The founders who “get It”

There are two types of investors in this world: There are those who believe that through sheer force of will they can mold a founder, and then there are investors who actually return the fund.

The difficult, yet fundamental truth is that people rarely change.

If a founder is going to be successful, they're going to be successful with or without me. I'm not going to be the reason that a business wins or fails. Anyone that tells you otherwise is blinded by their own bullshit.

Investors get this wrong because many of them don’t understand that there’s a big difference between being a great operator and being a great founder.

You can be an incredible engineer, an excellent operator, or an amazing product leader. But that doesn't automatically mean you have what it takes to build a billion-dollar company.

It's not about talent or intelligence. It's about that ineffable quality that separates good founders from GREAT founders.

As an investor, I've learned to trust my instincts on this. I'm not in the business of trying to force evolution. The friction isn't worth it, and quite frankly, it rarely works.

Some might call this perspective harsh. I call it honest.