September 2018

Increasingly I want to write about the intersection of venture dollars and the ways in which we live.

Seeding dreams, dreaming with founders, the decisions made in venture impact the ways in which millions live tomorrow. What we chose to see. What we chose to believe. What we chose to fund.

Jumping in forehead first, I have become fascinated by the things that dictate how we live tangibly. How do we live better? Age better? How do we keep working and creating better employment opportunities? How do we augment human ability and capacity? How do we enhance rather than limit ourselves through ever increasing data troves? How do build better cities? How do we adapt for a globe that is changing, undeniably?

If it doesn't affect the ways in which we live, work, communicate, age or move, it may not be for me.

As a second consideration, I am constantly inspired and amazed by my sisters – and wonder about the world that they will inhabit and inherit. How they'll communicate, create community, define themselves. What different expectations will they bring to the workforce. How do they think about their data, self ownership, right to privacy. And so, always with one eye on Gen-Z.

But the world that they will inhabit is not a given and – finally – as a product of the weird and wonderful years that saw boundaries blurred, paired with a healthy dose of Berkeley, a perpetual forward looker grounded firmly in the present, I also love those seeking to build into times of destruction. Times of unpicking. Unplucking. The unfurling of the fine threads that were built around us. Those looking for the opportunities that have to come from the gaps that are created, and uncovered. With imbalance amplified, uncertainty undeniable, I am fascinated by those seeding with unbridled optimism the technologies that exploit and build into the gaps of today.

And, as some would say, the future will not look like the past.