Entrepreneurs for Impact (EFI) Podcast: Transcripts
#175:
Bill Liao, General Partner at SOSV and Chairman at Ki Tua Fund — $1B+ Under Management. Top 100 Minority Ethnic Leaders in Technology. His Mantra for Startups: Don’t Die. Don’t Quit. Don’t Suck.
Podcast Introduction
Chris Wedding:
My guest today is Bill Liao, General Partner at SOSV and chairman at Ki Tua Fund. Bill is a rare kind of guy in the best way.
He's a thoughtful and prolific investor, recognized as one of the top 100 minority ethnic leaders in technology by the Financial Times, as well as kind of person who refused to fly in an airplane until his nonprofit called We Forest All One Word planted 100 million trees. Took about 10 years. SOSV is a venture capital firm that provides pre seed, venture and growth stage funding to thousands of startups in the technology sector with a focus on deep tech for human and planetary health solutions. Ki Tua Fund is a growth stage corporate VC firm focused on food and medicine. In this episode we talked about what the founder Pledge is and why he signed it. Insights from two startups he co founded with billion dollar IPOs. Why good advice is based on expensive experiences that didn't go as planned.
How doubt is a powerful driver for the scientific method. His mantra for startups three things. Don't die, don't quit, don't suck. The power of humility. A coaching session that he kind of on the spot gave to me on purpose and values the business benefits of neural diversity on a team. Why a one person cap table is a red flag. Philosophy books that shaped his thinking and a whole lot more. Please give Bill, SOSV and Ketua Fund a shout out on LinkedIn, Slack or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. Finally, one last request before we get into it. Hop on over to Apple or Spotify to rate, review and follow this podcast. As you know, I don't take any sponsors for our show, so this little Gesture of support means a lot to me and the guests.
Thanks so much and hope you enjoy it.
Podcast Interview
Chris Wedding:
Bill Liao, welcome to the podcast. I'll give a few of your titles. Many more to be discussed, I believe, during the podcast, but general partner at SOSV, which many of our listeners will know about as I think the most active climate tech investor, certainly in early stage. Also chair of Ki Tua Fund, which we'll cover as well, and chair of we Forest Planting, I believe I heard tens of millions of trees around the world and I, I wish this is a moment where I wish this was also a YouTube production, although I don't want the time or game chasing that implies. But for listeners to see that you are walking slowly and calmly on a treadmill as we record the first for sure. Anyway, Bill, welcome to the podcast.
Bill Liao:
Thank you so much, Chris. It's such a pleasure to be here. And yeah, it is something I'm a little bit proud of that the, you know, the audio and video set up here that allows me to walk on a treadmill that hopefully come through clearly.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, very clearly. And I believe you mentioned it earlier, but how many steps does this allow you to get while working per day?
Bill Liao:
A lot of my time is spent talking to portfolio companies, speaking with people on Zoom. I started this around about the start of the pandemic and I get around 22,000 steps a day. You know, just quietly strolling, walking and talking. Treadmill's slightly uphill, so it's, you know, I can break a sweat sometimes.
Chris Wedding:
Well, you know, sometimes I will take calls with some of our CEOs in our peer group while walking in the woods. But, but my new habit is to wear a, a weighted vest. Right. So Peter, ATI of the book Outlive, got my wife and I hooked on weighted vest to kind of, you know, step up the game. And so I sometimes if I'm going up a hill, tell founders or the CEOs, hey, look, I promise I'm in shape, but I am wearing a weighted vest while talking to you. Anyway. Good stuff, Bill. Good stuff.
Bill Liao:
Well, I have to say Peter is right. You want to take very good care of your knees while you're doing that. So because like, one of the fastest ways to reduce your longevity is to injure yourself while exercising, I should clarify.
Chris Wedding:
The weighted best is 20 to 25 pounds, not 50. Big difference. Big difference.
Bill Liao:
Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
Well, Bill, maybe we'll start with a couple of fun stats. So I believe the numbers are you're managing together with Your partners over a billion dollars to invest in climate tech and other impact solutions. And I believe over 1500 portfolio companies across, I'm guessing SOS mostly and also Ki Tua Fund. The newer. The newer work. Does that sound right?
Bill Liao:
Yeah, the 1500 would be SOS by itself.
Chris Wedding:
Right.
Bill Liao:
Ki Tua is a relatively new fund. We only have a few investments so far, but we have, you know, roughly half a billion in dry powder at Ki Tua. SSV is raising Fund 5, which is very exciting. So I would, you know, if things look up a little bit, I would say we'll probably hit the 2 billion mark just in SOSV sometime in the next two years, which will be exciting. I've been with SOSV since 2011 and it's been amazing watching it grow. We are a deep tech investor, so even though we love impact and we love climate tech investing and we are the most active in early stage, which by number of deals, that's true. We are investing for commercial return. So we're not an Article 8 or an Article 9 fund. Not that I have anything against that particularly.
