The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 20 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Gordon: Most boardroom attendees never say anything useful
“You know, my experience in boards, most people who sit in a boardroom don't say a single useful thing, you know, so if there's only five useful things, if the goal, the high watermark is five useful things in three hours, and when there's five board members, n…”
Gordon: No successful startup investor completely ignores valuation
“I don't know any successful investor in companies who invest that way.”
Gordon: VCs cannot help failing CEOs, only help successful ones scale
“You can't much help them when they fail, but how do you help them scale when they succeed?”
Gordon: Great investors optimize for expected value, not loss avoidance
“And Mark, I think great investors think about expected value, not loss avoidance.”
Gordon: Only execute M&A deals if willing to pay double
“My math is never do a merger and acquisition deal if you wouldn't pay double. Because the ones that work, basically a year later, they're twice as valuable as you thought they were. And the ones that don't work, the amount you spend probably doesn't matter.”
Gordon: Overpaying by 2x cuts a VC fund's at-bats in half
“The negative about that is most of the things that you think you're big game hunting for don't work out, and if you can do 30 investments in a fund and you overpay by double, and there's x percent are gonna be big winners, now you've cut your at-bats in half.”
Gordon: Controversial startup deals are better VC investments than obvious ones
“The other thing that we've discovered is we go around the table and it's controversial. That's often a good thing. And at that point, we depend on one person being a fervent champion on behalf of the company. But if it's really obvious to us, it's probably obv…”
Gordon: Investor board members must be the primary guardians of cash
“The investor board members just half It has to be the most attentive to cash because creative people and strategists don't always think about cash.”
Gordon: Pure investors focus on riding winners over fixing losers
“Most people who are pure investors tend to ride winners rather than trying to fix losers.”
Gordon: Creativity requires confidence built on optimism and earned success
“Psychologists can prove that creativity is enhanced with confidence. And confidence is built with optimism and with earned success.”
Gordon: Board members must ask hard questions without being hostile
“So I'd say in general, it's ask hard questions, but don't be an asshole.”
Gordon: The hardest operator-to-board-member transition is relinquishing control
“Being a board member for somebody who's been an operator, the hardest thing to do is to realize that you're not in charge anymore.”
Gordon: Optimal three-hour board meetings yield five actionable management ideas
“Board meetings are rated most highly when people are energized and when the management team takes away a couple of good, useful ideas. So I think in a three hour board meeting, five ideas that the manager team writes down and tries to figure out what to deal w…”
Gordon: Mike Maples provides game-changing insights in every board meeting
“So I love Mike Maples from Floodgate. He's been, I've been on a couple boards with him. What he does is so well, he has high empathy for CEOs. It seems in every board meeting, he says at least one thing that's game changing.”
Gordon: Fred Wilson was crucial early at Zynga despite dialing in
“Fred Wilson is kind of the crown prince of New York venture capital and a great blogger. He was extremely helpful in the early days of Zynga, even though he was mostly dialed in. He's just such a crisp, sharp thinker.”
Gordon: USV led edtech discourse years before making edtech investments
“And then Albert Wenger, he created the meme of hacking education, which I'm a fanboy of. And that was probably in oh nine or oh 10. He convened leading thinkers. And interestingly enough, they didn't invest in any learning and Companies for several years after…”
Gordon: Kleiner Perkins requires a single passionate partner to champion every deal
“And, you know, but for us, there's got to be one person who pounds the table.”
Gordon: Analytical strategy documents disable the creative process
“The way to hand off strategies to creative people is Was not to write an analytical doc. He said his secret was to write a short story. So I've taken that forever that I try to get creative people engaged in primary research, basically see customers that if I …”
Gordon: Human-powered robotics will be a spectacularly big industry
“And in general, I think human powered robotics is going to be spectacularly big.”
Gordon: Amazon AWS, Kindle, and Prime were shaped in key board meetings
“I remember the board meeting on Amazon where we first talked About what become Amazon Web Services, AWS. I remember the first time, I remember a series of meetings that led to the presentation of Kindle. I remember a series of meetings that led to the presenta…”