply to Dropbox. Um, and, and when I think about it in, uh, today, what I realized is that, you know, you, there is no silver bullet for success. And everything that you've learned only matters in context. So it's really important to think about things from first principles and build your arguments ground up.

4. 4:48 – 8:47

   How did you start South Park Commons?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings4:48

      Totally agree with you, and uh, (laughs) I also see the challenge in terms of them being diametrically opposed. I do wanna ask, kind of as the next step beyond that, you know, obviously, now we're at South Park and what an incredible journey that's been. But when I spoke to many of your friends, they told me that you didn't want to start (laughs) a fund, but obviously now run one. How did that happen?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi5:07

      When I left Dropbox, I was itching to start my new thing. Um, work was my identity, as is with many folks in the tech industry. It was a really tough time for me. I was sitting on my couch. All my friends, including my husband, were going to solve the world's most important problems or perceived most impro- uh, perceived most important problems. But I really wanted to stay disciplined. I wanted to create the space and the time to think about what I wanted to work on next. So to help myself do that, I created a learning group, and they were all people like me, folks who had either worked, um, in technology, in startups early in their careers, or had like, you know, started companies and sold companies like Meraki. Um, and, and I had three requirements. They had to be technical, they had to be unemployed, and they had to be willing to commit 20 hours a week to this learning group.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings5:59

      Yeah.

   4. RSRuchi Sanghvi6:00

      ... and the idea was that we would study a topic at a time. So in 2015, we were studying AI when there were only 20 papers published then. Ironically, there are 20 papers (laughs) published day-to-day in AI. We would read these papers. We would play around with open source software. We would conclude the month with a very robust discussion on what we had learned, where we see the field going in the next two years, in the next five years, in the next 10 years. And in this way, we visited multiple topics that were on the fringes of tech and didn't have markets developed yet. Another example was the market for space. Um, one of the co-founders of Planet Labs was a member of the group, and he wanted to run a session on the market for space. Ironically, in 2016, there were many space companies that were funded. Um, we even studied microbiomes as a big data problem. Um, we studied water purification technologies because someone was interested in that particular topic. But this learning group re- grew really quickly from, like, 10 people to 30 people, and now we have over 450 members. And, and once we... once we started growing organically, we decided to really invest in the community. So we took inspiration from learning communities from back in the 1700s, like Benjamin Franklin's Hunter Club, um, or the Bloomsbury Society from the early 20th century, which was a literary society, and we noticed that all of them had a name, they had a mission. They had concrete expectations from their members. So, we came up with our own name, South Park Commons. We built our own manifesto, um, and, and we wrote out a set of expectations of all members that attended or were... that joined the community or were recruited to join the community. And then these members went on to start many companies. They joined research organizations like OpenAI or Google AI. In fact, in 2016, we were the largest up a funnel for both of these organizations. And when I saw that things were actually working, I decided that it was important to make the community financially sustainable to ensure its longevity, and the fund was the most organic way of doing that. It also meant that we didn't have to raise financing every year, but the fund could support the community for five years at a time. So, the fees that we generated from the fund are used into running the operations of the community, and the community members, in turn, have given the fund the first right of refusal to invest in their companies. And that's how SPC The Fund came to be.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings8:37

      I mean, I, I, I love that, and it's just such an innovative model, (laughs) especially, you know, for me hearing that compared to so many of the VCs I've had on the show before. But it takes me to really

5. 8:47 – 10:30

   Do you believe venture is stagnant?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings8:47

      a question on the venture landscape, which is, when we look at the landscape today, it's often criticized for investing in innovation, but maybe not innovating itself. Uh, do you believe venture is stagnant as a model today?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi9:01

      You know, I think it's bullshit that VCs ask their companies to innovate when they operate as old-school, white-collar legacy firms. I kind of want to switch that around. I would tell all founders to only work with VCs who think of their own firm as a startup, those that are paranoid. And for what it's worth, it doesn't just mean new VCs. One of the reasons why Sequoia is so impressive in my books is because they're constantly paranoid and innovating, and that's the same with a16z or even Tiger for that matter. I just feel that there's so many ways that you can innovate in. You can innovate on the fund structure, like Sequoia has. You can innovate on how you build your org, like a16 has. You can innovate on how you scale the human element of venture with code, like Electric has. Or you can innovate on how you support innovation, like we have at SPC. So, I feel like ultimately, the VC's job is to be the allocator of capital. That's true. Um, but it's als- eh- but it's also true that capital is a commodity. So, the question, as a founder, you really need to ask yourself is, how do you bring smart money to the table? And how do you stack all the odds in your favor as a startup founder to actually win the long game?

   3. HSHarry Stebbings10:14

      Okay, I totally agree with you. For us, it's a little bit easier. We live in this world now, and we understand kind of the nuances and the deep, granular di- differentiators between funds. For founders, I don't, you know, I don't think it's as obvious, and I don't mean that patronizingly, but they don't live in the world.

6. 10:30 – 11:46

   How do you advise founders on choosing a VC?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings10:30

      How do you advise founders in terms of truly determining which VCs are innovative, which think differently, and which they should ultimately select? Like, what questions to ask? How should they play that out?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi10:43

      I think that when you talk to a VC, it's, it's much like a relationship. You need to ask questions of the VC as a VC would ask questions of you. You know, if you're a successful founder who has a fantastic idea, a great product-market fit, it's inevitable that you're going to be able to raise financing. So instead of just believing in, um, the PR out there or doing what all other founders have done in the past, the question you really should be asking the VC is, "How are you going to help me get to the next stage of evolution? How are you going to help me build my key milestones to be able to raise the next round of financing?" And, and identify for yourself what are the areas that you could use help from VCs. It could be anything. It could be recruiting. It could be company-building. It could be having access to resources. It could be customer development. And, and moreover, does that particular venture fund have the time to support you, not just in this particular round of financing, but in future rounds of financing?

