The Entrepreneurs for Impact Podcast: Transcripts
#135:
"You're Not a Real Climate Tech Investor" — Ryan Jeffery, Senior Managing Director for gener8tor Sustainability
PODCAST INTRODUCTION
Ryan Jeffery:
Gener8tor, we're a 10-year-old fund and accelerator program. Our mission is to be the best partner for communities who invest in its best and brightest. We've now supported and invested over a thousand startups over the last 10 years. We've gone on to raise 1.4 billion in funding. We're one of the bigger accelerators that most people haven't heard of. Our major thesis at gener8tor is investing in more underrepresented overlooked founders across race, place and gender. We believe, and our returns as a fund have indicated this, that more diverse teams lead to better outcomes. I think that's even more true in climate, which is disproportionately affecting communities of color. Yet we're not investing in those people who are experiencing it firsthand and I think that's what our thesis is really driving at.
PODCAST INTERVIEW
Chris Wedding:
Welcome to the Entrepreneurs for Impact podcast. My name is Chris Wedding. As a former environmental private equity investor, four times founder, climate tech CEO, coach and professor, I launched this podcast to share the entrepreneurial journey, practical tips and hard-earned wisdom from CEOs and investors tackling climate change. And if you like what you hear, please leave us a review on your favorite podcast player. This is the number one way that listeners can learn more about the climate CEOs and investors I interview. All right, let's get started.
My guest today is Ryan Jeffery, the Senior Managing Director for Sustainability at gener8tor, a leading accelerator investing in supporting startups across many sectors, including those tackling the climate crisis. They invest $100,000 in startups in their 12-week programs and over the last 10 years, they've made investments in over 1,000 startups, which have gone on to raise an additional 1.4 billion dollars. In addition, Ryan is the founder of Ignite, a diverse and dynamic leadership community in Chicago. Founding partner at Survival Ventures, which is investing, advising and growing ventures that preserve and protect our planet. Mentor at Impact Engine, and advisor to many more impact startups.
02:18
In this episode, we talked about the following including his delightfully provocative LinkedIn post that starts with this zinger and I quote, “If you're a climate tech investor sitting on your hands waiting for better market conditions before deploying more capital, then you're not a real climate tech investor. Climate doesn't care about market conditions,” dot, dot, dot. Related, he shares his views on fiduciary duty that is putting investors' interests first in light of the urgency for tackling climate change. Why gener8tor is one of the world's best startup accelerators that no one has heard of. How they pick five out of 500 startups to join each of their cohorts. Lessons learned from his three prior ventures, as well as investing in dozens of startups. Why 93% of their investments take place outside of the biggest states for startup investing, which are California, Massachusetts and New York.
03:22
What the top founders do well in his experience, including, for example, laser-focused on customer needs, as well as sending out monthly updates to quote unquote, friends of the company. Some of those who enjoy seeing the progress and ultimately end up investing in the companies. Why Brandi Carlile's song, The Eye is somehow relevant to startups and parenting and a whole lot more. Hope you enjoy it and please give Ryan and gener8tor a shout out on LinkedIn, Slack or Twitter by sharing this podcast with your people. Thanks.
Ryan Jeffery, Senior Managing Director of Sustainability at gener8tor, welcome to the podcast.
Ryan Jeffery:
Hi, Chris. Thanks so much for having me.
Chris Wedding:
We were joking before hitting record that we're both working in interesting spaces. Yours could easily be your kid's playroom or an accelerator space and mine could easily be a luxurious cabin in the mountains, or it could be a rehabbed shed that looks like a cabin in the woods in my backyard in Chapel Hill. You be the guess anyway.
Ryan Jeffery:
Or it could be virtual and none of it's real. Who knows, Chris?
04:40
Chris Wedding:
That's right. So, Ryan, as we talked about, I'm going to start us off by doing something I've never done before, which is to read something to get us going. We’ve chatted and talked a lot about how to support entrepreneurs in the space for a long time, and I came across a delightfully provocative post about a month ago on LinkedIn. So, I want to read that and have you maybe riff on it a little bit, or maybe talk about some of the feedback you've gotten pro not quite con, but counter, let's say. So here you are a month ago on LinkedIn, “If you're a climate tech investor sitting on your hands waiting for better market conditions before deploying more capital, then you're not a real climate tech investor.” Boom, drop the mic, not quite done yet.
