As a newbie, young investor in the early-stage venture world, I feel like I am constantly drinking water from a fire hose. Or, to use another analogy I use a ton, I am building a plane while flying it at the same time with no owner's manual. Two years into my career running a new venture fund as a twenty-six-year-old, I found myself hustling every day, meeting exceptional human beings with great stories and visions, but I have lost track of what is driving me on a day-to-day basis. Therefore, I have decided to stop, reflect, and do a silly exercise I found online of writing down the ten things I love the most in life. This exercise helped me reaffirm why I love the early-stage start-up world so much and why I think it is the best job on the planet.

• I love empowering friends and peers to achieve their full potential and succeed in life.

• I love meeting new people and hearing what makes them tick.

• I love listening to other people speak about what they are most passionate about.

• I love constantly learning and trying new things (hence the blockchain newsletter).

• I love competition and winning.

• I love thinking creatively and figuring things out on my own.

• I love making money.

• I love to be challenged.

• I love being the energetic force in the room that spreads optimism and positivity.

• I love understanding people’s perspectives and motivations.

Note: The exercise calls to do these quickly, and in no specific order to be as genuine as possible (I also excluded the obvious ones like family and religion). Also, sorry if some of these are cringey.

What I love most about early-stage venture as a new, young investor is that I am consistently meeting high-octane overachievers who think what they are building will change the world. This, in itself, is extremely motivational and one of the best parts of the job. However, I am constantly trying to figure out how to “win” as a new entrant in a crowded space.

Whether you are a thesis-driven investor or an opportunistic investor (or somewhere in between like myself), the goal is always the same—meet as many founders as possible, and back the top 1% where the team and TAM are strong enough to justify a fund returning investment—rinse and repeat.

However, I have come to realize that there is a ton of whitewash in the world of early-stage investing. Since my day job is listening to exceptional people all day, I realized that the cream of the crop founders need two things from investors:

1. Capital (commodity)

2. Unequivocal support and breathing room (scarcity)

Of course, it is great when investors can help with recruiting, fundraising, customer intros, etc., but the best-of-the-best founders can do that themselves more often than not. My biggest takeaway after two years into my investing career is that what I love the most is more uncommon than common.

As a Zoomer investor myself, this might be a cliché, but bringing the “good vibes” to a cap table seems to be what founders appreciate the most. Building zero to one is a lonely, bumpy journey. It requires an immense amount of brainpower and manpower to reach the mountaintop.

The best founders are the best decision-makers, and even Vinod Khosla said that 70-80% of his peers contributed “negative value” to their startups.

The people that give the best advice and guidance in my life are my friends and family. Usually, they provide me with straightforward, high-quality advice without interfering. This also tends to be the best strategy as an early-stage investor (from what I can tell).

I have heard this saying a thousand times—“do what you love, and you will never work a day in your life.” What I have realized from doing this exercise is that what I love is supporting my friends and peers to achieve their loftiest goals. What I love is being the force multiplier using sheer will, hustle, and “good vibes” to accomplish hard challenges. What I love is winning. And what I love most is that I just realized that applying what I love to my day job should, in theory, create a virtuous cycle of doing the things I love the most so I never have to work a day in my life.

I will be using this blog as a way to share my on-the-fly learnings as a Gen Z investor trying to build a generational investing practice. Given I like to listen to smart people and try a lot of things, I will also be sharing my takes on the cool things I come across and the trends taking over the best generation the world has ever seen.

If you are a young, hungry founder with a cool idea and want to talk, hit me at zach@range-group.com.

As a newbie, young investor in the early-stage venture world, I feel like I am constantly drinking water from a fire hose. Or, to use another analogy I use a ton, I am building a plane while flying it at the same time with no owner's manual. Two years into my career running a new venture fund as a twenty-six-year-old, I found myself hustling every day, meeting exceptional human beings with great stories and visions, but I have lost track of what is driving me on a day-to-day basis. Therefore, I have decided to stop, reflect, and do a silly exercise I found online of writing down the ten things I love the most in life. This exercise helped me reaffirm why I love the early-stage start-up world so much and why I think it is the best job on the planet.

• I love empowering friends and peers to achieve their full potential and succeed in life.

• I love meeting new people and hearing what makes them tick.

• I love listening to other people speak about what they are most passionate about.

• I love constantly learning and trying new things (hence the blockchain newsletter).

• I love competition and winning.

• I love thinking creatively and figuring things out on my own.

• I love making money.

• I love to be challenged.

• I love being the energetic force in the room that spreads optimism and positivity.

• I love understanding people’s perspectives and motivations.

Note: The exercise calls to do these quickly, and in no specific order to be as genuine as possible (I also excluded the obvious ones like family and religion). Also, sorry if some of these are cringey.

What I love most about early-stage venture as a new, young investor is that I am consistently meeting high-octane overachievers who think what they are building will change the world. This, in itself, is extremely motivational and one of the best parts of the job. However, I am constantly trying to figure out how to “win” as a new entrant in a crowded space.

Whether you are a thesis-driven investor or an opportunistic investor (or somewhere in between like myself), the goal is always the same—meet as many founders as possible, and back the top 1% where the team and TAM are strong enough to justify a fund returning investment—rinse and repeat.

However, I have come to realize that there is a ton of whitewash in the world of early-stage investing. Since my day job is listening to exceptional people all day, I realized that the cream of the crop founders need two things from investors:

1. Capital (commodity)

2. Unequivocal support and breathing room (scarcity)

Of course, it is great when investors can help with recruiting, fundraising, customer intros, etc., but the best-of-the-best founders can do that themselves more often than not. My biggest takeaway after two years into my investing career is that what I love the most is more uncommon than common.

As a Zoomer investor myself, this might be a cliché, but bringing the “good vibes” to a cap table seems to be what founders appreciate the most. Building zero to one is a lonely, bumpy journey. It requires an immense amount of brainpower and manpower to reach the mountaintop.

The best founders are the best decision-makers, and even Vinod Khosla said that 70-80% of his peers contributed “negative value” to their startups.

The people that give the best advice and guidance in my life are my friends and family. Usually, they provide me with straightforward, high-quality advice without interfering. This also tends to be the best strategy as an early-stage investor (from what I can tell).

I have heard this saying a thousand times—“do what you love, and you will never work a day in your life.” What I have realized from doing this exercise is that what I love is supporting my friends and peers to achieve their loftiest goals. What I love is being the force multiplier using sheer will, hustle, and “good vibes” to accomplish hard challenges. What I love is winning. And what I love most is that I just realized that applying what I love to my day job should, in theory, create a virtuous cycle of doing the things I love the most so I never have to work a day in my life.

I will be using this blog as a way to share my on-the-fly learnings as a Gen Z investor trying to build a generational investing practice. Given I like to listen to smart people and try a lot of things, I will also be sharing my takes on the cool things I come across and the trends taking over the best generation the world has ever seen.

If you are a young, hungry founder with a cool idea and want to talk, hit me at zach@range-group.com.