7. 11:46 – 13:02

   What happens to the multi-stage VC firms?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings11:46

      C- can I ask, you know, we've seen multi-stage move pretty aggressively into the early stage, and I think, you know, w- we've seen a lot of challenges for the traditional seed-stage firms. When we look at the movement of multi-stage earlier and the movement of everyone earlier, bluntly, eh-What do you think happens to these multi-stage firms kind of dominating now, in terms of like, do the small seed funds survive, and what happens to them?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi12:13

      And I think this goes back to the earlier question you asked. When a large fund writes, you know, a $1 or $2 million check in your seed round, they're simply buying option value to invest in later rounds. For a $1 billion fund, $1 or $2 million is cheap. Um, and it's a cheap way to buy that option. But when a seed fund leads your round with a $1 or $2 million check, it's a big deal, especially if they're a $50 million fund or $100 million fund. They're really incentivized to help founders get to the next stage and raise their next round of financing and hit their milestones. So from my perspective, there's always room for seed funds. However, there's really no point in playing the same game as everyone else, which is like, you know, pounding the pavement to win deals. I think seed funds need to innovate as well to stay relevant.

8. 13:02 – 14:38

   How do you think about ownership requirements?

   1. RSRuchi Sanghvi13:02

   2. HSHarry Stebbings13:03

      Can I ask you, w- with South Park today, you know, you mentioned they had the right to invest in the community and the right to have, like, you know, uh, first access.

   3. RSRuchi Sanghvi13:11

      Mm-hmm.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings13:11

      How do you think about ownership requirements? How do you think about getting enough in those companies and the spin-outs that you want to invest in?

   5. RSRuchi Sanghvi13:22

      So, at SBC, we've built a community for technologists who are in transition, who are figuring out what they want to work on next, and they in turn sign an agreement with SBC that s- that gives SBC the right of first refusal to invest in their companies. Um, and we get the right to invest up to a million dollars in the very first round of financing that these companies raise. So we don't take any equity upfront.

   6. HSHarry Stebbings13:50

      Yeah.

   7. RSRuchi Sanghvi13:50

      We also don't expect all our members to start companies. In fact, 30% of our members are domain experts who have no intentions of starting companies. But that said, with that one million, we try to buy betwe- on average, across all our companies, between, like, 7 to 10% equity. And if we need to pay up to do that because that's what the market demands, we do that. But the advantage that we have at SBC is that, you know, we've been working with these founders for nine to 12 months. We've tracked their pro- progress pretty closely. Um, we, we actually make risk-adjusted bets, um, over the course of six to nine months, not over the course of one or two meetings with the founders.

   8. HSHarry Stebbings14:37

      Totally

9. 14:38 – 16:48

   What’s enough diversification for a portfolio?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings14:38

      get you. Um, question, how do you think about, like, the right number of lines to have in a portfolio? Like, what's enough diversification, and then subsequently, how do you think about the right reserves management policy here given the community first aspect?

   2. RSRuchi Sanghvi14:55

      And before I, I answer that question, when you say, "reserves," you mean pro rata?

   3. HSHarry Stebbings15:00

      Yeah, exactly, like f- uh, 50/50, 70/30, exactly.

   4. RSRuchi Sanghvi15:06

      So we think of SBC as a funnel to some degree. We recruit community members. We provide a fantastic product, programming platform to help community members explore and learn. If they decide to start their companies, we help them with company formation, um, and, and build, and, uh, sorry, help them with c- company formation and validation of their core concepts. And then when they finally go out to raise, we end up funding them. So I think it, it is, it is ultimately a funnel, and the number of members that we recruit on, uh, right at the beginning determines how many investments we make a year. So with our fund, we try to target between 50 to 60 investments for the seed fund. And our seed fund is $50 million. And then we have an opportunities fund that we keep for follow-on investments and pro rata investments. And often because we have such great relationships with our founders, we are able to increase our equity stake down the road, even beyond the pro rata opportunities that we are offered. From that perspective, we always commit to our founders that we will invest no matter what in the first round of financing following our seed investment. And more often than not, we also do that in the second round. And then as valuations increase, we, we start becoming more discerning about whether it makes sense for a fund our size to continue maintaining our ownership stake over time.

   5. HSHarry Stebbings16:41

      Totally get you and makes a lot of sense. Thank you for breaking down the early versus the opportunity. I, I, uh, you know, it's funny, I spoke

10. 16:48 – 18:22

    Is the crypto fund landscape bifurcated?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings16:48

       to Avichal about kind of ownership requirements, especially in crypto and how it's different, um, whi- which does take me to crypto, which I do want to touch on, because, you know, when we look at the landscape today, there's Andreessen, there's Paradigm, there's Electric, there's Katie's new fund as the four dominant funds above a billion.

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi17:05

       Mm-hmm.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings17:06

       And then there's a bunch of 20 to 100 million funds. Would you agree with this k- kind of bifurcated view of the landscape, and is there any changes or additions that you would make?

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi17:19

       That sounds like mapping the Web2 universe to Web3.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings17:25

       Huh.

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi17:25

       I find that there's a lot more diversity in crypto venture funds, who the GPs are, the geography that they come from. It feels very dynamic, um, and evolving. For example, corporate VCs weren't really a thing in Web2, but quite a few Web3 companies have funds that invest in startups to develop the ecosystem. So some of them even lead grounds like FDX. Um, there's a huge emphasis on community, so Web3 founders like having a really large cap table with angels, influencers, analysts, multiple funds on their cap table. And party rounds are not really frowned upon as is, is the case in Web2. And then if you look at the largest crypto companies, um, or token projects, it's a pretty healthy mix of traditional venture capitalists and crypto venture capitalists in the early rounds. So I think it's quite dynamic and changing, and it's evolving....

11. 18:22 – 21:14

    Should traditional funds hire a crypto partner?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi18:22

       as we speak.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings18:24

       What do you think of traditional funds hiring a crypto partner? I have so many general partnerships who are like, "Harry, who should we hire? We need, we need crypto. We need Web3. Who's the partner that we should hire?" Do you think that these funds can kind of add on an ancillary partner to do crypto and Web3 and compete in this new world?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi18:45

       You know, I'm a big believer in Web3. One of the things, though, that I do not like is how exclusive the Web3 venture community is.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings18:54

       Mm-hmm.