“The climate doesn't care about market conditions. This crisis is not going to wait for you to feel better about the economy. The world is rapidly approaching a catastrophic warming threshold that we must address with deep, rapid and immediate action in quotes, for our part here at gener8tor, we refuse to sit idly by. We've already made more investments in climate tech startups this year, that's 15, than we did last year, that was 11.” Again, that was an April, this post, “And we continue to add resources, support, and additional funding to expand this in the years to come. Now is not the time to slow down. Let's roll up our sleeves and get to work.” All right, brother, talk to me. What would you add to that?
Ryan Jeffery:
No, that post was spurred by, I had just come across an article that talked about how VC climate tech investment had dropped to a three-year low. I was looking at some data that indicated that things were slowing down in terms of investment and dollars going towards what I view as the biggest challenge, the biggest crisis we face and I was a little frustrated by that.
I think there's a significant amount of dry capital that exists out there. If you look at the data around number of billions of dollars that LPs have put into climate tech VCs, there is a significant amount of capital that still exists out there. And to see that those numbers are dropping in what is a time that doesn't allow us to slow down was I think the reason for me sitting down and writing that post.
If you are a climate VC, if you have gone out as a GP and raised money from LPs in the last two or three years, and you're sitting on a good tranche of money, those LPs expect that you're going to be investing in companies and continuing to invest in companies that are on the front lines of our biggest environmental and climate crisis. To be sitting on our hands right now, waiting for market conditions to improve because of X, Y, and Z and a lot of that is just chatter, I think is reckless. We have a responsibility as an investor ourselves and the community overall to continue to deploy and increase the deployment of capital in this space.
07:42
The amount of money that you just look at the gap that we need to fill is still several trillion dollars that we need to fill in terms of investment to solve this crisis and we're not even there. And to see that that was dropping was really frustrating, I think that's where that post came from for me.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. Well, I can reflect back to the 2008 to 2010 period when things were extra suck with the recession in the US. I was working in private equity. It was an environmental real estate, private equity play, but real estate and finance, two sectors really heavily hit. Maybe two years prior, we'd raised our fourth bond at $1.2 billion and here we were with a bunch of dry powder thinking, how slash when can we possibly deploy this on schedule during the investment period, our LPs signed up for? I recall the thinking, which feels a little bit like now, the less draconian which is don't catch a falling knife, right?
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
And of course, you never know how far the knife has to fall.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
So, on one hand I get the waiting. On the other hand, I feel the same as what you said in your post, but let me pose one question. Yeah. I think some GPs would say, “Yeah, but Ryan, we're fiduciaries, got to put our investor interest first, not climate,” dot, dot, dot, what are your thoughts there?
Ryan Jeffery:
Actually, I'd push back and I'd say there is no better time to invest than in a downturn. I think the valuations are coming down to earth. There's no lack of innovation in this space. I mean, we had over 500 applications for our last cohort. There are startups out there solving our biggest challenges and making a lot of money doing it and I think for an investor, you talk about fiduciary duty, absolutely. You should be investing in companies that fit your thesis that you think you can help and that you think you can support. You have to be going out and finding them.
09:51
I think if you look back on the data around this too, the best time to invest are in downturns where you're able to get in early at better valuations that are more realistic. And the companies that survive those times end up doing better because they're better stewards of the capital. They are better and more customer focused and oriented and not out just spending money because they were able to go out and have three conversations with investors and raise $10 million at a pre-seed valuation of 30 million or 40 million. Our philosophy is now is actually a better time to invest and be an investor than it was even a year or two years ago when things were a little bit crazy. So, that's maybe how I'd push back on that thinking overall.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. Well, that was a setup Ryan, because I tend to agree that -- I mean, look, you're right, valuations are much more reasonable now than they were whatever, 18 months ago. So, fund managers, general partners, GPs are getting a better deal, if you will, on the buy, on the entry for their LPs. So, I think two things can be true at the same time. I think that is true and it can also be true that if they waited longer, they would get lower evaluations. Hard to say, hard to know.
You're also right to push back another, I guess, countervailing forces, these fund managers only have a certain number of years, three, four years of the life of the fund to put the money to work. After that investment period is over, they can't make new investments. So, the clock is ticking for sure. I'll say one last thing and come back to your input. This idea of almost like a criticism of, wait a second, what you're saying implies you're not being a fiduciary and the counter being, oh, contrary, it is precisely me being a fiduciary.
