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00:00:01
E33: Clarity - “Man makes plans and God laughs.” with Vip Tandon
1 Plays3 seconds ago
The MBA Partners Scholarship – in Memory of Denise Kaplan
it's hard to have a 10-year plan when the GFC happens in your 10-year plan.
“I just want clarity because everything's so confused right now.”
George Soros
Open Society Fund
E29: "Time happens" with Mike Kaplan
E32: "God forbid men not having an erection" with Frederique Labadie
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Transcript
Reflections on Life's Unpredictability
00:00:00
Speaker
Four or five years ago, um i was on a ski trip with some INSEAD classmates of ours. And one of those classmates... No names will be named? i was trying to decide if I should name it. It's it's sort of giving him credit, but it's also...
00:00:16
Speaker
Well, I'll let people work it out. ah One of my classmates um who was going through a particularly hard time, and sort of divorce and just challenging career and and was struggling ah through quite a lot, ah was on this ski trip with us in Colorado. I'll narrow it down for some people.
00:00:36
Speaker
um And we were talking about this 10-year career path and I was... I had a very clear vision for 10 years and i I had this sort of ah infrastructure incubator, I would call it, that's not really relevant anymore, of of what I thought I was going to do and how I was going to transition the existing company that but I was at into something that was a bit more structured. And andhow i went through this plan, talked about 10 years and the path to it.
00:01:04
Speaker
And he said something to the effect of, this isn't going to be his words, but I'll paraphrase what I heard, which was basically, why would you bother planning 10 years in advance? Because life can throw curveballs at you at all times. And he had just been hit by a few pretty bad curveballs.
00:01:23
Speaker
um And so basically, it's not worth planning 10 years in advance. That's what I heard. i know that's not what he said, but that's what I heard.
00:01:33
Speaker
um In retrospect, giving him a lot more credit for what he was saying, I think what he meant, or at least what he might have even said at the time, was that don't have fixed tenured plans.
00:01:49
Speaker
if If you fixate on some version of the future, um and then you get thrown on a curve ball, it can all collapse in front of you. So recognize that there needs to be a flexibility in that.
00:02:04
Speaker
I'm not saying he portended all that happened to me, but it sure for a moment felt like he did predict all the things that were going to happen to
Introduction to the Podcast and Theme
00:02:12
Speaker
me. So if you did do that and you know who you are, I don't know how you did that, but that was impressive.
00:02:17
Speaker
This is Republic of Ensiad in a new 2026 O3D Limited podcast edition. I am still Milena Ivanova and will be your host yet again. For how long? God only knows.
00:02:30
Speaker
The 2026 edition is about life that happens while we make plans for it. I am back on air because a bunch of you asked for it. Truth is I love doing these conversations, but another truth is to do them properly takes time. And I don't know about you, but I'm always short on time.
00:02:50
Speaker
In any case. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be able to have these conversations and to be able to share them with all 432 of you, the class of 03D.
00:03:03
Speaker
Life happens and time happens. We are hopefully still all the wiser, naturally smarter and as charming as ever. Welcome to the Republic of INSEAD 2026 limited podcast edition and enjoy the show.
00:03:19
Speaker
Well, hello and hello again, everyone. Once more, we are back
VIP's Involvement in Mike's Story
00:03:24
Speaker
at it. Today, we are back with a guy who is, quote, the guy Mike spoke about in Colorado.
00:03:33
Speaker
What a surprise. I must admit, I love how this podcast naturally embraces more and more voices, who volunteered to come forward. That's the best I could have wished for, honestly.
00:03:46
Speaker
So the way this one went is as follows. I bring you into the kitchen or what happens behind the scenes. I get a message on the 25th of March from him telling me, VIP tendon here. Thanks for all you do. I am traveling in Morocco. Can't seem to find link. Mind rescinding. I have kept the original wording because that is just how VIP is. Short and to the point.
00:04:14
Speaker
That was the Giving Day campaign and VIP wanted to make a donation to the Kaplan Partners Fund. So far, so great. But in addition to the link, I had something else to share with him.
00:04:27
Speaker
So I asked him if he actually listened to the podcast episode with Mike, because VIP features in that episode, unbeknownst to pretty much everyone, bar four people, and again, maybe four people, who may have listened to the episode and were actual witnesses to the original story.
00:04:50
Speaker
Turns out, Vip had made it only about halfway through the episode before Mike's story became too unbearable for him to continue. And so he himself had no idea he had a role in there too.
00:05:05
Speaker
Okay. One thing led to another and here we are today recording an episode for the Republic of INSEAD podcast. So welcome, VIP, to the podcast and thank you for reaching out and for volunteering to share your side of the story.
00:05:22
Speaker
which as always is somewhat different and comes from your personal angle. So let's have it. Welcome and let's go. Well, first of all, thank you, Melina, for having me and thank you for everything to do for our community and these podcasts and getting people to reach into their wallet and support scholars and partners and
Dinner Conversations and Life Clarity
00:05:42
Speaker
everyone else. um You know, it's funny because you can have...
00:05:46
Speaker
a random dinner that hits you and you don't realize it hits someone else as well. And for me, I didn't even realize Mike remembered that dinner. There was me and Mike and three other in the others and we were skiing and drinking. And one night we went to Tex-Mex I was in a pretty rough spot at that point, going through a divorce, going through a failed fundraise. And we'll talk about some of this a little bit later in the conversation.
00:06:17
Speaker
And I remember that dinner probably as vividly as Mike does. And i just remember it in a different way. And the way I remember it is there were five of us and four people talked about their 10 year plan and what they were going to be doing 10 years from then.