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi18:54

       There's this odd belief that if you aren't already in it, it's super late, you have to structure yourself differently, you have to be Web3 native, you have to build from ground up. Um, so my belief is that it's actually pretty early and there's still a ton of value and upside to capture. So, and, and if you look at tech's hi- history over time, every time there's a platform shift, there's a steep learning curve, and that applies to venture too. So I do think it is possible for traditional venture funds to get into crypto, to hire the right set of people, and the nuances around identifying opportunities, diligencing them, holding onto an asset, staking them, figuring out tax repercussions, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It's not rocket science. You can definitely learn and pick it up. In fact, you know, we ourselves at SBC, even though we're small, we've had some pretty great performing crypto assets, like Alchemy, Compound, The Graph. So, I personally think it's possible.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings19:54

       I totally get you. When you listen to Avichal, though, and you hear him talk about the org chart and how it's so fundamentally different with software developers, uh, you know, in the 10s instead of associates, principals in the traditional structures, and you just hear him discuss truly how different the org chart is, I, I just don't understand how it is possible. Like, I, I would love to... Like, honestly, I'm, I'm being honest here, Ruchi, I would love to learn and approach-

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi20:20

       (laughs)

    8. HSHarry Stebbings20:21

       ... this steep learning curve. I don't have time. I'm still investing in enterprise. I'm still investing in fintech. Um, I, I run a media company. I, I, I can't figure out staking of assets on top of all this.

    9. RSRuchi Sanghvi20:34

       You can't, um, because you have a ton going on already, and you are a solo player in your universe. You can if you think of it as an organization and wanting to develop expertise in a particular area. So from that perspective, a- again, like, you know, if you trace back hedge funds, they ended up hiring software engineers to be able to implement ML and AI algorithms and understand the new world. And similarly, like, venture capitalist firms (laughs) can hire economists and software developers to figure out crypto if they want to and need to.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings21:10

        I agree. I agree. Um, challenging for me. (laughs)

12. 21:14 – 22:32

    Will venture be replaced by DAOs?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings21:14

       Um, tell me, Avichal said, um, about the rise of DAOs and how it might impact the future of VC itself. I actually have Ian Lee on the show later this week from Syndicate who said that actually venture will be replaced by DAOs. Um, how do you think about the rise of DAOs and its impact on the investing landscape?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi21:33

       As long as traditional LPs, like university endowments, foundations exist, traditional VC will continue to exist. There's no question. Um, and it's interesting that you said you'll be talking to Ian from Syndicate down the road. Um, at SBC we launched our founder fellowship DAO with Syndicate. It was the first DAO of its kind. It's a 3C7 DAO that allows for up to 1,999 investors instead of the traditional 100 limit. And in our case, we had multiple funds participate, founders of Solana, Figma, Polygon, Alchemy, OpenSea all participated. It allowed us to distribute tokens to people who held office hours, who did talks at SBC, provided mentorship, added value to companies, and it expanded our resources far beyond our typical partnership. And the DAO itself has invested in 15 companies, and every founder has received tokens allowing them to share in each other's upside.

13. 22:32 – 23:25

    How do DAOs make decisions?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi22:32

    2. HSHarry Stebbings22:32

       Just so I understand, sorry, how do DAOs make decisions?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi22:36

       That, that, that's precisely what I was going to say, um, that this DAO, it has democratized crypto investing, but it has proxied all its decisions to a set of admins. Um, and which is what has made the founder fellowship DAO successful. Um, and, and so contrary to what DAOs stand for, there's some efficiency in centralized organizations and having centralized operational capabilities, which is kind of similar to venture. Um, so in the case of the founder fellowship DAO, they proxied their decisions to four sets of G- four, four GPs who, who make all the decisions. Um, and, and, and that's how it works.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings23:23

       Is, is this not, is this not

14. 23:25 – 25:02

    How are DAOs different than venture?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings23:25

       just venture? Like, I have 83 LPs, and they centralize their decision-making to me. In general partnerships, like in Sequoia, I have hundreds of LPs, and they centralize decision-making to the GPs. I don't... Sorry, I, I'm so naive and uneducated. I don't get how it's different.

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi23:43

       Well, not all DAOs need to operate that way. So you could, for example, have a DAO, um, where tokens are awarded to participants in the DAO, and then everybody votes on which deals you want to participate in and buy equities in. And that's a more decentralized DAO than the way we actually operate.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings24:05

       Got you.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi24:05

       So-

    5. HSHarry Stebbings24:06

       Did you-

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi24:06

       So I-

    7. HSHarry Stebbings24:06

       Did you, did you have a question around which way you thought about operating? Was there a decision-making process that led you to that?

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi24:14

       Before we get into that, I, I also think that decision-making comes in a spectrum. On one end of the spectrum, it is completely decentralized, and then on the other end of the spectrum, it is centralized, and then there are points along that spectrum, and you can fall anywhere on that scale.So we, while we did have a discussion on how we were going to make decisions, ultimately, the admin DAO, um, in our case, was pretty critical because everyone who invested in the DAO wanted to proxy their words to a handful of people who they thought would be experts in making these investment decisions.

    9. HSHarry Stebbings24:55

       Got you. Okay. That makes sense. Tell me, how do the... Sorry. (laughs) Again, you heard that show with Avachal.

    10. RSRuchi Sanghvi25:01

        No worries.

    11. HSHarry Stebbings25:01

        I specialize

15. 25:02 – 27:10

    How do tokens work?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings25:02

       in stupid questions.

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi25:03

       Yeah. No.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings25:04

       How do the tokens work then? Like, they invest money, and they get back a proportional amount of tokens? So I don't... Uh, sorry, help me out here. (laughs)

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi25:14

       Yeah. So you invest capital. You get, um, tokens in exchange for the capital. But you don't just have to be an investor in the DAO to own those tokens. You can be a contributor, a non-investing contributor, and helping, um, and that helps the DAO. And, and for th- for those efforts, you can be granted tokens as well. Participants in the DAO, such as companies and founders, who get investments from the DAO, can also be awarded tokens so that they can share in each other's success. And ultimately, the DAO, much like funds, have a 10-year life cycle. So when the DAO liquidates, you get the assets of the DAO as per, um, the amount of tokens that you hold.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings25:59

       Can you trade the tokens in the meantime? It's like one benefit of DAOs and the tokenization within DAOs that you have liquidity in a way that you don't in the ve- traditional venture model.