It's just there's good money to be made in solving the biggest problem in human history.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, I'm glad you clarified that. I think most listeners are of the same belief that there's no need to sacrifice investment returns to solve big environmental and climate challenges. For sure. Maybe. I think most of our listeners, or so the data says. Most of our listeners are in the US. You mentioned Article 8, Article 9, which I believe is an SFDR kind of EU protocol. But maybe just for those listeners who are curious, what's the short on Article 8 and Article 9?
Bill Liao:
So Article 8 means that you predominantly focus. I mean, there's a lot to it, but it's a standard that basically says that you know what the outcomes are for the planet and you focus there. Article 9 says that you are dedicated to environmentally positive outcomes as much as you are dedicated to financial return. And I believe Article 9 has just been banned in Texas.
Chris Wedding:
We are not surprised by that. Based on headlines from the last whatever, 15 months or so. Clearly politics versus what many investors and entrepreneurs there believe.
Bill Liao:
It's kind of crazy that there is an adversarial relationship between politics and reality. In my experience, reality tends to win no matter what you say.
Chris Wedding:
The time scales may vary, but yeah, reality wins exactly.
Bill Liao:
One of the things I often ask founders when they come to us with a deep tech proposition is does it obey the laws of physics as we know them? And if the answer is no, then I'M deeply concerned.
Chris Wedding:
Right. That's probably a situation where it's like, all right, next deal, let's look at the next deal. Yeah, let's go back to SOSV for a second. So you provided some clarity on kind of activity levels and some broadening of the scope clearly beyond just climate. But maybe for those folks that are newer to sosv, just describe thesis, if you will, or the box within which founders may fit if they come knocking on your door.
Bill Liao:
Absolutely. So the thing that sets us apart is the majority of us, including our founder and managing partner, Sean, we're all entrepreneurs. So our fund is led by people who've done it. I've co founded, taken public, $2 billion startups. I've also blown 7 million of my own money, created it in a failed startup. So I've seen a lot of life on the entrepreneur side. And we started to create accelerator programs around two very difficult areas to work in. One is hardware with our HACS program, and the other is biotech. And I actually co founded the biotech accelerator Indie Bio with Arvind Gupta, who's now Mayfield. And the idea is that technology has democratized to the point where hardware and biotech are kind of within the scope of VC, normal VC based returns.
Which means that you could deploy capital into those new areas in hardware, robotics and biotech, everything from genetic engineering to therapeutics and see a VC style return horizon, 10 times your money in three to five years, that kind of return. And our programs, our accelerator programs basically de risk the startups we invest in. So what we're looking for is a young vibrant team with great technology, fairly well balanced, a prototype that has an impact and also has a deep tech focus that we can back and we can put through our program, give them some money straight away and get product market fit and give them all of the advice, not just from us as former entrepreneurs, but also from the 1500 other CEOs. And then on top of that, CFOs and CTOs and all the other people that have just burgeoned our community.
And yourself know the value of community and how it takes a village. And then at the end of our program, we then expose them to every investor that we know. And if you think about, we've made 1500 investments and most of those investments have gone on to raise additional capital. We participated in something like four or five thousand investment deals and with just about every other investor you've ever heard of. And so we have this outsized ability to assist our Startups to raise more money at better valuations post program. Now, we don't invest in companies that just walk across the door unless they can do the program, because we found that the program is very powerful in de risking because we're just sharing a lot that we've learned the hard way.
If someone comes to you and gives you advice, the best question to ask them is, how much did it cost you to learn that? And in our program, in our Indie Bio program, for instance, or a HACS program, you're talking about advice that's cost hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars. It's just a very different pool of knowledge that we're drawing on. And I'm quite proud of that we've grown it up. Because in 2014, there was no biotech accelerator in the world. We were the first. And in the nine years of running the programs, we've learned a lot of hard lessons and we've interacted with a lot of people who've learned a lot of hard lessons, very expensive lessons that have then been able to de risk what has turned out to be just a bumper crop of great startups doing amazing stuff.
And I think if you're going to shift the needle, entrepreneurship is a really powerful way of shifting the needle.
Chris Wedding:
On the lessons piece, there's some sort of great quote which says, you know, it's really great to learn from your mistakes. It's even better to learn from someone else's mistakes. Right. Which is part of what you get to do in a program like this. Can you elaborate on what the program entails?