00:06:32
Speaker
And that was 2022. that'd 2032. And they came around to me said, and they came around to me and i said I guess I can swear on this, right, Melina? So I said, i have no fucking idea of what I'm gonna be doing in 10 years from now.
00:06:46
Speaker
And Mike, to his credit, kind of read the room and said, Okay, what do you want in the next year? And I stopped. And i remember the word I picked distinctly, which was clarity. I just want clarity because everything's so confused right now.
00:07:00
Speaker
And one of the other things I took away from it was just how anathema I am to ten-year plans. I just, I don't believe in them because as we talked about earlier, Melaina, you're going to get curve balls and if you're anchored to your ten-year plan, the curve balls are going to knock you off the plan and you're also going to miss opportunities because you're so set on where you think you need to be.
00:07:23
Speaker
um And the funny thing about the ten-year plans amongst the five people at that table I think every single one of us has a different job and a different trajectory than our 10-year plan, except for the one guy who actually said, i want to get another job.
00:07:38
Speaker
So i thought, you know, given, yeah I ultimately did listen to Mike Kaplan's whole podcast. And, you know, I think he still thinks about life and 10-year plans. And that's just not how I think about the world. So I thought I'd hop on and we could talk a little bit about my experience and and why I think that way.
00:07:57
Speaker
Awesome. So ah let's let's get on with it. um We did talk quite a bit and I must say the back and forth with you confirms your whole, it's like each of us moves in in an energy of our own making, right? And so... You and I, it took us a while to get to the recording date, right? So we make a plan, we make a plan and then something comes through, ah goes and blows up our plan. So that was the third attempt. And my and as I was telling you before we started recording, I am in Marbella for a 50th birthday party. But I said, I'm not canceling this a third time because we got to get on with it. So...
00:08:42
Speaker
um yeah true okay you can't do 10 year plan you can't even do a 10 day plan exactly for a two months plan so exactly oh there you go well as i said in the beginning it was the 25th of march and now we are the 8th of may so took us six weeks but we got there so but uh back to you let's walk us through ah through what what you've been up to before INSEAD.
Health, Career Decisions, and Meeting a Partner
00:09:10
Speaker
In fact, because when you wrote to me, you even told me, and I did not remember that story of you prior to INSEAD and how you landed at INSEAD being US born and never left the US or never worked outside, rather. So let's start from wherever you want to start and and tell us the story of your ups and downs and plans and no plans. And the one time I made a plan. Yeah.
00:09:39
Speaker
So guess I'll start on January 1st, 2000. As people who know me well will know I enjoyed myself, bad Year's Eve. And I woke up not feeling great.
00:09:51
Speaker
And... I was starting a new job on the Monday and I was focused on getting better for the Monday. And after like three, four weeks, I was like, I just don't feel right. Something's wrong.
00:10:01
Speaker
And I went to go see a doctor and they said, we think it's this thing. And we recommend you live a life with no stress, no alcohol.
00:10:12
Speaker
You should become a vegan and kind of said, I need another doctor. um So I worked my way through seven who told me that. and then the eighth one said i'm working on an experimental drug that will manage this and cure it um and i said well you're my doctor and we did that and it was you know i was 26 at the time with a career on wall street and it was just like a huge reset moment for me where it was like, okay, I guess you could say I kind of had a 10 year plan. My 10 year plan was to go and crush it on Wall Street.
00:10:46
Speaker
And I got thrown this curveball. when I first got told about it, I was talking Malayna about this earlier. now i called up my best friend. We went and had a beer, totally inappropriate for what I should have been doing.
00:10:59
Speaker
And my friend said, well, what are you doing? Yeah, exactly. i I was still in the process of getting a new doctor because of that advice. And he said, well, what are you going to do?
00:11:12
Speaker
And I was like, well, I think the only rational thing to do is sell all my stuff and go travel. And i was really thinking about doing that. Then I met the other doctor who was like, I can treat this and it's all behind me now. So everything's great.
00:11:24
Speaker
um But it made me reassess a lot of things in my life. And, you know, I had been hardcore Wall Street guy, hardcore party guy. and It kind of made me swivel a little bit.
00:11:39
Speaker
you know, I think some of you know my ex-wife, Crystal. She was over at INSEAD for a period of time. And, you know, I figured, all right, I need to go to business school, take a break.
00:11:50
Speaker
um I applied to Stanford, Harvard, and INSEAD. when I go into job interviews they ask why I went to INSEAD, I say because I wanted to experience other cultures and I wanted to see if I could work with different people from different backgrounds.
00:12:04
Speaker
Honestly, I didn't get into Harvard or Stanford. That's why I went ah and you know, I was all geared up. it was like fall of 02. was single. I was going to move to France. And the plan was after France, I moved to London.
00:12:21
Speaker
and another one of those curveballs just don't see coming is I met Crystal. I remember the dates. November 7th. We went out on dates starting on November fourteenth We were inseparable. we were staring at, i think I showed up the last day at INSEAD before classes started, well, before welcome week started. And, um,
00:12:42
Speaker
but I didn't see that one coming. like I was planning on moving to INSEAD single, carefree. And as some of you may recall, I wasn't on campus a lot because was flying back to see her or she was in Paris, we'd go to Paris or whatever. i did tell you that I do not remember.
00:12:57
Speaker
in, you were rather present, even though you were absent half the time. So you really were there. i in so here I would fly out friday now Thursday night and then take the red eye back Sunday.
00:13:16
Speaker
Land, drive straight to class, and just keep going. um it's like That wasn't in my plan. and you know The plan had been i was going to move to London. um She wanted to come back to New York. so you know On those trips where I'd come back for the weekend, I'd stick around and interview on Mondays.