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi26:10

       You can trade the tokens if the tokens are transferable. But you can also build a DAO where the tokens aren't transferable. So it really depends on the governing structure of the DAO.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings26:20

       Got you. And how do you determine, um, like allocation to non-investing members? I'm intrigued. If I, uh, am very helpful to your DAO in, I don't know, marketing and PR, um, say, um, ch- choosing just anywhere where I provide value-

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi26:36

       Sure.

    9. HSHarry Stebbings26:36

       ... um, like, who determines how much I get? Who determines, like, why I should get less than someone else who provides different value? How does that work?

    10. RSRuchi Sanghvi26:46

        So again, that depends on the DAO's governing structure. You could have hierarchal DAOs, where a certain set of admins decide how much non-investing contributing members get. You could have the members of the DAO themselves vote on how much value you provided and how many tokens you should get. It could be a proposal that is presented to the members of the DAO. Um, there are multiple ways of facilitating

16. 27:10 – 28:49

    What is the biggest challenge DAOs face?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi27:10

       that.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings27:11

       Got you. Can I ask, what do you think is the biggest challenge that DAOs face moving forwards when you look at the current structures that we have in play? If you're like, this is a challenging element, and maybe you've seen it in others, maybe you've seen it in your own, what are the barriers or hurdles?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi27:27

       That's a pretty good question.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings27:31

       (laughs)

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi27:31

       I think, um, uh, the reason that it's stumping me a little bit is that DAOs themselves are so new. You know, even, even though that we, we, we use Syndicate, it's not that they had figured everything out. We were working together to figure out what the perfect solution for the Founder Fellowship DAO would be, and it took many hours of legal work, and many hours of back and forth, and, and weeks and months to actually set up. So there are a lot of hurdles and barriers that come along and, and decision points that you have to navigate.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings28:05

       (sighs)

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi28:05

       But I, I think the key thing to remember about a DAO is that it's not just an intimate group or a Reddit community. You know, it's almost like a variant of why use a blockchain if you can just use a database? So it's really important to understand why you're using a DAO, um, why you're using on-chain governance, um, and, and not being, like, fully blind to the fact that a hierarchal model might work better, um, a proxy model might work better when you think of governance as it relates to DAOs. So, so I think there are, like, a lot of different variables to consider, and we're just beginning to figure this out.

17. 28:49 – 30:00

    What tooling do you use in DAOs?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings28:49

       So, a couple of different questions. Uh, in terms of, like, tooling, what tooling do you use for yours, and do you see DAOs using? Is this like Telegram and, I don't know, WhatsApp and traditional tooling? Or is there a new generation of tooling that is created to make DAOs more efficient?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi29:07

       There is a new generation of tooling, and, and there are many. Um, in fact, like, you know, I, like, uh, let me just give you the list of tooling that exists out there. Um, everything from Syndicate to AstroDAO, to SuperDAO. Um, and, and, and the list is actually endless because a lot of folks are realizing the potential of DAOs and, and the tooling that it'll require, um, to put the DAO on chain, to, to figure out membership, to assign mint tokens, um, to think about, like, you know, uh, dr- air dropping NFTs for membership, et cetera. So there's just, like, a ton of stuff around it and a lot of potential. And people are figuring out how to build the tooling as DAOs themselves evolve. Um, does that-

    3. HSHarry Stebbings29:53

       What-

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi29:53

       ... answer the question?

    5. HSHarry Stebbings29:54

       It, it totally does. Do you think... You mentioned that kind of, you know, as long as we see traditional large endowment funds

18. 30:00 – 32:18

    Will institutional capital move into DAOs?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings30:00

       in venture, it will survive. Will we see the movement of large-scale institutional capital into DAOs or not?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi30:08

       So, as, um, SBC is a traditional venture fund, we've invested in the Founder Fellowship DAO. So, in a way, traditional institutional capital has found its way to a DAO through SBC as a mediator. And one would assume that if these DAOs are to be successful over time, much like companies, institutional investors over time will find direct access to these DAOs. Now, it might take like, you know, 10 years, 5 years, 15 years. But if this is already happening...... they are, they are bound to, like, jump through the, the middleman to make the process more efficient.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings30:51

       I totally get you. So they do jump through the middleman and then we do see large-scale institutional capital flow through to DAOs?

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi30:58

       Yup.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings31:00

       Got you. Um, okay. No, I, I, I, I totally agree. Do you not think there's a shift then away from traditional venture when you think about, like, endowment allocation buckets? Does that not take away from venture?

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi31:15

       Not really, because I can't imagine all investments and all types of investments happening through DAOs. I think there's a val- there's value in the ecosystem for having traditional partnerships, um, where partnerships are making those investments. As you mentioned, like, you focus on SaaS investments and, and other such investments, we don't really have the time to focus on crypto. Um, DAOs traditionally focus on Web3 investments, um, and, and it makes sense as they're part of the ecosystem, um, and a lot of, like, the economics flows through tokens and so on and so forth. Um, I, I just think that y- it... again, it's like a spectrum. DAOs still need to shake out. It's not clear to me which way they will trend, um, and what will be the most successful DAOs, and for as long as that is the case, traditional venture will exist side by side.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings32:11

       Such a relief to know that I won't be unemployed.

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi32:13

       (laughs)

    9. HSHarry Stebbings32:13

       Um, (laughs) when I, when I spoke to Avichal, I was like, "Whew, I am

19. 32:18 – 33:46

    Zero tolerance for mediocrity a weakness?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings32:18

       getting nervous."

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi32:19

       Yeah.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings32:19

       Um, I do want to touch on some elements of kind of how you work and operate. When we think about, um, you know, some of the research that we did, I spoke to some mutual friends, as you know, and o- one, um, recurring theme was they said you have zero tolerance for mediocrity.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi32:35

       (laughs)

    5. HSHarry Stebbings32:35

       Um, some put it as a strength, some put it as a weakness. Do you think this is a weakness, and how do you think about your zero tolerance for mediocrity?

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi32:45

       So it is most definitely a weakness.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings32:47

       (laughs)

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi32:48

       And... but I am unapologetic about it. Um, earlier in my career, I always just focused on the end result, and if people on my teams could not keep up, they would just fall by the wayside, and that is not a healthy way to manage a team. The journey, you know, is just as important as the end result. It is what allows you as an individual to scale with the organization, and I really had to learn that the hard way. Um, so I, I know this about myself. I'm not good at scaling large teams. I recognize that about myself, and I try not to put myself in those situations. Um, I really thrive in chaos. I do best in the zero-to-one phase, um, and it's important in that phase that everyone on your team spikes and you don't stand for mediocrity, um, and, and I've kind of just optimized my career around that.