Bill Liao:
So we see a lot of scientists that are yet to become entrepreneurs, we see a lot of engineers that are yet to become entrepreneurs. And there is a complex journey between the worlds of science and engineering and entrepreneurship. If you treat it as a covenant, there's an organizing word for most human covenants. You know, in the religious covenant, you would hope that the organizing word is faith. Although I see money and power seem to have crept in there in various places. But I still believe that there is some true religion with truly faith as its convening word. In the corridors of power. It used to be the convening word, used to be and sometimes still is service in the corridors of entrepreneurship and investment. The convening word is conviction. Because without conviction, there is no funding, there are no staff, there are no customers.
You have to have conviction. You yourself know that the covenant of science cannot be conviction. Science is convened around doubt. For without doubt, there is no scientific method. And without scientific method, it ain't science, it's Theranos.
Chris Wedding:
Right?
Bill Liao:
So you have to, as an entrepreneur, scientist or engineer, you have to learn to tread between the covenants. And because of our deep experience in assisting very deep tech founders, to learn how to express conviction in the right way, in a convincing way, how to tell a story, how to make people engage. That is a lot of what the program is about. And then there's all the mechanics. Like, yeah, you will learn more in two weeks at Indie Bio about business than you will in pretty much any MBA I've ever seen or heard of. And not just like theoretical stuff, like actually how it works.
Chris Wedding:
For listeners who know that I also teach MBA students at Duke. I have to say, maybe that's true, but I hear you. Yes, the intensity and practicality are worth a ton.
Bill Liao:
I'll put it another way. You know there's a lot of incubator programs in the world, right? And I don't mean to offend with the MBA comment, I'm just saying at all, like, there's a lot of incubators in the world. And if you think about an incubator, it's kind of a safe, comfy place to grow for an organism. Our experience is that doesn't work for startups. So our programs are more like crucibles where great startups are forged under high pressure. Now, it's not pressure that we artificially create, it's more created by the awareness that founders get of just how short the fuse is if they're going to have their startup be a massive success.
Chris Wedding:
That's a really interesting juxtaposition of the nice and warm and cozy incubator versus the crucible. Forging something great. Let's go back to what it looks like from the founder in terms of. I mean, is there a formula on, hey, we. Whether it's hacks or indie bio, we provide this package of, you know, advice and capital and other in kind. And in exchange, we have this kind of term relationship, equity options, etc. With, with companies. Or is that kind of bespoke? What's it look like for founders?
Bill Liao:
It's pretty much a straightforward deal. Is something like a quarter of a million bucks in a safe. You could claim that you've got a million, 2 million plus valuation, even though it's not actually valuation, but you can hold your head up and say, hey, I didn't sell out equity for nothing. And then on top of that, you get lab space, you get all of the de risking that we provide you also get access to a really unique folks program. I mean you get Amazon A9 hosting for free and you get G Suite and you get all this other stuff, accounting software, everything. Last time I looked at it, I think it was about 20 million bucks of available perks in the program for each startup. And I think we're averaging something like 5 to 6 million worth of redemption.
Chris Wedding:
Those are big numbers. Much bigger than the surface value of the cash, huh?
Bill Liao:
Yeah, yeah. And we get that because we just have such like, it's such a big community. It gives us that kind of group buying power.
Chris Wedding:
And having seen so many startups come through the crucible, the accelerator and having been the founder, serial founder yourself, what are a couple of the biggest blind spots? Let's say standing between a founder with conviction and I don't know, but product market fit, et cetera, whatever the next stage is across the valley.
Bill Liao:
So there's a. It's always going to cost more than you think, but it just always does. And Excel is not a great way of modeling the future.
Chris Wedding:
Darn it. Yeah.
Bill Liao:
My three rules of startup are don't die, don't quit and don't suck in that order. So yeah, you will have to make compromises in order to survive. In all likelihood, no matter how good you are at raising money, don't give up because it's going to get dark before the dawn many times and provide a solution to a problem that's of a sufficient quality that someone will pay for it. In other words, don't suck at what you do. And if you can do those three things, you're kind of okay. Like there's a very, like there's some luck involved. Don't get me wrong. And still you're going to be ahead.
Chris Wedding:
Of the pack on the last one, the, the don't, the don't suck piece.
Bill Liao:
Yes.
Chris Wedding:
I'm reminded this author thinker that I like a lot, Cal Newport, he wrote, you probably have read some of his books, Deep work, et cetera. But his next one coming out in March is Slow Productivity. So very much nice counterintuitive. But he has three, he has, he kind of summarizes the book in three short phrases. But the last one I believe is Obsess over Quality, which sounds a lot like don't suck. Right?
Bill Liao:
Yeah. I mean there is a balance between to be had between OCD perfectionism and getting it done enough good enough that it's good enough is actually includes high enough quality that people will love the product. That's good enough. Like you're producing something that nobody wants is not good enough. Producing perfection is also impossible. Like, like, I see a lot of founders miss the mark, either one way or the other. Either their product really sucks, or, you know, and they just can't bring it up to a standard that's. That they could be proud of, or they just obsess, obsess about perfection and they never get it out the door. And so there is a happy medium there. Another great book that helps with that is a book called Quiet.