00:13:34
Speaker
And they'd be like, you're great, don't you come back in on Tuesday? I'm like, which part of the fact I go to business school in France, don't you understand? And it was it was before the Zooms and everything like that, so you had to actually be face to face there.
00:13:45
Speaker
um And I was thinking about you know the delay in us getting this on the calendar actually makes it very fortuitous, which is, It's 20 years pretty much the date when I joined Soros.
00:13:59
Speaker
And it's pretty much 10 days to the date when I put together my plan, like Mike had a plan. And not to one up Mike, but I put together a 12 year plan, not a 10 year plan. And, you know, and it's just funny how the world makes you change your plans. So I'll stop there before I get into that part of the story. Life happens while we make plans for it. Right. My favorite phrase is is it man makes plans and God laughs. ah ahha Yeah.
00:14:30
Speaker
So curve balls. You mentioned that with meeting Crystal, so basically six weeks before joining INSEAD. And then you've had a bunch of those. So do you want to expand on the curviness of... fish water but Which part do you want me to talk about?
00:14:51
Speaker
um Well, the the three most shocking ones to you. Let's do that. Okay.
Career Shifts and Challenges During COVID
00:15:00
Speaker
So... I had been so at Soros about a decade on the private equity side.
00:15:06
Speaker
And I remember was probably May of 2016. I came home and I was like, I figured it out. I had the best job in the world. I work for a guy who has $30 billion, dollars lets me do anything I want.
00:15:21
Speaker
I just made partner. I'm going to stay here for the next 12 years. And in 12 years, our little one's going to go to college and then I'll be done at 54. and I mean, it was like two months later, I came into the office and the two heads of my group took me out to lunch and said, we're spinning out, we're leaving Soros.
00:15:42
Speaker
And kind of sat back and was like, what the hell? Like, I finally figured out how this is all going to work. and so, you know, the spin out was very difficult.
00:15:55
Speaker
The negotiations for the partnership were very difficult. um Very, very difficult to put it mildly. And we spun out at the end of 2018 probably within like a day, I was like, I'm leaving this b place.
00:16:09
Speaker
I just, I don't want to work with these guys anymore. And my whole plan had just gone up in smoke. Like, and it should have, what should have been a good thing was a bad thing. Like we were spinning out. I was going to own part of the firm for a change.
00:16:22
Speaker
We got $2 billion dollars from Soros to launch our firm and i just couldn't make it work. And 2019 was brutal. it was like a year-long negotiation to get out.
00:16:34
Speaker
um But finally, in January of 2020, I got out. And it was pretty amazing kind of reflecting on it. know i've made a plan to launch my own firm and I left in January of 2020. I took two weeks off and I started fundraising.
00:16:53
Speaker
And that's when people were putting hand sanitizers on the conference tables. And instead of shaking hands, they were tapping elbows. And by March, the whole world shut down.
00:17:03
Speaker
um And, you know, I think with the benefit of hindsight, I was probably too angry to my plan because i was like, you know what? Screw it. I'm raising this fund.
00:17:14
Speaker
And I spent basically all of 2020 and 21 on Zoom calls from my house in the country in the Hamptons, trying to raise this fund. And, you know, I looked at a few other things, but I didn't pay attention to them. The other opportunities that presented themselves with the benefit of hindsight, I think if I'd been willing to adjust more, it might've come out better for me.
00:17:37
Speaker
um But ultimately that didn't work. I wanted go work at a private equity firm. I was there for like a year and it didn't work. So that fell apart in November of 23. But it's interesting because as I overlay that timeline, February of 22, I think is when we were all in Colorado and I started at this firm in June of 22. So it was like in that world of uncertainty, I was like, just give me a job, give me something. and the other thing that happened during that time is, you know I think COVID was really a pressure cooker for relationships and you either got stronger in that cauldron of fire or you broke apart.
00:18:19
Speaker
and you know crystal and i had been together for almost 20 years at that moment and i think those of you who remember from insead we were always very different people like in terms of introversion and extroversion and all those things and ultimately covid for me was probably the worst thing that's ever happened in my life um took away everything i love took away interpersonal activities, interactions, music, festivals, sporting events.
Family and Future Reassessment Post-COVID
00:18:50
Speaker
And for her, it was great because she got to stay at home and spend time with kids, which is what she wanted. um And we'll typical we talk about the divorce in a little bit, but, you know, we were going through all that. And then one of my daughters had a some kind of ailments where right at the start of COVID, she wasn't able to walk properly.
00:19:13
Speaker
And so we were racing around the doctors doing emergency um MRIs trying to figure out was going on. And, you know, it's a weird way to remember a day, but we were down at the children's hospital, of Philadelphia, you know, things are bad when New York doctors send you to someone outside of New York, cause they're just so arrogant.
00:19:32
Speaker
And we were getting ready to go get her last, not her last test, but one of her last tests done. I remember looking at the TV for some reason, they were saying Ben Bernanke cuts interest rates 100 basis points. And I was like, oh my God, this is going to be really bad. And i think we locked down like four days later in the Hamptons and My daughter couldn't go up and down the stairs by herself. So, you know, I had walked away from a job at Soros.
00:19:58
Speaker
I was feeling pressure in my relationship with my wife. And one of my girls was sick and we were carrying her up and down stairs. And we couldn't even get her to a doctor because the hospitals were obviously overwhelmed with COVID.
00:20:11
Speaker
And You know, it's funny because I look at it and I'm like, it was just four years earlier. I had a 12 year plan and it's just amazing how it can all just go up and smoke so quickly.
00:20:24
Speaker
Um, so I'll pause there and let me redirect wherever you want to go, Melina, since it's your show. So when, so when it rains, it pours basically. Uh, so three curve balls within like not even 12, well 18, 24 months of of each other. And so, and right before that dinner, but right before that dinner, there you go. So that gives us more context of where you are coming from when Mike had his 10 year plan and you were like, what the heck are you doing? I was just like, I was like, I need a 10 day plan right now.