    9. HSHarry Stebbings33:43

       Okay, so it's a weakness,

20. 33:46 – 36:06

    How do you think about ambition throughout your career?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings33:46

       uh, in that case. (laughs)

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi33:48

       (laughs) Yes.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings33:48

       O- other friends mentioned the unwavering ambition. How do you think about ambition in different stages of your career, starting there?

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi34:00

       You know, when I left Facebook, I tried to look for a better Facebook, and, and that was impossible. And then when I left Dropbox, I tried to look for a better Dropbox, um, and- and that was impossible. So instead of chasing something bigger and better, it was important to me to reinvent myself. And then on the flip side, I find the tech industry is extremely ageist. Things advance so quickly, um, that most people end up fearing being irrelevant. So if you take your foot off the pedal or you take a break, you kind of need to start from ground zero all over again. And, and as a result, you're, like, constantly chasing things, struggling to keep up, striving. You know, there are always companies to start, companies to invest in, problems to be solved, conferences to attend, conversations to influence. Um, but my father, who recently passed away, um, from cancer, asked me a very, um, important question. He asked, "Are you living life or are you chasing life?" And I've been mulling over that question quite a bit, and as I think about that question, I've realized that I've built a life that I'm content with, and there's really no shame in that. But when you talk to most folks in tech, they... you know, they would say that I've lost my edge. But the truth I came to is that no matter how much money I made or how much influence I wielded, it was not going to materially change my life. So now, you know, I kind of, like, ruthlessly prioritize. I define impact for myself. I work on things where I can truly make a difference, not just a marginal difference, but a 10X difference. And I feel like I'm having a 10X impact by helping SBC members and founders, like, find their life's work at SBC. So I think it's, like, just really important as you go through different career phases to redefine

21. 36:06 – 37:43

    How do you think about your relationship to money?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi36:06

       ambition for yourself.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings36:09

       Can I ask you-

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi36:10

       Y- yeah.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings36:11

       (laughs) ... something that I think about a lot but is relationship to money? Um, how do you think about your relationship to money today? Because, yeah, I- it's one that I've struggled with over the years.

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi36:24

       I built an Excel sheet-

    6. HSHarry Stebbings36:25

       (laughs)

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi36:25

       ... to figure out my relationship to money. I projected how much money I would need to lead the kind of life, uh, I want to lead. You know, I'm not flashy. I don't have fancy cars. Um, I have pretty basic requirements, and I'm pretty happy with them. Um, and once I understood that-You know, it wouldn't change my life if I made a billion or even 10 billion. My relationship with money fundamentally changed. Um, so it was no longer something that I was striving for. Um, it was just a tool or a means to get done what I wanted to get done.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings37:04

       What do you think caused that change?

    9. RSRuchi Sanghvi37:07

       I, I, I would go back to the question that my father asked me, "Are you chasing life or are you living life?" I feel like we're constantly in this mode where we are chasing things, not understanding how to utilize them, so I feel like a lot of people make money, um, and then have no idea what to do with that money or how to spend that money.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings37:28

        I agree. And then actually, there's always the bigger-boat problem, where someone always has more. (laughs) You know, you're always going to-

    11. RSRuchi Sanghvi37:36

        Yeah.

    12. HSHarry Stebbings37:36

        ... have an Elon Musk of the world, um, and it's an insecurity, I think. I'm riddled with insecurities, Ruchi,

22. 37:43 – 39:42

    What are your biggest insecurities?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings37:43

       honestly. I mean, it's the reason I live in therapist rooms. What do you say your biggest insecurities are?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi37:51

       My biggest insecurities are that I stop learning, um, that I actually kind of become lazy and no longer am interested in the pursuit of learning-

    3. HSHarry Stebbings38:06

       Mm-hmm.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi38:06

       ... and keeping myself relevant. That, that really is my biggest insecurity.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings38:11

       Why do you think that is? Because you know yourself, (laughs) y- you know that you have a zero tolerance for mediocrity. You know what makes you happy, what drives you. Why is that an insecurity?

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi38:24

       The reason that's an insecurity for me is because I fear being complacent, and the minute I stop learning, I know I have become complacent.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings38:34

       I get you, but, like, have you ever been complacent before?

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi38:39

       Yeah. I go through, I go through it in a ... I mean, I go through phases, really. I, I don't understand balance. Um, I'm really poor at understanding balance, so I will work at a 200%, um, run rate and then finally burn out and need to take four to six months off. And then when I do that and decide to come back to work, it's actually really hard to get back into it. It's really hard to dive into it. It's really hard to learn everything that you missed in the last, like, six to eight months. It's really hard to stay disciplined about it, um, but that's the way that I operate. So, it takes a lot of stamina and effort to get back into the work mode once I've taken that break.

    9. HSHarry Stebbings39:27

       I get you, and I get that. I, (laughs) I think one thing that I struggle with is also a little bit, honestly, ego management. I am quite young, and yet I've been doing this for a long time, and I've done well in youth. Um, you did very well

23. 39:42 – 41:50

    How do you deal with ego?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings39:42

       very young. Did ego management become a problem for you in your earlier days?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi39:48

       I think of ego slightly differently. Because I was successful so young, I felt like I had a lot of answers, um, and a lot of knowledge to share. So, I became a little arrogant and, you know, would, would think of problems ... or would think that basically, like, all problems were essentially the same. They could be broken down in the same way. You just had to, um, you just had to modify the solution to fit the problem at hand. And, and I, and I got really arrogant, and I got bored, um, and- and everything just felt uninteresting. It felt like, you know, I could leave and come back after six months and conversations would start where they had stopped off earlier. Um, and- and that's, that's the kind of ego, um, that I had, which I had to really work on, um, and change my mindset around that and enter every conversation with the mindset that I was going to learn something new from this conversation and it was going to be worth my time. Um, so that was the kind of ego that I struggled with. I didn't really struggle with, um, having a lot of money or having a lot of early success. Um, it was really, uh, it was really, you know, having more humility, um, and- and understanding that there was a lot more that I could learn.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings41:17

       You mentioned earlier, and then I promise you, the therapist session is over.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi41:20

       (laughs)

    5. HSHarry Stebbings41:20

       You mentioned earlier, um, that tying your identity to, you know, wha- what you do at the time of ... what you're doing. Um, you know, I- I didn't go on holiday for many years because essentially I hated going away, because you detach yourself from your company-

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi41:34

       Yeah.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings41:34

       ... and then honestly, I was looking in the mirror going, "Well, who am I, and what do I do with my time?" And so I, I never did it. Uh, and I really still struggle today, actually, in detaching who I am, identity-wise, from my company, clearly, at 3,200 shows in.