I forget the author off the top of my head, but I'm sure people can find it. And it's a book about introversion versus extroversion. There are a lot of optimistic people in the world, a lot of pessimistic people in the world, a lot of introverts and a lot of extroverts. And that diversity of thought is necessary. Startups need diversity of thought. The place where you need to come together is around purpose and values. If your values don't resonate, then you're going to have founder splits. And that's actually the number one cause of startup death, in my experience, is founders breaking up one way or another, which then leads to running out of money. And if you can account for all the different ways people think and yet share resonant values, that's incredibly powerful.
And by the way, for anyone who thinks that, you know, pessimists don't have a place in the world, next time you get on an aircraft and you see an engineer working on the engines, I swear you want a pessimist at that moment.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. Well, one thing we talk about among the CEO group is it's nice to have a devil's advocate, but it's nice if they're appointed and if it rotates, because if the same person is always the pessimist, you're like, come on, man, why?
Bill Liao:
Why?
Chris Wedding:
Can always be a buzz kill, you know? But the red team, blue team is pretty important.
Bill Liao:
Yeah. At the same time, remember covenant of doubt, science, engineering importance.
Chris Wedding:
That's true.
Bill Liao:
Like there. Another classic mistake I see founders make is they hire people just like them. So their purpose is the same, their values are the same, but their skills are the same. Their modus operandi are the same. Not resonant, identical. And if you hire people that just look like you, then you are killing your diversity and therefore your ability to engage with the real world. Because the real world is going to throw you all different kinds of problems. And if you can only solve problems, one Kind of problem. They're welcome. Evolution in action.
Chris Wedding:
That's right. It's like higher for gaps versus higher for, I don't know, mimics or something.
Bill Liao:
Yeah, higher force multiplier. Like it's insufficient just to hire for gas. You want to take what you do and hire to inject nitrous oxide into it and to inject a spark. You don't have time to hire. Okay, you need to hire amazing in a startup, like in a normal business. Hey, hire people that can just do the job and you'll be fine. In a startup, you gotta hire a team plus and you gotta hire force multipliers for your A team plus.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, it is hard. Let's go back one more time to sosv and then we're going to switch to many other hats that you wear. Of course, listeners may not know I'm staring at you wearing a very unique hat which they'll see on your profile pic.
Bill Liao:
So I prefer to think of it as stylish.
Chris Wedding:
That was a compliment. It's about as. It's about as unique as folks joining a podcast with me and see me wear, you know, a flannel shirt. Like, I'm in the my happy place of the North Carolina mountains.
Bill Liao:
Anyway, you are in your happy place. I mean, for those that it's true. Can't see it. You are in a log cabin. I mean, like, it might not be it on the outside, but on the inside it certainly is.
Chris Wedding:
That's right. Complete with hammock and meditation cushion. Yes. It's everything one needs almost.
Bill Liao:
I can see the hammock in the corner there.
Chris Wedding:
That's right. That's right. So, okay, one more question. On SOSV, you all get whatever, some multiple for sure of applications from startups versus those you clearly pick for your program. Either how do you make that selection and. Or how do you make the investment decisions more broadly? I think they're the same question, but if they're not, like, what's your. What are your investment criteria beyond don't quit, don't die, don't suck, if you will.
Bill Liao:
Okay, so that's the startup survival criteria. Investment criteria are a little different. My ideal team comes in with some humility. They know that they don't know everything they need to know and they're eager and keen to learn. I say the word team because if it's just one person on the cap table, we tend not to take them into the program. We'd send them off to a venture builder to find a co founder and by the way, you know, getting a co founder, you need to have a founder vesting agreement that is long term because if you do have a founder split, they need to give their equity back. The one leaving needs to give the majority of their equity back to the company, otherwise the company's dead. And if the company's dead, their equity is worthless anyway.
So you need a founder vesting agreement and that's another exclusion criteria. Right. If a team won't sell in a founder vesting agreement before going into the program, that's a really bad sign. Bad sign for us. We want to see a prototype, we want to see that people have actually cobbled together something that kind of works. And we want to see a little bit of market insight, like does anybody want the thing that works? And we love to see teams that have a lot of doers, but also that have some level of hustle that we can help enhance. And those are how we take them in.
And then three to six months later, we want to have seen massive progress, we want to see traction, we want to see bringing people on, we want to see great advisors coming in, customers, letters of engagement, non refundable engineering sales, any kind of mass attraction. Really interesting happening in the program. And we want to see engagement with other investors. So there's a queue of people saying, hey, I love this. Because that's how we then know that we haven't fallen in love with our own children because other people lead the rounds after us. So somebody else leading that round after the accelerator, you know, we've brought them in, they're giving a great valuation because there's great traction. It's then obvious to us that we need to follow on, defend our position.