A similar I think story happening in the broader ESG investing world, more on the public equities side of things where folks say, many more critics today would say, “Get out of town, man. We don't need this environment social filter, this do-good filter to distract from our fiduciary duty of financial returns.” Yet I think you and I both know, maybe many listeners know, that data tends to say, “No, if you incorporate material, financially material, environmental, social governance factors, you are more likely to mitigate risk and capture new opportunities, for example, as we shift to lower carbon environments.”
12:29
Kind of what you just said in the context of climate A, B, C also applies to note, we espousing ESG excellence for say public equity investment, we are actually being a better fiduciary. All right, that was too much. Back to you.
Ryan Jeffery:
Well, I would just add onto that and this is maybe the difference between now and the last clean tech boom overall. Granted, I wasn't actively investing back then, but I do have a number of friends and colleagues that pushed me on this a little bit in terms of my thinking. But I think right now, in terms of why this is a better time to be investing, if you want to put impact companies into this overall in terms of ESG, I think there are several factors that macro trend that lend this being the best time to be investing and supporting the space.
One is human capital. You just look at the number of people and the talented, really smart people that are looking to direct their careers. Or it's more impact-oriented areas, climate specifically. There's some really good companies out there, Climate Draft, others that are helping to drive people from the big tech companies into climate focused careers, and there's just more of that than there ever has been.
I think a lot of that has to do with the urgency of this problem isn't going away and I think people realize that it's happening right now. We're seeing the effects of climate change happening and so people want to direct themselves. I think there's also the environmental capital aspect of this too. It's actually more expensive to be pulling things out of the ground, to be using bones from dinosaurs, to fuel things. I think the cost of solar or wind has come down drastically and that has spurred this on in a lot of ways.
Financial capital aspect of it, if you look at the capital stack across climate has increased significantly. I'm not even talking about venture, yes, but also IRA, non-dilutive capital grants, other forms of funding towards this space. The regulatory and compliance aspect of it as well is another big trend that’s occurring. It's just becoming more expensive for companies to act dirty, and they're actually being rewarded now through a lot of incentives to clean up their act and to invest in clean energy and the transition that's occurring right now. Then I think the last element to this that overlays all of this is that there's now consumer, customer demand for it. The green premium, I think, is going down. Electric cars are a perfect example of this.
14:59
I had a buddy recently, who I would never consider an environmentalist that would never be considering his environmental impact that he is just not oriented like that, but bought an EV because it's a better car. And it had nothing to do with, yes, it's cleaner and better for the planet, all those sorts of things. It was just a better car than what was on the market. I think those things are finally starting to tilt towards, it just makes sense as an investor to be investing. Again, to go back and maybe put a bow on this, now is not the time to slow down. Now is the time to double down and increase our effort and our focus overall.
Chris Wedding:
Yep. Right on. All right. Let's go matter here. So, what is gener8tor? What is sustainability at gener8tor?
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah. Great question. So, gener8tor, we're a 10-year-old fund and accelerator program. Our mission is to be the best partner for communities who invest in its best and brightest. We've now supported and invested over a thousand startups over the last 10 years. We've gone on to raise 1.4 billion and follow on funding. I tend to joke and a TechCrunch article literally stole this that said that we were one of the bigger accelerators that most people haven't heard of.
So, part of that is on purpose. I think over the last 10 years, in some ways we've operated outside of the major tech hubs. So, our major thesis at gener8tor is investing in more underrepresented overlooked founders across race, place and gender. If you look at where capital is going in VC, average VC, 80% of VC dollars goes to three states, California, Massachusetts, and New York, and 93% of our investments have gone outside of those three states.
Then if you look at the race and gender aspect of it, 97% of venture goes to men who primarily, honestly look like me and live in the Bay Area. We're about 15 to 20 times more leveraged towards investing in underrepresented founders, women founders, minority founders. Not because it's the right thing to do. Yes, it's the right thing to do, obviously, but because we believe and our returns as a fund have indicated this, that more diverse teams lead to better outcomes and I think that's even more true in climate and I'll get to the second part of your question around sustainability and gener8tor. I think that's even more true in climate, which is disproportionately affecting communities of color, yet we're not investing in those people who are experiencing it firsthand. That's what our thesis is really driving that in terms of investing in those areas. It's specifically sustainability at gener8tor.
17:28
Well, gener8tor is, again, a fund accelerator program. We have over 40 accelerators across the country and now the world. I lead all of our sustainability investment accelerator programs of which now there are several. I've been with the team for about a year and a half. I come from a background, both sides of the table as an investor, three-time founder, some success, some failure in there, more failure, we can talk about that later. But knew that I wanted to dedicate the rest of my life towards climate and sustainability after my last company was acquired, I had my first kid and knew that that's what I wanted to do.