24. 41:50 – 44:12

    Do you align your identity to your company?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings41:50

       Uh, (laughs) um, like, how do you think about your identity aligned to SPC and aligning identity to company?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi41:59

       And when you say company, which company do you mean?

    3. HSHarry Stebbings42:01

       Any... Y- the company that someone's at. Say, a founder aligning their identity to their company. So, for you, it would be SPC.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi42:09

       Yeah.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings42:09

       But, you know, how do you think about and reflect on the alignment of your identity to SPC?

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi42:21

       Um ... All right. So, in, in the tech industry, and especially in Silicon Valley, I think we have a very unhealthy practice where our identities are aligned with our work. There's so much more to a person besides what they do professionally.... um, but it's really hard for people to shake that off. So when we have members come to SBC, the first thing that I tell them is that you're going to have to introduce yourself at least half a dozen times in the first two weeks that you are at SBC, and it's going to take you nearly three months to get really comfortable saying, "I don't do anything. I'm thinking about what I want to work on next," and break apart your identity from what you used to do and your work itself. Um, so, a- and I think that's extremely healthy because that frees you. So again, when you ask a question like, "How do I, like, identify myself as it relates to SBC or as in a company?" It's, it's almost as though I'm telling people to no longer do that. Um, and as such, I've had tremendous practice in not doing that over the last five years.

    7. HSHarry Stebbings43:34

       Yeah. I, I think it's challenging. I mean, especially when you've held, you know, very high-powered roles with great titles and then to suddenly say, "I'm- do nothing now, and I'm thinking what to do next."

    8. RSRuchi Sanghvi43:45

       Yeah. (laughs)

    9. HSHarry Stebbings43:45

       I think it takes a lot. Um, I do wanna move into my favorite though, Ruchi, which is a quickfire round. So I say a short statement, and you can-

    10. RSRuchi Sanghvi43:52

        Hey, before you move on, you... Are you not gonna ask me anything on negative one to zero? Because I think that's pretty key. (laughs)

    11. HSHarry Stebbings43:58

        Y- I'm totally happy to. Like, d- do you wanna touch on that before the quickfire? I was gonna integrate it into the quickfire.

    12. RSRuchi Sanghvi44:05

        Um, yeah, I think you should, and then you should decide if you want to edit it out. I have a few... I have... I can go under 10, so you can, like, cover

25. 44:12 – 48:08

    What does “-1 to zero” mean?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi44:12

       it all.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings44:12

       To- totally. Okay, well, then, listen, let's touch on negative, uh, one to zero. (laughs) So, this is a, a phrase that you've coined. Can I be blunt and ask, what does it actually mean?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi44:25

       You sure can. I get a lot of WTFs, um, (laughs) which, which I think you ask me as well. Um, so, you know, zero to one is a phrase that Peter Thiel coined. It's really popular, and one can simply associate it with product market fit. Negative one to zero, for us, is about founder market fit. Um, and we have this really eloquent definition at SBC, which is that it's turning the chaos of possibility into the clarity of conviction. You know, it sounds easy, um, but it's not. It's a horribly lonely journey and the most neglected part of a founder journey when they are actually thinking about what to build, what markets to explore, how to validate ideas, and how to narrow down the idea matrix. And founders are really vulnerable in this phase, um, and, and are riddled with self-doubt and unrealistic expectations. So at SBC, we've kind of built this environment, um, that really facilitates learning and exploration. It's the antithesis of an accelerator, um, and it allows you to do that with like-minded individuals, um, which is why we call it the negative one to zero phase.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings45:41

       Can I ask, you know, Josh Kaufman before said about the importance of the pick, and when he says the pick, he means the idea of-

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi45:48

       Yeah.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings45:49

       ... the idea that you choose and the idea you pick. Um, how do you think about, like, increasing the quality of decision-making in negative one to zero around the pick?

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi46:00

       So typically, when you think of traditional accelerators or even founders who decide that they are going to start the founding journey, they have this unrealistic expectation that they are going to pick an idea, they're going to validate it, they're going to do some basic customer development, and they're going to raise their seed financing all in the span of three months. Um, and if you can't get it done in three months, then you have essentially fazed- failed. Um, but at SBC, we actually believe that it is really important to move slow to be able to move fast. So typically, our members spend, on average, about nine months picking that idea. And that goes... and, you know, and, and they do everything from TAM exploration to identifying problems that are key in those spaces to identifying solutions that might be valid to figuring out what competition might look like or whether it's nascent or not and, and to identify if they have the skill sets to actually solve those problems. Um, so I think that picking the right idea takes time, and it actually takes a lot of work.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings47:10

       Is there a framework that's kind of cookie cutter? And what I mean by that is, like, TAM analysis, competitive analysis? Is it like cookie cutter, or is it nuanced?

    9. RSRuchi Sanghvi47:19

       You get founders who are first-time founders and are actually surprisingly unaware of the basics of evaluating whether a company they might start might be a venture-backable company. So you equip with- them with the basics, but you also give them the confidence to challenge assumptions, um, or priors that have been held in the past. And equipped with both and an environment that supports exploration and provides infrastructure and programming, I think that's when they end up, like, you know, thriving and the magic of SBC happens. So I think it's important to be equipped with the knowledge because you'd be surprised how many people aren't. Um, but it's also, it's also important to give them the confidence

26. 48:08 – 50:25

    Where do founders go wrong when picking their idea?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi48:08

       to challenge core assumptions.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings48:10

       Can... Where do most founders go wrong in the pick phase of this kind of ideation process?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi48:16

       Again, I think it is the unrealistic expectation that you can pick an idea, validate it, build a customer base, raise seed financing in three months, because what inevitably happens in a capital-rich market, where capital is a commodity, is that it's fairly easy to raise a couple of million dollars, and then you end up wasting four or five years of your life trying to find product market fit.Um, so I feel that founders go wrong in that initial phase because they haven't done enough upfront work, um, haven't, like, actually moved slow to be able to move fast, um, in identifying the ideas to work on.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings48:57

       What if they need the funding to pay the bills, respectfully? You know, they've left a job and they have their mortgages, school fe- I, I don't... you know, costs of living, and they need the funding to, to just be able to do the customer discovery in the first place and do it properly.