00:21:02
Speaker
There you go. And then, and then, but then the interesting point there also being, you said that you got that job, which subsequently you hated. just because you wanted to get an answer or to move just to move forward.
00:21:16
Speaker
To move forward. So that's also something, I mean, everything we do, I suppose, ads, we learn from it, but sometimes not rushing is probably a better way than rushing. But we We are trained, right? In business school, that's what you get trained on. Make a decision, make a move. Reflection and contemplation and meditating over things is not exactly a skill trained in business school. And in markets or finance, same story, right? So, um yeah. is Where I am now, I am now, and we'll talk about it later, i have a business partner.
00:22:02
Speaker
And just yesterday he came to and he's like, we need to respond to sell and sell. And I said, okay, like, let me think about it. He's like, when are gonna be ready to respond to sell and sell? It's like, when I think about it, I'm going to take my time and I'm going to think about it. And what we find ourselves saying to each other a lot of times is just slow down.
00:22:21
Speaker
Just slow down. Because when you rush, that's when you mess things up. Yeah, yeah. But I suppose we need to, time teaches us. As in when we were 30, we could not practice that. No matter how many times someone someone tells you, slow down.
00:22:37
Speaker
So then 20 later, teaches. life t has taught you, me and everyone else. So there you go. But let's let's talk a bit about the divorce. So both you and I have gone through a divorce. Yes. Statistically, the statistics is shit, right? It's about 50% of marriages end up in divorce. And another 25% should.
00:23:01
Speaker
There you go. And I had the the the episode with Fred where we talked about women and perimenopause and menopause and how many women in that window between 45 and 55 initiate divorce. So it's like divorce is a fact of life. And, you know, when I went through mine and I was one of the early ones and I felt like a total failure, I'm like, what's wrong with me? Everyone else is happily married and I'm like getting divorced. um I was really like, I thought I'm defective because I'm getting divorced. Then I realized I'm simply um what a trendsetter.
00:23:41
Speaker
and I was divorced. I was a trans-setter, all right? so But divorce. So what was it for you? And there you go. i so i I shared my, I felt like a total utter failure. on a personal level and my at the time my career was doing great and blah blah blah but my personal life i'm i'm such a failure what was divorce for you and how did you how did you go through the mechanics of it while it was happening and then yeah um
00:24:15
Speaker
So my family's Indian by heritage and Indian people are supposed to meet Indian.
Navigating Divorce and Family Relationships
00:24:21
Speaker
was supposed marry Indians and Crystal was obviously not Indian. And, you know, I think my parents were generally supportive, but it was always in the back of their mind.
00:24:31
Speaker
Like this doesn't make sense. um And then my brother married a Cambodian, so they lost on both fronts. um And It's funny because it all started happening in 21.
00:24:43
Speaker
and i think to your point about not wanting to be a failure, I anchored to, I have to save the marriage. I can't, and none of my friends were divorced. So probably similar to you. And i was like, I gotta save this marriage. Like I can't be the divorced guy.
00:24:56
Speaker
And just as a side note, like when I would do private equity deals, if the CEO was divorced, I would tend not to do the deal because my view was he screwed up the most important investment of his life and or her life. if it was a female um And now I look back on it and I'm like, that was so simplistic and idiotic.
00:25:17
Speaker
um But like we did couples therapy like three hours a day, three days a week, did everything to save the marriage. um And at a certain point, like you can't even comprehend the idea of not being married not living with your kids all the time um and i spent a lot of time in my own personal therapy in my own journey getting comfortable with it um and we didn't you know we didn't really fight about money we didn't fight about the things most people fight about we thought about the kids and just making sure that i had a relationship with kids um
00:25:58
Speaker
And it took us, know, think we' probably separated April 21. We didn't even tell the kids until June of 22. So, know, it was like I would stay in the Hamptons. She would stay in the city.
00:26:08
Speaker
We'd switch. We'd take the kids back and forth. They didn't interrupt you. But do you think the kids did not figure it out? I think they knew. Right? Because kids have intuition, which we totally underestimate. Yeah, because...
00:26:23
Speaker
I think they knew, i think my older one had gotten comfortable with it. And in June of 22, sat him down and told both of them and my little one just collapsed. You think she was holding out hope against hope that it would work.
00:26:34
Speaker
Um, and so we told them in June of 22 and then unfortunately here in the U S the legal process just takes a long, long time. And you know, at some point we were just negotiating over stupid shit just to win the stupid shit.
00:26:48
Speaker
But finally we got it done in, uh, January of 24. And then the court approved at the end of 24. So going back to the dinner, because that's actually what made me reach out to you.
00:27:01
Speaker
I was in that purgatory right then, which is I was doing intense couples therapy, trying to save it. And it was a few months later that I started that private equity job that we talked about. And we told the kids and it was like, you know, the thing I asked for at the dinner was clarity. And it was like, I was starting to get clarity.
00:27:17
Speaker
I wasn't living in this in between world of not having a job, trying to raise a fund, not sure if I'm getting divorced. By like June, it was I'm getting divorced.
00:27:27
Speaker
I have a job. I'm not raising this fund. um And let's go start dating. So it was ah June was like a big pivot point for me, June of 22.
00:27:40
Speaker
and then But then you said you decided you're never going to settle down again. And you're that highly eligible but not available.
00:27:52
Speaker
Well, look, I think it gets back into... you know you try to make a plan for what you want to do. And so in June of 22, I was like, I'm never settling down. um And in November of 23, I left the private equity firm.
