Rob Go
I’ve been using the phrase “an explorer’s mind” quite a bit recently to describe the kind of person we are hoping to recruit to join our team at NextView. This idea came up frequently as my partners and I were reflecting on our own personalities and what we thought would be important attributes of a young investor.
To us, an explorer’s mind is one that:
- Is curious about things beyond the horizon. They’re looking for the future and wants to investigate the unknown.
- Wants to explore for oneself. Is not academic about things, but wants to plant their feet on the sand of new shores. In our world, it means experiencing things directly, using new products and engaging in new communities instinctively.
- Is BOTH wildly open-minded AND intellectually prepared. An explorer that is not intellectually prepared will die at sea. One that is prepared but not open-minded will never leave the dock.
Here’s the thing – the venture business can be like a headwind to the explorer’s mindset. VC’s see pitches for thousands of companies that don’t work out and we invest in dozens of companies that fail to meet their potential for many reasons. Some things we are convinced will happen fail to materialize, while others we were sure would never happen become reality. On top of this, so many things rhyme in our business that it’s so easy to say “I’ve seen that before”, and not ask the question “has something changed?”
We are fighting this every day while also trying to be wise stewards of the capital of terrific institutions. We hope to find a fellow explorer to come join us. For more on the role and how to apply, please see here.