And so, I have known gener8tor for the last 10 years, I've mentored some of their early accelerators and to their credit, I went to the partners two summers ago and I said, “Hey, if you ever do anything around climate and sustainability, let me know because I'd love to co-ambassador support.” Long story short, they came back and said, “Hey, we want to do something in that space, we understand the urgency of it, but if we're going to do it, we want you to lead it.”
So here I am, we focus overall, I think our thesis is systemic change in climate. We want to invest in climate positive companies, so those that exist because of climate change and those that we think can be massively scalable across energy, transportation, food, land use, industrial and carbon overall. So, we run several accelerators a year, five to six companies each so it's really selective. About 1% of those that apply get accepted, but that selectivity and that small cohort size allows us to be much more hands-on, impactful, supportive.
We invest a hundred K into each of those five or six companies, and then provide a really impactful three-month program where we introduced them to over a hundred mentors. We introduced them to our network of climate tech investors that's now 500 plus strong or broader network of 3,000 investors that we have in our pipeline and really help accelerate their growth overall, get them from zero to one or from one to five, depending on where they're at and really look to be the most value-added investor on their cap table.
19:22
Chris Wedding:
Well, I'm writing vigorously to make sure I capture this for the intro to this podcast, which is recorded, of course, afterwards. A thousand startups over 10 years, pretty cool. 1.4 billion a follow on. That TechCrunch quote sounds spot on, the biggest accelerator you've never heard of. Let's go to this 1% acceptance rate. So, 500 applicants, you pick five or six per cohort a few times per year. How, Ryan? How do you go from 500 to five?
Ryan Jeffery:
So, it starts with, how do we get 500? One is, we've got a pretty broad network syndicate of investors that shares deal flow with us. Our founder is our biggest ambassador, they go out and tell others, “Hey, you should look at gener8tor if you're looking for an accelerator.” We certainly, go out and network and try and connect with people when they're forming and starting their company. We get in at the earliest stages too, which I didn't mention, but we're typically pre-seed, seed. We're oftentimes the first, maybe second or third check into the company. We like to get involved early and help accelerate their growth.
In terms of once we get those applications in and then whittling it down, we've got a pretty in-depth diligence process, so we bought five people on our sustainability team that reviews every application that comes in. We score those applications and then move the top 100 based on cumulative average score into first round interviews. We do first round interviews, whittle it down based on those to the top 50 second round interviews. We do the top 20 and final round interviews. Get that 20 together.
Generally, if it's virtual via like a virtual launch, but then do final round interviews, do our diligence our end, look into those companies. Then select the five or six based on a number of different factors that we look at and based on what we want that cohort to look like. But it's a pretty, yeah, in-depth process to get it down. I think it's probably the hardest part of the job just because you get down to the top 50, all of those at that point are investable and you have to find the top five or six based on that group to invest in and work with that cohort.
21:31
Chris Wedding:
All right. So, two questions. I'll write them down so you don't need to remember them. One is maybe describe some of those criteria, which get you from 500 to five and the next question, which I'll bring back later is, you said 50 of those are really investible at a pre-seed, seed stage, you only pick five. What happens to the other 45? Any way to help them along, even if they're not in your cohort? So, start wherever you'd like with those questions.
Ryan Jeffery:
I'll start with the last part of it. We continue to try and be as helpful as we can. Oftentimes they come back and apply for a future program. We do one in the spring, one in the fall. We have a number of programs. So, sometimes we have multiple people, multiple companies apply for multiple programs, and so we're helpful throughout that. We ask all of them to add us to their investor updates or a monthly update list so we can stay involved and helpful. We have some partnerships where we refer to others that are in the space, other incubators that maybe are earlier stage. If it's something that they need help with product or hardware where we're not going to be super helpful, we have some of those relationships, but really try to be helpful and supportive and stay in touch with those 45 or so. Even the broader group of 500 plots that we think we can continue to support, that’s not always easy.
I think a lot of investors say, “Let me know how I can be helpful,” and don't often follow up on that and that's from personal experience as a founder myself in the past, but I think we try. We have open office hours. My calendar is always open and constantly trying to continue to help and support those founders that we don't accept. The first part of that question, remind me, Chris.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, totally. I got you. This is my job. I wrote it down too. So, as you're going from 500 to 100—
Ryan Jeffery:
Right, what do we look at?