00:28:07
Speaker
As people who know me professionally, I tend to get really good contracts. So they had to pay me until 2026. twenty twenty six So I was November 23, I don't have a job, I'm single.
00:28:19
Speaker
i was like, gonna do a version of what Mike did, but without the paddle. I was just going to travel around the world for a year and a half, two years. and i was starting to book trips. I was going to see Metallica in Warsaw and ACDC in Wembley. And was looking at a visa and my now business partner calls me up and he said, I heard you're available.
00:28:43
Speaker
was like, I am. And i think this is part of why you don't have a plan is so that when opportunity knocks, you can actually answer. o And he said, Hey, would you like to meet this private equity founder? Who's a multi-billionaire?
00:28:58
Speaker
And I said, sure. course I want to meet him. What the hell am I talking to him about? and he relayed a story that he had been talking to this guy and had to basically run a business for him.
00:29:14
Speaker
And he had said, i think you should have a partner. And he started describing me on a no-name basis. And apparently guy who leans over to him and just says, i think you're talking about Viple Tandon and if you are, you'd be perfect.
00:29:27
Speaker
So, you know, my plan for Bali and Singapore and all that. No Metallica in Warsaw? Well, it partially went out the window. So we had agreed terms in February of 24 and I told my business partner, I can't start until July.
00:29:43
Speaker
He's like, why not? I'm like, I'm going to see Metallica and Warstall and ACDC at Wembley. And I've got a trip down to Argentina and all this other stuff. And it's funny, I started probably like July 1st.
00:29:55
Speaker
And then the second week I was on vacation. i was like, and sorry, guys, I've just got these vacations booked. um And it's been fantastic. like and This is like my dream job. Can you hold on for a second there?
00:30:09
Speaker
So who who said who should have a partner? the billionaire. Okay. Said to your current partner, you need a partner.
00:30:20
Speaker
Correct. And why is that? Because, so what's the rationale? So let's, this is a very interesting, so... why have a partner in the business you're in as opposed to going it alone does this billionaire have a partner he had several partners okay all right he he's sorry compliance doesn't want me to say yeah that's fine If you just Google me, you'll figure it out. um he
00:30:50
Speaker
So this guy had started a family office um in 2017. And he always wanted to have three strategies, real estate, private equity, and the business that I co-run called GPC.
00:31:03
Speaker
my bit My background was always in direct private equity and building financial services companies. And my business partner's background was investing in emerging managers. But he had never done the hard work. He's really good at picking investors, but had never done the hard work of actually like launching a firm. And I had done that probably a dozen times when I was at Soros.
00:31:23
Speaker
And so when they said he should have a partner, it was someone who had a complimentary set of skills. And I think that's what they were looking for. and He and i when I tried to launch my own firm in 2020, he was gonna be my partner.
00:31:36
Speaker
So we've been trying to do something together for four or five years at that point. So it just made logical sense. I'm always fascinated with this because like we've had a bunch of ah people in our class and I've had a few of those in episodes, but Chris and Walter as partners and Mike and Ricky as partners, yeah which is which is a different model from the archetype, the CEO, the one omnipotent. So I'm quite... um That's why I ask because it is, and I've heard from people investing in other businesses that often they evaluate the and look for partners together as opposed to one person, one leader teams when they invest in startups. So that's why it piqued my interest. and and And one comment I should make, everyone should pay attention now, you said something crucial. So if anyone has a contract to negotiate,
Humorous Take on Negotiation Skills
00:32:42
Speaker
who is your man to help you negotiate such that you can take three, four years off?
00:32:50
Speaker
and There was one point where I was working and getting paid by two other companies. There you go. So whip is VIP is the guy. um who who Those who know him would be privileged. So remember that. End of commercial break. Product placement. There's no product placement. I just created more work for you. Sorry. Well, it's funny, actually. Some of friends say, i should launch a company just to negotiate severance points in contracts.
00:33:19
Speaker
I want to go back one thing you brought up, which is this idea having a partner. Yeah. Because like when I was going to launch a firm with Federico, who's my business partner, I was the lead guy.
00:33:32
Speaker
So I owned 75% and he owned 15%. um And that dynamic wasn't good. And when he brought me in for the conversations here, the first thing I said to him is, well, look, you've We should be 60-40. And to his credit, he said, look, we're 50-50 or I'm not doing this.
00:33:55
Speaker
And I think that's an indication of true partnership. And then the other one is, you know, those people who knew me well at INSEAD is I don't lack in confidence and I don't lack in just making a decision and saying I'm right.
00:34:07
Speaker
um But this is the first time I've actually worked with someone where before I react anything, I'm like, take a pause, talk to Federico, and we end up making better decisions when we slow down and talk about things. And I think if you can find a partner like that, that's awesome.
00:34:25
Speaker
think a lot of partnerships don't work, but that should be the goal. Yeah. Yeah. and really being equal. That's a... It doesn't come naturally to many of us because there is a lot of alpha around. But when you put it on equal footing, the responsibility as well as the the the shared joy when you succeed is very different. I i mean...
00:34:51
Speaker
Yeah, and it honestly, it creates a a really cool spree decor with us and our team. Yeah. Because it's like, and all my team has part of the carry, so we're all gunning the same way. Yeah. um And I think that's just invaluable from like all the way down to our assistant has a little bit
Insights into Working at Soros
00:35:10
Speaker
carry.