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi49:13

       You come to a place like SPC where we actually fund (laughs) great founders and give them the, and give them the bandwidth to be able to do that.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings49:28

       Got you. But, like, why would you not also do VC funding? Like, that, that makes sense. And then you have less of a budget. You have more money.

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi49:40

       Again, like, for me, uh, for me, the most important commodity is time.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings49:45

       Yeah.

    9. RSRuchi Sanghvi49:46

       Right? And if you, if you aren't sure you want to work on something, but you feel obligated to spend the next four or five years of your life because you've raised $2 million to identify it, I think that's a colossal waste of time.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings50:02

        Yeah.

    11. RSRuchi Sanghvi50:02

        I think you need to build enough resources to give yourself about nine months to identify, um, whether or not you've hit upon something interesting. And i- in my books, it's actually success if you decide, you know, there really isn't a problem to be solved or there really isn't an idea to be had or a market to play in and, and decide to go back to the

27. 50:25 – 51:51

    When should a founder give up?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi50:25

       workforce. You've just saved yourself four or five years of your life.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings50:28

       How do you advise founders on when to give up with an idea? This is one I struggle with, which is like, you know, how long is enough data to know that it's not working? But also, we're trained on this persist, uh, keep going, you know, the market will see your vision. Uh, there, there's two kind of competing ideologies. How do you think about when to give up?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi50:50

       I do strongly believe that if you're smart, um, and you're playing in the right market with the right set of problems, persistence is the key ingredient. And if you persist, you will figure it out. Um, I think the time, uh, a- and this is especially true in, in early stages of company building and especially, uh, you know, right around the time of pre-seed and seed, that if you have a great founder and you have an interesting market with interesting problems, it is inevitable that the founder is going to pivot. I think the time to give up is when you have run out of ideas and there is no room in the idea matrix to navigate, um, and, and you're getting concrete signals from the market, whether it's customers, whether it's, like, um, financiers, whether it's, um, uh, whether it's your peers, um, that it is not

28. 51:51 – 53:33

    Do VCs poach from SPC?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi51:51

       working. I, I would say that that is the time to give up.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings51:53

       Do you have a challenge? Because a lot of the, you know, people within SPC are very pedigreed, are phenomenal, talented technical people that bluntly VCs will come and chuck them a term sheet before they have kind of validated the idea. Do you have a challenge of kind of retaining them in the idea maze to make sure they've got it right before vulture VCs (laughs) that say... come and give them a load of cash and say, "Go, go, go."

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi52:22

       We do have that challenge, and it's a great challenge to actually have. It just basically means that we originate deals, um, and the community is high quality enough to keep... make that a sustainable motion, and we're even further upstream than, let's say, uh, YC. But that said, because our members are incredibly pedigreed, um, you know, they've been around the block a couple of times, they've either worked at startups or started their own companies, so they've been through the motion. And a lot of folks actually do turn down investors and say that, "We're not ready yet." Um, ironically, it ends up creating FOMOs for investors, and then they end up chasing the companies even more.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings53:02

       (laughs)

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi53:03

       Um, uh, it's, it's actually great (laughs) in, in all ways, um, but we, we do, again, like, you know, we do provide an environment that is pretty open and transparent, um, and, and provides a lot of support. So these members do have discussions, and if it makes sense, they'll take the capital. If it doesn't, they'll actually push back.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings53:24

       It is a great problem to fundamentally have, just t- uh, so I, I, I do agree with you there, though, for sure. Um, I, I do want to move into my favorite, which is the quick-fire.

29. 53:33 – 54:05

    Favorite book and why?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings53:33

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi53:33

       Yeah, let's do it.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings53:33

       Uh, so okay, rock and roll. What's the favorite book, Ruchi, and why?

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi53:39

       I love fiction. Um, I love sci-fi. I love all sorts of fiction. So my favorite book actually is The Three-Body Problem, um, and the reason I love sci-fi so much is that it gives me an escape, um, but it also gets my creative juices flowing. Um, it... and how it, it creates a future for me, um, that I... you know, that is, like,

30. 54:05 – 54:32

    What have you recently changed your mind on?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi54:05

       difficult to, like, get into in your everyday life.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings54:08

       What have you recently changed your mind on?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi54:12

       Oh, a ton of things. Um, I recently changed my... you know, I used to think raising capital was hard. I no longer think that is the case. Um, I used to think there are no stupid people in the world. Um, (laughs) I actually changed my mind on that. Um,

31. 54:32 – 55:20

    Most challenging element of SPC fundraise?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi54:32

       th- uh, just a ton of different things.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings54:34

       (laughs) Wha- what was the most challenging element of the SPC fundraise? You mentioned that it wasn't difficult. Wh- what was the most challenging element, though?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi54:44

       ... that it's relationship-based. Um, I'm not great at building relationships. I'm not, um, very empathetic either. It was, um... As a first time fund manager, um, it was really hard for me, um, to work on those relationships and build those relationships, and, and that was honestly the most challenging part of the SBC fundraise.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings55:06

       Yeah. No, I think it's the b- biggest mistake that fund, like, managers make, which is they view fundraisers as these static processes, which is, like, in between-

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi55:14

       Yeah.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings55:14

       ... you have to build the relationships. Like, invest in lines, not dots.

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi55:18

       Yeah, exactly.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings55:18

       Like, I'm not raising now, but I meet

32. 55:20 – 56:24

    Who’s your biggest mentor?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings55:20

       five LPs a week. Like-

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi55:21

       Exactly, yeah.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings55:22

       Um, okay, tell me, who's your closest mentor and what have you learned from them?