Chris Wedding:
What are the five criteria you all focus on?
Ryan Jeffery:
So, I think the first umbrella question that we ask, and we do filter out a lot if we don't feel like they check these two big boxes is what are the climate positives, meaning do they exist because of climate change? Are they doing the most to solve, mitigate, adapt to the climate crisis that we face? Got that box, great.
23:40
The second is, do we believe that it's massively scalable? Can it in theory touch billions of people, generate billions of dollars in revenue, those sorts of things? Check the box. Yes, in theory, it has the opportunity to do that. It's not backyard business or anything along those lines. Once we filter that out, the criterion generally, when we get down to looking at it through this lens is when we get in the top 50 or so, we first look at three or four different pillars that we look at.
First is, at pre-seed, seed stage, it's really all about the team. So, I know this is overused, the founder market fit, do they have deep insight into the problem they're solving and know how to attack the problem because of their experience that they've had? Or have they researched the problem a ton for months and months or years and years, a PhD or they have some background that allows them to know or allows us to know that they're the right people to attack this. High technical capabilities, strong co-founder relationships. Do they have some of the intangible things like resiliency, grit? Do they have that giver mentality that I think is really important as a founder? We look at that.
The second big pillar is the climate problem that they're solving. Is it big enough? And I'm not just talking about the problem is climate change, that's not the problem that they're focused on. It's always more specific based on the customers that they're going after, but is it a big enough challenge? Our philosophy, my philosophy is that the solution is always going to change, the product is going to evolve, but the problem that they set out to solve should really be the guiding north star. Is that problem big enough, is something that we look at.
Then tied to that is the next pillar, is the solution focused on systemic change? Meaning, does it have fundamental effects on how the whole system functions overall? It's about the changes that spread and behaviors that become new normal, rather than just confining to a narrow group. We look and try to pick teams that we think fit into that. We also then look at traction, is the revenue or some early product or prototype that we can look at, barring revenue, fractured around LOIs? Do they understand their customers? Have they gotten their feedback, those sorts of things? Then the last sort of thing that ties to earlier part is the market. Can this be a big business?
25:56
Again, we're a fund, we're looking for high returns as well and genuinely, we're not backing down from that. We don't shy away from the fact that we think that the most successful companies from a financial standpoint will also have the biggest impact in solving this crisis overall and so we put it through that lens. So, that's how we think about all of those elements when we're going down and selecting and working with the companies.
Chris Wedding:
Cool. Sounds like such an easy task.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yes.
Chris Wedding:
Tell us about this recent cohort. Maybe if you want to summarize all, or if it's easier to just go deeper on a couple, what does it look like?
Ryan Jeffery:
So, just to pull back the curtains a little bit. I came on as a managing director in September of 2021. I ran our first sustainability focused program last spring. It was five companies that are actually still doing tremendously well, happy to talk through all of those companies. They're phenomenal and then the thought was, let's just do one a year, see how it does. It was so successful and the companies did so well and the network that we had, everybody wanted to help and support. It was just such a successful cohort, we did another one last fall with six companies. So, we invested in 11 companies last year.
Based on that momentum that we had, we actually used that to springboard into three congruent sustainability focused programs that we're currently running. I am now the senior managing director. I have three MDs that work on three different programs. One is an AgTech, food land focused accelerator and partnership with Serra Ventures and Champaign. We have one with US Ventures, which is a multi-billion-dollar energy transportation logistics company in Appleton, Wisconsin. So, we run a transportation, a sustainable mobility program at Appleton, and then we've got our global program that I helped start last spring where we've got five companies that we're working with right now. So, there's 15 companies that we're currently working with through these three different programs.
27:51
I'll spare you from going through all of them, but I'll say at a very high level, they're again, on the frontline, working on solutions to our biggest energy, transportation, food, land use, industrial challenges that we face, helping us transition to a just clean energy future overall. Happy to pinpoint on any of our past portfolio. There's a couple that I can point to in our first cohort that are doing really well, that are really interesting, but I'll pause there and just see if there's any specific thoughts or areas that I can double click into.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah, let's get specific. So, maybe pick two or three portfolio companies and tell us a short story.
Ryan Jeffery:
So, I'll just go back to our spring cohort to start with, just because it was our inaugural one overall, and I think it’s a good indicator because there's some time that's lapsed since that first one, now a year. I'll go through those five companies.