00:35:10
Speaker
And I think it makes a huge difference in terms of... How big is the team? Right now, we are five. All right. And so, um all right. We probably can talk a bit more about, i I would like you to share, but since you mentioned Soros and i am a big, I am a on one level, I am a Soros product from the philanthropy end though, because yeah I was a Soros scholar twice. uh first in 93 it's a funny story um i was uh uh i was a candidate of the open society in bulgaria and they were supposed to send us so and i was approved i was one of 15 bulgarians um to go to the states for one year exchange program but then they figured out they made a mistake because
00:36:04
Speaker
half of us were in our summer before our last year in high school. And if they sent us to the States in the last year of high school, at the end we would be in a limbo because we wouldn't graduate from Bulgarian and we couldn't graduate from American high school. So what they figured out, they scrambled and they sent us instead to Chote Rosemary Hall which I understand was the school where Soros' kids went.
00:36:32
Speaker
Maybe. Maybe. I don't know. doesn't matter. It was a great school in Connecticut. It's one the best schools in America. Exactly. And so that's how I got five weeks in America in the in one of the best schools as opposed to one year in America somewhere. But that started really my whole journey, I think, pivotal in terms of how my life, personal and professional,
00:36:55
Speaker
ah ah happened. So to me, Soros is like hu almost semi-God. perhaps and and And by the way, in Eastern Europe, obviously, the Open Society Fund has done huge amounts of work.
00:37:13
Speaker
So I'm very biased, but I want you to share your experience working for Soros with with the company. So yours is a professional in a professional capacity and you've known the man. i only read his books and admired him from a very long distance. But can you talk a bit more, a bit, not more. Can you talk about Soros, the man, Soros, the organization, people you've worked with there, et cetera, et cetera?
00:37:44
Speaker
Sure. It's funny you bring up the, I guess you call it the source scholars or whatever the program is that brought people to the U S because when I was there, we were recruiting a VP and, um, we wound up hiring a woman from, who was originally from Croatia.
00:38:00
Speaker
So it comes to the U S on one of those scholarships for a year. She got a year and, for me that kind of all brought it home the idea that like he could have philanthropically supported this at the time girl who became a woman and who worked for me who was amazing and you know when she got the offer she actually burst into tears but i can't believe i'm going to work for the person who helped me create everything i've created um and that's what was really cool about working at soros i mean you got to work with the best and the brightest and the most driven.
00:38:33
Speaker
But there was always this overhang of philanthropy that you knew that the money you were making was making the world a better place. And you can agree or disagree with how he implements that and allow people here in the US to do.
00:38:46
Speaker
by It's just cool to think that he has 30 billion and if you make 15%, he gives away four and a half billion. um And the other thing that was amazing there is like, i don't think anybody else in the world does this.
00:39:02
Speaker
He did a three to one donation match. So up to i could give up to $100,000 away a year and he put $300,000 on top of it. And he's obviously very liberal and big supporter Democrats. couldn't give to politics, but nonprofits.
00:39:16
Speaker
um But that was huge. Like you could really get involved in organizations you cared about. and I think his perspective was, I'm giving away billions to stuff I care about. Let me give away millions to the stuff that my employees care about.
00:39:30
Speaker
um So that always kind of overhung the organization in a good way. um Of course, you know look while I was there, he you called him a godlike figure.
00:39:42
Speaker
I mean, here in the US, he became a demonic figure. I know. Same in Bulgaria and in Eastern Europe. But at least the narrative in Eastern Europe, I feel, comes from the East, as ah as as in That was a persistently pushed narrative. And, you know, to be called a Soros-linked person in Bulgaria is an offense.
00:40:07
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, it's this. So it's the same dynamic.
Soros' Global Perception and Advocacy
00:40:10
Speaker
But as far as Bulgaria, and I wouldn't be surprised if it's also in the States influenced It was a line that was pushed from east of our border. Yeah, I think from here it was pushed kind of by what eventually became the MAGA movement, right? So because George's fundamental belief, and it's in the name of his organization, is Open Society, which calls for open communication, open voting, open systems. um
00:40:39
Speaker
And the reality is um when you're trying to close a society, that's when George becomes the enemy. Yeah. And so, you know, Bulgaria, Romania, other parts of Eastern Europe were closing down their systems in terms of openness.
00:40:56
Speaker
And I hate to say it, it feels like that's what the U.S. is doing now, which is why George has become a boogeyman here. um You know, transitioning from kind of the political and philanthropic George to the business
Financial Acumen and Crisis Foresight
00:41:09
Speaker
George. Yeah.
00:41:10
Speaker
mean, He is a wonder. um He's without a doubt when he walks into the room, always the smartest person in the room, connected at the highest levels.
00:41:22
Speaker
And he's very old now, but going back to during the GFC, his ability to take in information in vast quantities and separate the signal from the noise is just beyond anything I've ever seen.
00:41:37
Speaker
Like in 2008,
00:41:40
Speaker
we were up 30% while the world was falling apart. And have a couple vivid memories from that time. One was, i remember George just walking down the hallway one day and going, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, they don't make sense to me.
00:41:57
Speaker
Shut them all.
00:42:00
Speaker
Okay. And so, you know, I was doing like a hundred million dollar deals and George has got like a $5 billion dollars short on Danny May and Freddie Mac. And you know what? He was right. and other people couldn't figure that out. And then my favorite memory of George I was doing a lot in financials, so we'd spend a fair bit of time together to try to understand.
00:42:20
Speaker
And the funny thing is, I had never done anything in financials before I joined Soros. So I asked all the dumb questions like, wait, how does this bank fund that? And what if that bank's not there? don't know you remember, there was a thing here in the U.S. called TARP, which was an emergency rescue thing. And I happened to be on the trading floor the first time they voted on TARP.
00:42:41
Speaker
And it failed. And i think that everything went limit down like so fast. And all a sudden George, he's like probably 75, 80 at that point.
