Justin Kan
18 statements across 4 episodes · 5 bullish · 3 bearish · 2 people on the record · first statement Aug 1, 2016 by Justin Kan · said 27 times in 16 episodes since 2015 · across every show →
On the record as a speaker too: Justin Kan's record, appearances and statements → this page counts the times other people say the name.
Mentions by year
brought up most by Harry Stebbings (17), Steve Huffman (3), Mike Maples (2), Emmett Shear (2), Jon Dishotsky (1), Eric Glyman (1), Alex Bangash (1)
tap a year for its mentions
2026 1 mention in 1 episode
2023 1 mention in 1 episode
2020 7 mentions in 2 episodes 4 per episode
- 20VC: Twitch Founder & CEO Emmett Shear on When To Persist vs When To Give Up For Entrepreneurs, The Fundamental Tension When Scaling Orgs and How To Optimise Them & How The Role of CEO Fundamentally Changes with Scale
- 20VC: Floodgate's Mike Maples on 3 Key Breakthroughs Startups Experience in Success, The Rise of Angel and Operator Funds, Multi-Stage Funds Re-Entering Seed Investing and The Insight Development Framework
- every mention in 2020, scene by scene →
2019 8 mentions in 5 episodes 2 per episode
- 20VC: Reddit CEO Steve Huffman on Scaling Teams; What Works and What Does Not, A CEO's Relationship with Stress and Managing It & How To Structure Internal Decision-Making Effectively
- 20VC: Y Combinator's New President, Geoff Ralston on The Single Most Important Perspective An Investor Can Provide A Founder, The Biggest Lessons From Working Alongside Paul Graham & Why You Will Lose As An Investor If You "Profile Invest"
- 20VC Exclusive: Roy Bahat on Bloomberg Beta's New Fund, The Truth About Valuation That Very Few VCs Will Tell You & Why Founders of Venture Backed Startups Make The Best Angels
- 20VC: Mercury Founder Immad Akhund on Why Angel Investing Makes Founders Better Operators, The Right Way For Founders To Discuss and Present Competition To Investors & How To Think About Your Initial Wedge Into The Market and How It Expands Over Time
- 20VC: How To Build True Human Relationships with VC Pre-Investment, Why Valuation Is Not The Only Term and When To Take Lower Offers & How To Approach Mental Health As A Founder with Jon Dishotsky, Founder & CEO @ Starcity
- every mention in 2019, scene by scene →
2018 1 mention in 1 episode
2017 5 mentions in 3 episodes 2 per episode
- 20VC: Y Combinator's Paul Buchheit on Creating Gmail Version 1.0 & Leadership Lessons from Working With Zuckerberg and Larry Paige
- 20VC: The Power Of A Concentrated Seed Portfolio, Why Operational Value Add Models At Seed Do Not Make Sense & Why We Will See A Shakeout Of Growth Stage Investors with Roger Ehrenberg, Founder & Managing Partner @ IA Ventures
- 20VC: Why You Should Build Your Investor Team Like A Sports Team & How To Leverage The Abilities Of Your Investors Effectively with Ted Blosser, Founder & CEO @ WorkRamp
- every mention in 2017, scene by scene →
2016 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
- 20VC: Floodgate's Mike Maples on What Makes Category Kings, What Most Venture Funds Do Wrong When Hiring & 'The Dance Of Product Market Fit'
- 20VC: Why The Whole Industry Is Backward Looking, The Best Funds Are Entrepreneur Led and Venture Is All About Access with Alex Bangash, Founder @ Trusted Insight
- every mention in 2016, scene by scene →
2015 1 mention in 1 episode
Everything said about Justin Kan, oldest first
Aug 1, 2016
Aug 1, 2016 bullish
Aug 1, 2016
Justin Kan: Successful Investors Need Platform, Selection Thesis, and Relentless Pursuit
“Well, I think investors have to have, you know, there's three qualities of investors that I, or of investors or firms that I think are important investing. I've thought about this a little bit. The first one is a platform that generates leads for them or reaso…”
Aug 1, 2016
Oct 10, 2016
Jun 21, 2019 positive
Jun 21, 2019 negative
Kan: It is a myth that founders must suffer to build startups
“I think people feel like they have to suffer in order to do a startup, and I actually just disagree with that. I don't think you have to suffer. You're going to experience pain, definitely. Things aren't always going to go right, but you don't have to suffer.”
Jun 21, 2019 positive
Kan uses a daily phone alarm to meditate on non-attachment
“I have a timer on my phone every day that actually reminds me to meditate on attachment specifically and to remind myself that, you know, if I achieve the thing that I want, I think I want, actually, I'm not going to actually be any happier, whatever that goal…”
Jun 21, 2019 negative
Jun 21, 2019 negative
Kan: Treating Atrium like an investor was my biggest early mistake
“I think I approached Atrium with a little bit too much of an investor attitude in the beginning, which was a little bit too much like hands off. Like I'm just going to build a team and the team is going to do everything without like really myself getting in th…”
Jun 21, 2019
Kan: Founders have a fiduciary duty to investors to avoid burnout
“And if you burn out, you are not doing yourself or your investors or your employees or your customers any favors. You need to like retain yourself. And so you need to create a situation inside your company where you are going to be retained for a long time. I …”
Jun 21, 2019 neutral
Kan: The happiness of selling Twitch for $1B lasted a week
“When we sold Twitch, Almost a billion dollars. Like I was very happy for one day, two days, even a week. But after that, I was just, I remember, you know, kind of just went, okay, that's the new normal. And now I'm back here at my baseline.”
Jun 21, 2019
Jun 21, 2019
Kan: Tying your entire identity to your startup guarantees burnout
“My entire identity was wrapped up in my company. And being an entrepreneur. And so the problem with that is that when things go badly, you feel badly about yourself. You transpose those feelings that you might have about what's happening in your company onto y…”
Jun 1, 2020 neutral
Jun 1, 2020 positive
Justin Kan: Quitting alcohol is tech's easiest performance optimization
“Yeah, I think it's becoming much more socially acceptable and in this, I guess, especially in Silicon Valley, you know, where people are looking for all these performance optimization things and they're intermittent fasting and eating keto and meditating and l…”
Jun 1, 2020
Jun 1, 2020 positive
Justin Kan: Navigating nightlife sober forces you to build real confidence
“I would never have thought that I could have fun without being hammered at nightlife before, but it's kind of like having to actually just live your life in Normal mode instead of easy mode, you know, and figure out how you can have the confidence and be okay …”