One of them, a company called Mycocycle that's using mushrooms to eat trash and create renewable byproducts from that. They just closed, or about to close, I should say a two and a half million-dollar seed round led by Anthropocene Ventures, Joanne Rodriguez, phenomenal founder and entrepreneur. Work with a lot of manufacturing companies, industrial companies to again, divert waste from landfills. We've got a company called It's Electric based in Brooklyn. Tiya and Nathan are the founders, phenomenal background. They're bringing EV charging to urban neighborhoods. Just closed a $2.2 million pre-seed round. Recently, just launched their first pilot in Brooklyn and are off to the races, helping to make sure that the 40 million drivers who don't have access to EV charging can do it when they park on the street.
We've got another company in that cohort called Carbon Yield that's helping farmers move towards regenerative farming practices. So, there's a lot of macro trends around that, better use of land overall, and farmers are moving towards that. Another company called SolarSteam that is working on industrial heat and heat is the big elephant in the energy room and most of that's powered by fossil fuels. They have this proprietary deep technology that they've developed that uses solar to power that heat.
Then we've got a company called blip energy, which is using second life lithium-ion batteries to provide backup power and energy storage for those that live in apartments. And so, providing energy backup storage to those that can't afford the Tesla power wall or similar diesel generator in their backyard. It's surprising and shocking how many of us Americans still experience power outages on a daily basis and their device is helping to provide more equitable access to charging.
30:32
So that's, again, our first inaugural cohort last year, I think gives a sense of the breadth of the companies. Again, we don't shy away from hard tech and deep tech. It’s a mix of software and hardware, and we really look to support their growth overall and get them to that next stage.
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. It sounds like we'll probably have a conversation for another hour, just on those first five companies, let alone the next 15.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
But we can't, slight time limitations here. How about from either your experience as a three-time founder or working with advising dozens of early-stage startups, lots of entrepreneurs listening, mostly in the climate and impact space, a lesson learned or two about going either zero to one or one to N. You tell me.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah. Let me frame this as what I think some of the most successful founders that we've worked with do, and maybe some of the things that I've learned that I maybe didn't do as a founder. One, I think it's be extremely customer focused and customer centered. I think there is a tendency to build out your materials and think through, “Okay, how do I raise capital from VCs and those sorts of things?” I think the best companies have a very laser deep focus on their customers and providing solutions for that customer subset and work towards that. Then raising money and all of that come from building those relationships with their customers, selling to them, getting LOIs to support all of that and working on solutions for them. So, I think that's number one.
In terms of traits and qualities, it's hard. There's no silver bullet like the pre-seed, seed stage in terms of this is what you have to do in order to be successful. But I do think there are some traits and qualities that really make a founder stand out from others and what I've seen make them more successful in terms of the impact that they can have. A couple of things come to mind. One is they're super responsive and I don't just mean they follow up on emails and slacks and those sorts of things. Yeah, that's part of it and they do it quickly, but it's being responsive to the customer needs and to the market demands and those sorts of things and they're on top of it. Part of that is that they have strong views that are weakly held, that they're very confident about what they're doing, about their mission, what they're trying to accomplish. But they're not so strong on those views that they're willing to change them or evolve them if new ideas or thoughts or things come to the surface.
33:03
I also think that they're extremely coachable. They take feedback really, really well. They're organized and action-oriented. One of the biggest lessons I learned is that you're going to get told no as a founder so many times, from customers, mostly from investors, who by the way, like speaking from experience, aren't necessarily that smart. You have to be able to have thick skin, realize that it's not necessarily personal and move towards action, just continuing to survive and to do, that overcomes all of those no's overall. I think is a really core aspect of being a successful entrepreneur. I do want to add one thing because I think this is a very tangible thing that I think if you're a founder listening to this can take with you and surprisingly few do this and this sets you apart, very detailed and action-oriented thing.
Do a monthly update list. Everybody that you talk to at the end of the conversation, ask them, “Can I add you to our monthly friends of the company?” Keep an updated list and be diligent about sending a monthly update. What’s going well? What's not going well? What do you need help with? Here's what's going on with the business, those sorts of things and send that out on a monthly basis. Shocking how many people don't do this, but we've had so many of our founders and we do this in our program.
We actually make them send weekly updates to their friends of the company list and then afterwards they do it every month. But we've had people who haven't talked to an investor for a year, but they've kept them on their update list and from that update list, that investor has ended up investing in that company. Responding to that email saying, “Hey, I see that you're raising your round. I'd like to put in money.” So, very auction-oriented thing that somebody can do starting right now that shocking few people actually do.