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi55:28

       I don't believe in mentors. I believe in asking people for advice who are world-class on the issues I'm facing. You know, if I go to you with a specific problem or question, you're most likely to respond, um, with a helpful answer. I also learn from osmosis. So, you know, I've learned how to get the best from people, from Mark. I've learned the art of storytelling from Chris. I've learned how to build trust from Trepp. I've learned how to, you know, balance work and life from my friend Priscilla. I've learned empathy from my colleague Mitra. And my husband and co-founder for most endeavors, Aditya, has been a thought partner all my life. Um, so I think of mentorship in that way, rather than having, like, a single person who I consider a mentor.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings56:20

       Tell me, what's the most memorable first founder meeting you've had?

33. 56:24 – 57:56

    How I first met Mark Zuckerberg

    1. HSHarry Stebbings56:24

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi56:24

       So this is probably not the answer to your question, but let me tell you how I first met Mark Zuckerberg. I had an interview scheduled for 9:00 AM. I walk into Facebook's offices and there's absolutely no one there. I wait for half an hour, and then Jeff Rothschild, who was like, you know, the adult in the room, shows up. Um, he is brilliant technically. He was the founder of Veritas. He asked me a bunch of database questions, which I... and we get through our interview in half an hour. And then I wait another two hours and nobody shows up. And then finally, Mark walks into the office and Jeff is like, "You have to interview her, and you need to keep interviewing her till the other folks show up." Um, so there he was in the room, and he was asking me a bunch of questions. The interview went on for, like, nearly an hour, 15 minutes. He was running out of questions to ask. (laughs) He would ask me esoteric questions like, you know, "If you were going to climb Mount Everest, would you take half a bottle of water or a full bottle of water?" Um, and it was the most entertaining first time founder conversation that I've had. And then finally, people saunter into the office to start the real interview process with me, and the r- and, and by then it was like 3:00 PM. And the reason everyone was late, um, was because they had, like, you know, a bug that they were solving the previous night, they hadn't gotten to bed in, uh, in, till the early hours of the morning, and they'd

34. 57:56 – 1:00:55

    What makes Mark so special?

    1. RSRuchi Sanghvi57:56

       just been waking up walking into the office. Um, it was quite the experience.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings58:00

       What do you think make Ma- makes Mark so special?

    3. RSRuchi Sanghvi58:06

       You know, I've observed Mark from the very early days, and I think the thing that makes him so special is his rate of learning. The rate at which Mark absorbs information, processes information, and learns about different topics is just incredible. Um, and, and you know, he wasn't always like that. Like, everybody imagines, like, Mark is, was this brilliant person who had j- you know, dropped out of Harvard and, and built Facebook, but it's a skill and a muscle that he's developed over time. And, uh, and it has been absolutely fascinating to watch.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings58:47

       Yeah. No, I, I totally, uh, get you, and that from the outside, it's terrifying. (laughs)

    5. RSRuchi Sanghvi58:53

       Yeah, and I, I... I'll tell you this funny story. Like, you know, we received an invitation from Davos, and I think it was the year 2006. And we all just trashed the invitation thinking it was an invitation from the University of Davies, not understanding the import of this invitation. Um, and it's funny, and, and if you think about that, like, you know, way back, um, in 2006 versus, like, where we are today, that just shows the pace of growth.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings59:21

       When you were there, were you aware of just how momentous Facebook would be? Like, did you, did you, did everyone believe it would be one of the most important companies in the world?

    7. RSRuchi Sanghvi59:32

       No, that would be extremely arrogant. When we were there, we were a college-only website. We were just building a product for high school students. It would be absolutely arrogant or, like, you know, you would have incredible vision if you thought that you would become the communication and sharing platform for over three billion users. Um, so the answer is most clearly none.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings59:56

       (laughs) When did it become obvious?

    9. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:00:01

       I think it became obvious maybe starting in 2018. Again, most people don't remember that Facebook had a ton of competition in the social networking space. There was Myspace, that was bigger. Um, there was Friendster, that was bigger. And we eventually beat out all that competition, um, to become the predominant platform. So around 2018 when we opened up to the world and we went in national, and it wasn't just college students or high school students, like, that's when things started becoming real.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:34

        Do you mean 2008?

    11. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:00:36

        Sorry, you're right. I do mean 2008.

    12. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:38

        (laughs) I was like, "2018?" Wow.

    13. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:00:40

        I can, I can answer, I can a- You know, I like to think of myself as being young, but-

    14. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:45

        (laughs)

    15. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:00:45

        ... yes, you are right. It was 2008 and not '18.

    16. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:49

        I was like, "Why is that... I swear, my, my memory's not..." Like, maybe I'm wrong. (laughs)

    17. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:00:54

        Yeah.

    18. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:54

        Tha- that's

35. 1:00:55 – 1:02:29

    Most recently announced investment

    1. HSHarry Stebbings1:00:55

       too funny. I, I do want to finish, um, on... Uh, you can choose actually. We can do most recent publicly announced investment and why you got so excited, or we can do next 10 years for you in SBC. Which one would you like?

    2. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:01:08

       Let's talk about our most recently announced investment, and-

    3. HSHarry Stebbings1:01:12

       Great.

    4. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:01:12

       ... that would be Replit. Um, and I guess I should answer the question why. So when we met Amjad and Jaya, their stories are just incredible. Um, these are founders, when you talk with them, you want to join their crusade and you want to follow them to the ends of the earth. Um, and then on the... Uh, and when you think about the product and the company, everyone talks about how software is eating the world, but as, as, like, you know, second derivative, one must assume that there will be an increasing number of people who learn how to code and who are coding over time. Um, and, and Replit provides that platform. And not only does it provide pla- that platform, but it has a vision for software building which is, like, collaborative, real-time, and we already see these trends emerging in companies like Figma, um, and other places. So, so Replit, I would say, is an investment I'm extremely excited about.

    5. HSHarry Stebbings1:02:13

       Ruchi, listen, a- as I said by the beginning, I had many great things. I loved doing the, the calls with mutual friends. So thank you so much for, for agreeing to do the show, and I, I, (laughs) I really loved this session with many different parts.

    6. RSRuchi Sanghvi1:02:26

       Yeah. I felt like we spanned the universe but came back.

Episode duration: 1:02:35