00:42:54
Speaker
walks up trader by trader like people are in shock and he grabs them by the scrub of his neck and shakes them and says sit down do your job sit down do your job and i was like that well first he walked out before it had failed and said it's going to fail and then everybody was in shock and then he said like do your job short the market do your job short the market do your job short the market and that was george like he could he could see things before other people saw them And when people were frozen in fear and terror, e could get them to, I mean, hate to make it this callous, but make money. Like just, you know, separate the signal from the noise. And, you know, and it was amazing to cast the characters that went through there. um
00:43:41
Speaker
You know, so like two, tre secrets of the treasury Steve Mnuchin, Scott Bessent. um I did a huge deal with Steven. I spent a lot of time with him.
00:43:53
Speaker
um am i And Steven is, there's a quote about him, so I'm not making this up, but like he puts the douche in fiduciary. and The way I describe him is he is a velociraptor of capitalism.
00:44:08
Speaker
and So if you put 20 people in a room with a dollar bill sitting on the table, somehow Steven would walk out of it And the other 19 people would thank him for doing it. um So I was yeah one of my closest mentors in the world. It was Stevens right hand guy for a very long time until he went to treasury.
00:44:26
Speaker
And I happened to be with him when it broke that Mnuchin had signed on to be the campaign finance director for Trump. And Stephen's a wickedly smart guy. That was the first time, right? 2016, basically. yeah Yeah. Yeah, 2016. And turned to my mentor and I was like, what the hell is Stephen thinking?
00:44:46
Speaker
And I think this gives you a perfect perspective on Stephen. He turned to me and said, well, Steve's basically an independent, but he's more than Democrat. And he's met every Democrat billionaire on the planet.
00:44:58
Speaker
By doing this, he's going to meet every Republican billionaire on the planet. So if Trump wins, he gets to be secretary the treasury. And if he doesn't, he just met a whole bunch of other billionaires.
00:45:09
Speaker
And that's kind of that Mnuchin Soros mindset. um And we had and a CIO for a while. This is one of the things I loved about Soros is it made me a better investor, not just a better private equity investor.
00:45:23
Speaker
Because the people who ran the firm could invest anywhere they wanted to. And after the GFC, we came up with this great idea to launch a mortgage insurance company. And we went to investment committee. i was like, this is a great deal, blah blah, blah. And the CIO at the time, a guy named Keith Anderson, just looked at me said, I can recreate everything you're doing in synthetic trades.
00:45:46
Speaker
Why do I have to go build a company? was like, no, no, but we're private equity. We build companies. He's like, great. Go talk to the mortgage desk. See if they can recreate this exact trade without actually any people.
00:45:58
Speaker
And for me, that was like a whole different way of thinking about the world. is Because if all you do is private equity your whole career, you have one tool. yeah And people sitting higher above me forced me to look at other ways to implement an idea.
00:46:11
Speaker
And that was that's really profound for me to figure that out. And at a relatively young age, I mean, I was by thirty four i was 34 the middle of a global financial crisis with some of the smartest financial minds around me. So it was great.
00:46:28
Speaker
Can you believe it's almost 20 years? Okay, it's 18 years. It's 18 years. and that It feels like it was yesterday. And now I listen to commentary because we are in a shaky period, right? I don't know ah what when it's going to blow up, but it is going to blow up.
00:46:44
Speaker
And I'm listening to commentary and to people. I still consider myself 29 plus or minus, right? But then the financial crisis was 18 years ago. And I'm hearing people who are saying, well, the current generation of traders and people in finance have not experienced a recession in their life. And I'm like, what do you mean? Exactly. And the thing is...
00:47:10
Speaker
And we are basically on our third crisis whenever it comes, right? No, fourth is going to be. Dot com? um i I joke, whenever I decide to be an entrepreneur, the world falls apart.
00:47:24
Speaker
In 01, it was the dot com. but I did VC in 01, the world fell apart. I went to Soros, the world fell apart. And then I tried to launch my own firm and we got COVID.
00:47:34
Speaker
And so now yeah you know there was one funny anecdote from Soros about the GFC, which I'll i'll tell because it's pretty funny. it's ah I sent Crystal to go get $50,000 because like I just wanted currency. And she went to the bank. yeah Cash. I just wanted cash.
00:47:50
Speaker
And they only had 20s. They were out of hundreds. And I was like, that's a but that's a bad sign. Like, So I only took 10,000 and I was talking to one of my colleagues, a senior guy, and I said, I'm getting my emergency bag ready.
00:48:05
Speaker
He's like, all right, what are you going get? I'm like, tents, ready meals, flashlights. I'm getting an inflatable canoe so I can paddle across the Hudson River if I have to. i was like, what are you getting?
00:48:18
Speaker
It's like a gun. I'm like, why are you getting a gun? It's like, I'm going to come take your canoe. was like, oh, I was like, all right, cool. so I see how this works. it's probably I think about the those days of the GFC and those days of the dot com. And in New York, it was an exceptionally terrifying time because that was also the time of 9-11.
00:48:45
Speaker
And I lived four blocks from 9-11. Like I watched the towers fall. I watched the people jump. And when you think about the current generation of investors who haven't been through dot com with a 911, GFC, where like you act like I remember sitting Sunday nights with CNBC on to figure out which bank failed, where they bailing out AIG and and remember i was supposed to go have lunch at a friend's house here in the city and he was in a barbecue and his wife was like, can you barbecue?
00:49:17
Speaker
i was like, yeah, where's Eric? Oh, he's at the Fed. They're going to figure out which bank they want to buy. They were just selling off banks. And like if you haven't been through that, it's hard. Well, going back to the the subject of the talk, it's hard to have a 10-year plan when the GFC happens in your 10-year plan.