34:49
Chris Wedding:
Great. Yeah, very practical. Obviously, you'll do it weekly because you're building those muscles, putting in the reps.
Ryan Jeffery:
You got it. Yep.
Chris Wedding:
And even if some folks listening like, “Well, I couldn't manage monthly,” but that's okay, do quarterly. Do something--
Ryan Jeffery:
Do something. Yes.
Chris Wedding:
…to stay on top of mind.
Hey, it's Chris. Just a brief message from our sponsors and we'll get back to the show. Just kidding, we don't take sponsors. On the other hand, I do have the privilege of leading the only executive peer group community for growth stage, CEOs, founders, and investors fighting climate change. With monthly group meetings, annual retreats, and one-on-one executive coaching calls, our members help each other boost revenue, impact, capital raise, clarity, confidence, work-life balance, and team effectiveness. Today's 30 plus members represent over $8 billion in market cap for assets under management for climate solutions. If you're interested, go to entrepreneursforimpact.com and join the waiting list today. All right, back to the show.
Let's switch from gener8tor to Ryan, as we do in the pod. Ryan, if you could chat with your younger self, what kind of advice might you share to be more effective, happier, et cetera, on this journey? A business advice would be great.
Ryan Jeffery:
Business advice?
Chris Wedding:
Or non-business even better.
Ryan Jeffery:
Well, I think maybe both of these are tied into one. It'd be, this may sound selfish and I don't mean for it to come across like this, but I think to do more things for myself. When I was younger, there's a time to do it when you just do what other people tell you to do because you think it's the best thing for you. Not that I’d go back and do anything differently, but I think if I can give myself advice, it would be to try to find and to make sure that what I'm doing, what I'm directing myself towards and what I'm saying yes to is because I want to do it, not because somebody else wants me to do it.
36:56
There’s this aspect when you're young of like, “Oh, I just need to do everything I possibly can. I need to say yes to everything,” you probably do that more when you're younger than when you start to get a little bit more experienced. I did too much when I was younger in my career that wasn't for myself that other people told me I should do because they wanted it done or they needed somebody to fill that role and I just said, “Sure.” Instead of really understanding what I cared about, what my mission was, what my values were and then directing what I did around that. I don't think it was until later in my 20s and early 30s, where I actually started to direct myself towards that and aligned and I was much happier when I did that.
Chris Wedding:
Well, plus one, another illustration of that is, most people go to work or open their laptop and they check email first thing or pretty early on. And the way I've heard it phrased is, if you do that, you're letting someone else create your to-do list for you.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
Versus if you come in and say, “Look, I'm not going to check until 10:00 or 11:00, which is what I try to do usually it's like, it's what's on my to-do list, my priorities. Even if those priorities are helping the CEOs that I coach, those are my priorities. Now, do I occasionally miss important updates to my calls for the day because I check email late? Yeah, maybe, but anyway, similar part.
Ryan Jeffery:
Part of that too, Chris, though, and this is having a little bit more grace with yourself too, having a little bit more acceptance around, yeah, maybe every once in a while you falter from those things or you fall off and you check email early, that's a very small thing, but there are bigger things that maybe you do, mistakes you make. Having acceptance of those and not being too hard on yourself and too critical on yourself -- A lot of those things that I was so hard on myself when I was younger, I don't even remember anymore and weren't worth the energy and the time of me getting down or upset about that. So, just another thought.
38:54
Chris Wedding:
Yeah. I've read somewhere that something like 70 or 80% of our thoughts, most of which we're not aware of throughout the day are negative thoughts. And it's like, hold up, wait a second. How do we shift that? Again, I think the word you used was grace. A little more grace for yourself would be worth to most of us.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yep.
Chris Wedding:
What are some habits or routines, Ryan, that keep you healthy, sane and focused?
Ryan Jeffery:
You're asking me at a bad time, Chris. Today I have two kids under four, a have a three-year-old and a one-year-old.
Chris Wedding:
Even more important.
Ryan Jeffery:
I know, right? Look, I don't know those that have young kids out there and know how challenging it is to keep routines and those sorts of things. I think kids need it, that’s separate podcast for a separate day, but for me, what I try to do and certainly I've got my bike down here and try and get outside, I got a dog that I take for a walk as much as I can, for me, it's getting outside as much as I can.