Chris Wedding:
Mm.
Bill Liao:
And we do that story a lot for sure.
Chris Wedding:
Makes sense. Okay, so we've got 23 minutes to cover your four other hats, plus some, I don't know, kind of personal belief, you know, productivity type questions as well. So let's start with the 4:1, the Ki Tua fund. What's the focus there?
Bill Liao:
So Ki Tua fund is a food as medicine fund primarily, but it also is a generalist late stage investor as well. It's a corporate venture capital arm of a giant dairy cooperative in New Zealand called Fonterra. And Ki Tua means forward looking. And I'm chair of the board and chair of the investment committee. And our mandate is pretty broad in terms of financial returns and very specific in terms of the food is medicine, human health. So we've invested in companies like Pendulum and some genomics that are doing amazing new things in microbiome. We've invested in a drug called Cyclarity or a drug company called Cyclarity that looks like they have a way to end and reverse heart disease for all humanity.
Chris Wedding:
Oh, just that?
Bill Liao:
Just that. Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
Aim higher Bill. Yeah.
Bill Liao:
No, I'm always needing to raise the bar. You know they have a molecule that they designed using AI that is non toxic, that's a common food grade ingredient that they have made a dimer of that removes 7 ketocholesterol from the body which is the cause of all arterial plaques. And actually also, you know, the improvement in circulation won't just end heart attacks and most strokes, it'll also end many dimensions. So those are the sorts of things that we're investing in. You know, looking at amazing stuff there.
Chris Wedding:
Exciting. Well, clearly that's a whole podcast in and of itself. But we're just going to kind of tease listeners on the Ki Tua fund. Let's go to we forest. What's the story?
Bill Liao:
So my daughter, when she was 8, I was actually appointed to the diplomatic corps of St. Kitts and Nevis by the Prime Minister there to attend climate meetings at the UN in Switzerland where I used to live. And I was reading through the materials that I was being sent and we homeschooled our kids. So my daughter was basically reading through this stuff with me and I, you know, quite advanced stuff and she turned around and said to me, daddy, you broke the planet, you better fix it.
Chris Wedding:
Okay?
Bill Liao:
And what she meant was my generation had screwed it up for her generation and she didn't want to inherit this problem. And like, you know, if you have a daughter, you know that when they stick a knife in your heart there's really not, you're no defense, right? Like you gotta get going. And I started to notice that the whole environmental movement was very negative and fear based. And about a third of all humans when they're confronted with fear, run away from it. About a third of all humans when they're confronted with fear, freeze in place. And only about a third of humans when they're confronted with fear actually get moving. So I looked high and low. Is there any leverage point that we could use to give us a bit of time, extra time to slow down climate change?
I came across the work of a guy called Walter Jane who showed very conclusively that wherever humans have deforested rainforest, that rainforest complete deforestation has turned into desert and it hasn't come back. And he showed an interesting mechanism of action and that Mechanism of action is that there is a microbiome of a rainforest that is aerial. There are little critters out there, like Aryobacter orogenes, that get swept up in the wind. And how they come down again is by absorbing moisture and catalyzing raindrops so they can colonize new areas. And Aerobacter is actually more powerful, causing it to rain, than silver nitrate. So here's this mechanism that most people don't know, that rainforests don't grow where it rains where there are rainforests. And so if you can start taking degraded land and restoring it to primary rainforest, you can actually create more cloud cover.
And a 2% increase in equatorial cloud cover actually reflects about the same amount of energy that the whole of our human emissions absorb. So there is a way, not as a permanent fix, but there's a way to slow climate change down that isn't in the CO2 models. And this work, you know, I was doing this research, yeah. Back in way like 15 years ago. And so I said, well if this is true, and there's plenty of evidence suggests it is, we need to start planting trees. And then I started thinking, well, if we plant trees, and I noticed that a lot of tree planting resulted in charcoal. So if we plant trees, we need to find it, figure out a way that they're going to be integrated into the lives of local people to make their lives better.
And my wife and I both studied permaculture. And so, well, if we could create permaculture food forests, you could create a self replicating system that with relatively minimal funding would actually lift people out of poverty and cause cloud cover to form. And that's where we forest came out of. And like I just cut a check for the first 10,000 trees and we, you know, we never stop. Now. I did make a foolish pledge when I went to my first cop. I said, you know, I live a carbon negative lifestyle these days, but the one thing that I'm bad at is flying. Flying is terrible. So I said, if to go to my first cop, what I'll do is I'll quit flying until we have 100 million trees funded. Well, that took me more than 10 years.