My kids, fortunately love being outside and so I try and get outside, outdoors as much I can. If I can work outside, great and then the little things in terms of staying centered and some of the routines. It’s just trying to be present as much as I possibly can. It's very easy, especially when you have young kids to be thinking about the future. I can't wait until they're grown up or I can't wait until they're out of this phase where they have these meltdowns and temper tantrums or whatever. For me, it's just trying to be present, concentrate on being in that moment and accepting what comes and controlling what I can control. Hopefully I’m more centered and happier because of that. Although I still have certainly my moments.
Chris Wedding:
So, speaking of kids, we were talking before pressing record, ours are now older, two teenagers, almost three teenagers and much fewer physical needs or time demands, more psychological perhaps. What are they thinking? How do I motivate them? But the one thing we said a lot early on was like, how do we relish the chaos? And just right this moment, I'm thinking about a Brandi Carlile song where she talks about dancing in a hurricane or something, which you can only do that if you're standing in the center. It's kind of what parenting has to be. It’s like I’m in the eye. It's total chaos, but I'm in the eye, I'm in the center.
41:12
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah. I heard this recently too and I try to do this, when you have those moments when your kids and things are chaotic and hectic and you got a thousand things that you're concentrating on, that's one of the things I'm trying to do a better job of too, is there's so much going on with work, but trying to separate that and be present with my kids when I'm there. But I heard this great thing recently, that when you have those tough moments to try to put yourself in the frame of mind of you're 85 years old on your deathbed and you get to come back and spend one more moment, one more night with your kids, and this is that moment that you're in.
It just helps you reframe that moment that you're going through. Even if both kids are crying and screaming or whatever you're dealing with at that moment, it just, all right, I'm here and I can be present and I can be in this moment and I can try to enjoy the chaos of it.
Chris Wedding:
I love that. All I would change is when you're on your deathbed at age 125—
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah, there you go. Sure.
Chris Wedding:
…not 85.
Ryan Jeffery:
85 is too young. Yeah.
Chris Wedding:
You're underselling yourself here. Come on.
Ryan Jeffery:
Well, let's hope that the planet that we're on when we're that age is still a planet that we all want to be at.
Chris Wedding:
No, no. We're all working too hard for any other—
Ryan Jeffery:
That's what we're here for. Real trends.
42:25
Chris Wedding:
All right. I got two more for you. One, give us some recommendations, maybe books, podcasts, tools, quotes, listeners may find value in and again, not business stuff. Fair game here.
Ryan Jeffery:
Yeah. I'll do two climate-oriented books because they’re top of mind. We gave them to every cohort that we have, Speed & Scale, John Doerr book, really good book on what we have to focus on in climate overall. Then it's a fiction book, Ministry for the Future, really great book. I think one of the best fiction books out there on the future planet and what we're doing in the climate space overall. I'm also a big nerd for like historical World War II novels and currently reading, I think I'm behind the times on this, but The Winds of War. I'm currently in an audio book reading it and it is phenomenal. So, anybody else is into that sort of stuff, that's top of mind only because I'm reading it right now.
Chris Wedding:
Well, we know when you said you're behind the times you were referring to reading about wars long gone. Hey, last thing, Ryan, any kind of call to action, shout out? Who do you want to hear from after the pod?
Ryan Jeffery:
Look, I think we all need to be rowing in the same direction here. This is the biggest challenge that we face, but also the biggest opportunity I think we'll ever have and biggest business opportunity in particular. This is the greatest opportunity for generational wealth, equitable generational wealth. And so, if there are others out there working towards this, that we're always building our network of mentors, of investors, of founders, of people supporting each other in this space, we really want to build this really robust ecosystem. It's just Ryan, R-Y-A-N@gener8tor.com. That's gener8tor with an eight in it and I don't know if we can post my email or anything, but happy to connect, happy to talk with anybody out there and continue the conversation.
Chris Wedding:
Well, at your request, yes, most of us we know, happy to add your email to the show notes. Hey Ryan, we're rooting for you-all’s success. Excited to see how the three sustainability programs become even more in this large accelerator few folks or too few folks have heard of. We're changing that today though, baby.
Ryan Jeffery:
Let’s do it.
Chris Wedding:
We’re changing it today with the podcast.
44:39
Ryan Jeffery:
Let’s do it, Chris. Me and you.
Chris Wedding:
All right, man. Keep it up.
Ryan Jeffery:
Thanks so 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 have subscribed to our Substack newsletter at entrepreneursforimpact.com or drop me a note on LinkedIn. All right. That's all, y'all. Take care.
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