So I spent 10 years traveling the earth on boats and trains. I did the Trans-Siberian Railway to Japan and back. I did multiple container ship journeys across the Atlantic. By the way, your fractional use of a container ship is about half a cup of bunker fuel as opposed to your fractional use of an aircraft, which is about three times your body weight. In jet A. So in it is a more carbon neutral way to travel. It's really hard to sail across the Atlantic in all weather though. Anyway, so we got to 100 million trees funded. I started flying again. And I can tell you that because of the integration we've done, any we forest woman in any we Forest village will cut the nuts off any man before he cuts a nut tree down. So those trees.
Chris Wedding:
I'm pretty sure you've used that line before, but it's a very good one.
Bill Liao:
Happens to be true too.
Chris Wedding:
Wow. You know, there were several very inspiring things there. The 100 million trees is inspiring. Connecting these various dots into a single mission, if you will. And of course not flying. I think our listeners must be asking, wait, has Bill written a book about. About his life yet? So if you haven't, I'm sure someone's asking the question. Anyway, I'll plant that seed if you will.
Bill Liao:
I don't really go in for. I don't really. I'm not super comfortable with the idea of an autobiography. I've written a couple of books. All of the books have been either to make people laugh or try and give them a hint about how to do business better. At the age of 53, I kind of had a midlife crisis. So I decided to learn how to do standup comedy. I've done gigs, I have routines. And I can tell you the one thing that is harder than startup is stand up. Because with standup the failure is public and the feedback is immediate.
Chris Wedding:
Lots of places we can go there, Bill, but I'll leave it at that. Yes. Contrasting stand up to start the startup. Okay, how are we doing here? We got two more of your. Of your entities I want to call attention to. And then we'll go to the Bill. The. Well, kind of the Bill portion. We've covered pieces of that already. Founder's pledge. What is founders pledge?
Bill Liao:
Founders pledge is very simply and it's for investors as well. It says that I'm never going to be a billionaire. In fact, it's I'm never going to be a hundred millionaire because I have pledged to reinvest it all, give it away, reinvest it all in the betterment of humanity rather than hang on to.
Chris Wedding:
It for a single second period again. Period. Good motivation. Look, I think lots of founders, I'll say in climate tech have similar motivations. Yes, let's build a great company. Yes, let's sell it for a lot. But guess what? When I have that capital, I can do great things with it. Yeah, I Think I learned this back when I was in private equity. To see our CEO invest in so many environmental startups or causes, it's like, well, if you do well financially, you can kind of multiply that how you direct those rewards, which is kind of.
Bill Liao:
I think it's deeper than that. I think it's deeper than that, though. I think for some people wealth has just become a score and like, it's just not okay. You know, wealth should be, shouldn't be over concentrated. I, I honestly think that if you've become a billionaire, there's something a little obscene about that.
Chris Wedding:
I don't disagree.
Bill Liao:
Yes, that's controversial take though, right?
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, there's more comfort that one needs that in this life or many lives.
Bill Liao:
More comfort than one needs and also more wealth concentrated in the hands of one mind because, you know, you need diversity of opinion and diversity of thought to solve big problems. And so concentrating all that wealth into the hands of one mind, no matter how good that mind's team is unlikely to produce great results for new challenges.
Chris Wedding:
Well, it also may be true. I don't have any evidence for this, but the higher the net worth, the more one may believe they don't need outside perspective, because there's tons of evidence for that.
Bill Liao:
There are a couple of studies, you can look them up on Google Scholar, that show that empathy decreases with wealth. And I learned this a long time ago. And because I don't want to lose my empathy, that's why I started actually pledging to charity before I made money.
Chris Wedding:
Yes, to all that. Let's go to Coder Dojo. What's Coder Dojo?
Bill Liao:
Coder Dojo is the largest network of free clubs for kids to learn to code in the world. And it is totally free, forever free. And it was created, started here in Quark, and it's spread all around the world. And it simply solves the problem that schools do not get kids to learn deep tech and iterative thinking at anywhere near an early enough age. And so 7 to 17, anyone could start a Dojo. It's all open source. It's supported by Raspberry PI Foundation. There's also Code club if you want to start one in a school. Basically anyone could start a dojo. And it's open to any kid age 7 to 17 anywhere to get their hands deep into technology and have fun and play with it in a really open and safe learning environment. And there are no teachers, there's no exams.
It's all about mentoring and fun and play. And it works.
Chris Wedding:
Inspiring. But first, there's a brief message from our sponsors. Just kidding. We still don't take any sponsors, but did you know that 100,000 plus CEOs belong to CEO peer groups? And if that makes you feel a little fomo, and if you're a CEO or founder, then you're in luck. I have the privilege of leading North America's top peer group Community for growth stage CEOs founders and investors in climate, tech, clean energy and sustainability. Today's members are creating billions of dollars of market value and millions of tons of greenhouse gas reductions. With our monthly group meetings, annual retreats and one one executive coaching calls, our members help each other, most importantly, help each other boost revenue, impact, capital raised, clarity, confidence, work, life balance and team effectiveness. If this sounds interesting, please go to entrepreneurs for impact.com and join the waiting list today. Let's go.
Chris Wedding:
As we do from the kind of more business portion to the bill portion, obviously some of that intermixed, you know, throughout so far. What kind of advice do you give, you know, emerging professionals, let's say, whether they're, you know, in college or whatever, in their 20s? Because I think listeners will see you've had a variety of, you know, quote unquote careers callings in life. Yeah. How do you reflect back to kind of distill that for folks just starting off?
Bill Liao:
It's a two step process. Chris. My first, the first part of that process, I'm going to ask you what are your top three values?
Chris Wedding:
Wow.
Bill Liao:
What are the things that you really hold dear? And don't say integrity because that's just the flaw. If you don't have integrity, then fuck off. What are your top three real values? What can't you live without? Mine, by the way, are kindness, curiosity and getting shit done.
Chris Wedding:
I like those. I like those. I don't have them at a word, but there's a phrase that resonates with our prior thread. To those to whom much is given, much is expected in return. So I feel like I've been blessed a lot. So there's lots of duty there perhaps.
Bill Liao:
So. Duty, duty, I would say perhaps even honor is a value. All right.
Chris Wedding:
So Judy, I think there's another expression that comes from the thinker Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, who wrote a book called I Am that which says something like I wrote and I know it well.
Bill Liao:
It's great book.
Chris Wedding:
Love tells me I'm everything. Wisdom says I'm nothing. And something like in between those things, in between those two I kind of choose or live my life, which is pretty. I don't know. It hits the head and the heart at the same time.
Bill Liao:
Yes. And it is a very empowering state of being. And choice is the ultimate empowerment. So I would guess you value choice.
Chris Wedding:
I feel like I'm in therapy right now. This is great. I think there's something around humility, which, despite my social media presence, would suggest otherwise. But something around it isn't just about me or humans or this generation, Right?
Bill Liao:
Absolutely. I think my favorite. One of my favorite quotes is from C.S. Lewis, which. And I would just say humility is the value. And CS Lewis said, humility is not thinking less of oneself, it is simply thinking more of others. And there's a couple of puns in there that are all valid. So humility is a beautiful value. Now, if you take those three extraordinary values, to harness them and receive the absolute greatest benefit, you need a purpose. And there is this illusion that purpose finds you. And maybe that happens. But there's another way to look at it, especially if you've got any level of design and iterative thinking, which is design your purpose and refine it until it lights you up, until it gets you out of bed. Because it's very cheap to design one's purpose.
And when you get it right, it gets you going. My purpose in life is a world that works for all living things while civilization thrives. And I designed that and I live it. And it's based on my values. That's the questions that I ask. I don't necessarily give that as advice as much as what I just did with you there. So what is the purpose you've designed for your life?
Chris Wedding:
I think it's along the lines of how can I impact the most people in a deep way that combines really the two words I use in describing our newsletter or podcast, which is using entrepreneurship to tackle climate change and something around personal growth. Right. Realizing we are much bigger, more kind of powerful, I suppose, than how we're maybe raised to believe or condition through daily routine, perhaps.
Bill Liao:
So it's best to choose a purpose that's bigger than yourself because then all your problems seem smaller. So I would worry less about the personal growth, which is just a value, by the way. It's a great value. You've just identified your fourth value as personal growth. Great. That shouldn't be your purpose. That's just a tool to make your purpose happen. Harnessing entrepreneurship in service of a climate that's fit for humans, that would be an interesting purpose. And you've got it. Just articulate it and refine it until you can say it. If somebody slaps you awake at 4am in the morning, you can say it as the first thing out of your mouth. Then you'll find an entirely new look on life. Like get. Having it kind of articulated seems okay. Having it purposefully articulated. Like, you'll find there's another level there, Chris.
You really will. And I'm not trying to be egotistical about this. It's all in service of you and your listeners. This is the inquiry to be in.
Chris Wedding:
No, I think it's great. I think workshopping like this with a guest is rare, but when it happens, I think fun for me, but also fun for listeners to kind of see the process happen. I think what it reminds me is that I do have these various sheets of mantras and goals and purposes, but they're not. They're not something I look at every day. They don't show up in my morning meditation. More of a watching practice, perhaps, but maybe a good reminder to crystallize that so it is easier to see. We're starting to ask on podcasts, maybe.
Bill Liao:
Yeah, well, crystallize it and communicate it with the people you love and have them test it and hold you to it. Like the number of people who've heard my purpose and are helping to hold me accountable is definitely more than one.
Chris Wedding:
At least tens of thousands as of today. Let's go to the next one, which is habits. I think we've already described one of your habits that keep you healthy, sane and focused, investing in and starting lots of powerful kind of new ventures. Tell us a couple others, perhaps Bill, to come to mind.
Bill Liao:
So I'll give you a practical one and a spiritual one. The practical one is I have been inbox zero for 36 years.
Chris Wedding:
It's a long time.
Bill Liao:
And not just email. Everything, every message, every voicemail, every social media contact. Inbox zero on all of it, bar one. And that one is LinkedIn. Because frankly, I have 22,000 followers. So overwhelmed. I have. I have somebody who helps me with that. But everything else where it counts, the meaningful transactions. Inbox zero, 36 years. The system for that is on my Medium account. It's free for everyone to use. You know, I use a piece of proprietary software that I buy from someone that's listed there. I have no commercial relationship with them. I'm just a really good friend of the founder who I trust. So Inbox Zero, clean. Clean your mind of tasks and communications. Don't let them build up that 5,000 in your inbox is not something to be proud of. It is a weight that holds you down.
Then the other one is a more spiritual one. And that is I just take a moment very frequently to let go of everything. Just let it all go.
Chris Wedding:
But what's that look like practically? Is it something you say you do? How long is that practice?
Bill Liao:
I just say to myself, let it all go. I imagine just opening my hand and just letting all of it go. No, I may choose to pick things up afterwards, but it's just really nice to let it all go for a while.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. Have you read the Surrender Experiment by Michael Singer?
Bill Liao:
Yes.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, similar. Somewhat similar, I think. Yeah, yeah.
Bill Liao:
Letting it go is a little simpler.
Chris Wedding:
Yes, I read that recently and then I was visiting my parents in central Florida and so I. I dragged perhaps coerced my family, parents and. And sister who flew in to visit one of Michael's, you know, sessions on. On Sunday morning there. It was quite powerful but also quite shocking for my. My parents who were not used to walking into, you know, a scene with. With lots of pictures of Indian yogis and all the rest on the wall.
Bill Liao:
I'm a great believer in philosophy. No matter where the philosophy came from. There are some wonderful philosophy and ontological ideas that are timeless and that if you steep yourselves in them, that's incredibly valuable. Books like I Am that are a fantastic example of that. You know, they talk about wisdom of angels. Humans haven't altered all that much.
Chris Wedding:
And actually I think I believe I saw Misargadata's picture, the author in Michael Singer's retreat there.
Bill Liao:
Undoubtedly.
Chris Wedding:
Let's go. Maybe just two here. We'll wrap Bill. One is books or podcasts, maybe quotes, tools you would recommend to listeners that you haven't already covered. What are a couple of those as we wrap up here?
Bill Liao:
So one of my mentors and best friends recently passed, Mark Gulston, his book Just Listen. Unbelievable. His podcast, his most recent podcast before passing, I'm dying to tell you, because he knew he had terminal cancer at that point. Very poignant, very powerful podcast. Other books, as I mentioned, Quiet is a great book. You know, accounting for introverts and extroverts. I am that as we've already spoken about. I love Homo deus. The idea that we've replaced that we haven't found a good replacement for religion in terms of collective success. We've over deified individual success. On my medium account there is a little post called Psychopaths and How to Spot Them. And in a world where individual fulfillment is the top ideal psychopaths tend to thrive, and we need to start taking a solid look at that.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, your description of Homo deus really resonates a lot. A big gap there still to fill. Bill, I feel like we could talk for a couple more hours, but I.
Bill Liao:
Think it's been a pleasure. Chris.
Chris Wedding:
It has been fun, for sure. Maybe just as we wrap here, what's a final message? Call to action, the kind of folks you want to hear from. What's your last message here to the podcast?
Bill Liao:
Be kind.
Chris Wedding:
Don't need to say much more than that. I believe lots of other ways we could be. It's a choice for sure.
Bill Liao:
Yeah, it's the right choice. For no other reason than it's the right choice. Just be kind to yourself and others.
Chris Wedding:
Bill, I feel like. I feel like I've been through a. I don't know, a backpacking trip or a therapy session all combined in one. What a great podcast. A brother from another mother across the ocean. Anyway, to be content.
Bill Liao:
We're friends now.
Chris Wedding:
That's right. Hey, we're. We're all rooting for. For your all success on the various. The various fronts. Pretty exciting stuff.
Bill Liao:
Thank you very much, Chris.
Chris Wedding:
Thanks for listening. And if you want more intel on climate tech, better habits and deep work, then join the thousands of others who subscribe to our substack newsletter@entrepreneursforimpact.com or drop me a note on LinkedIn. All right, that's all y' all. Take care.