00:49:35
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so um interesting times in any case. And we are about to have some more interesting times, I'm afraid. So I don't know how bearish you are, but I am like... I used to think I'm bullish as as a baseline. And now I start to think maybe I'm not bullish a baseline because... or his age, i have no idea. but i mean, it's amazing though, because...
00:50:06
Speaker
I think Warren Buffett said the last great financial innovation was the ATM. And like I sit with people now in New York and they're just slicing and dicing risk. They're running it through models.
00:50:18
Speaker
They're rating it this garbage and people are just buying it. It feels like 06, 07 to me. And it's kind of terrifying. Yeah.
00:50:30
Speaker
Let's see, 50,000 in cash. But for an exchange rate, I don't know what that is in euros. hu but Oh, and and there is another character. So you had two Treasury Secretaries. So Scott was my boss. Yeah. oh Oh, he was even your boss.
00:50:49
Speaker
So he was my boss's boss. He was a CIO. Yeah. um I didn't know him as well as I knew Mnuchin. um What I find... It's very interesting. Before this, I was thinking to myself, I don't even remember who Joe Biden's second trey secretary the Treasury was.
00:51:06
Speaker
Janet...
00:51:09
Speaker
expert Janet, loved the ex-Fed chair. Yeah. But like, yeah in the Trump presidency, you know who the secretary of treasury is and the Biden, they were seen and not heard.
00:51:22
Speaker
um And what I find amazing, so Scott's very smart. I mean, Scott, the little known story about Scott is he came up with the trade to break the Bank of England. Yeah. And he told, um Druckenmiller, who upped the size, and then Druckenmiller told George, who went all in on that trade. But that was Scott's idea.
00:51:41
Speaker
So he's brilliant. um The part I do not understand about Scott is he's probably the most successfully openly gay financial executive that we know of.
00:51:53
Speaker
And the fact that he can serve in this administration is's just, it's shocking to me. um And i would trust him more to negotiate with China than I would Kushner or Wyckoff or any of these people.
00:52:07
Speaker
Like, he's excellent. But, um so I don't know him as well, but he's very smart. He's very capable. yeah Which is when it becomes very confusing when you get very smart people to get to...
00:52:22
Speaker
act in roles like that. But that got us more or less to politics. And I think it's time for a break and I'm going to read your annual or your yearbook entry, which you think Daniel Elfen wrote. But I can tell you, I did check with him and he said you wrote his profile, but he did not write yours. So that anybody's listening and remembers who wrote mine, and I'd love to know it.
00:52:47
Speaker
He thinks, so we should check. He thinks it was Mike Young.
00:52:53
Speaker
Mike thinks young.
00:52:58
Speaker
Wait, or am i wait? I'm checking what he wrote.
Humorous Yearbook Entry
00:53:02
Speaker
So hold on. My next guess would have been Alex Anderson. Wait, no, no. Elfen.
00:53:10
Speaker
There you go. Mark Young. He says. Oh, maybe Mark wrote it. That might be right. um I remember well. So I did check. But listen, listen. So I'm going to read it. that It was Mark Young's house in Colorado.
00:53:24
Speaker
that ah There you go. see Well, you should ask him. But I'm going to read it. it's I must warn everyone, it's a difficult language for me. So my pronunciation is not going to ah recreate the the true meaning there. But listen now and then we'll talk some more. So I start. Open quotation.
00:53:47
Speaker
Pay attention, y'all, and listen real close. How I break that shit down. One love to the big brother, v i p His that player and soothsayer, he be part in late night, Chateau high-fiving, Peugeot driving, and fee-styling, Bellefontaine gate-crashing smiling.
00:54:09
Speaker
He disappear next day like a ghost to New York City, East Coast. Back in Napoleon's hood, our Chateau, all a fluster, but she ain't no Bill Murray ghost-a-buster.
00:54:24
Speaker
Hear another story about my man in his glory. One time he does a night of drinking and poker. The chain smoker, he be the poker.
00:54:35
Speaker
All beginners welcome. Just bring your cash and your dumb ass for the car sharp is hot tonight. He clean out each trust in Saka. He got 400 euro, the mother effa. He the mastermind like the board game you play when you is nine.
00:54:54
Speaker
Financial engineering, wheeling and dealing. Republican with feeling, but he no stealing cause VIP he be fly. Yeah, flamboyant for life, yo. Yeah, yeah, flamboyant for life. So there you go, you are flamboyant, see? But what I didn't realize... but wish everybody could have seen your face as you were reading that. Because the visual did not align with the words in any way, shape or form.
00:55:24
Speaker
Honestly, it's so difficult to read it because it's the punctuation and the no capitalization and missing letters and it's all on purpose, obviously. And I cannot imitate... I'm not an actor and I cannot imitate properly The accent that was meant and the words and the the whole, yes, New York City.
00:55:47
Speaker
Yeah. But what I didn't know here was you being, well, we've never, or I forgot, I'm talking about Republicans or Democrats or whatever back in the day, 20X years ago. So what's that Republican with feeling? you told me You told me that you are no longer identifying yourself as a Republican. So let's talk a little bit about Republican and what you mean, what you where you are coming from, where is that now and why are you independent?
00:56:23
Speaker
Like...
Evolution of Political Views
00:56:24
Speaker
Yeah, i think i think non-Americans have a trouble understanding the difference between Republicans and Democrats. And if you think about republicanism in its most basic form, it's really close to libertarianism.
00:56:39
Speaker
It believes in small federal government, small state government, limited social net safety net, um low taxes, basically everybody, ah a dogmatic belief in the Bill of Rights, free speech, free enterprise, free right to assembly.
00:56:56
Speaker
And that's what I believe in and I think probably when did Reagan come in? 1980? So probably like 40 years ago, the Republican Party chart started to change.
00:57:08
Speaker
And they brought in a group that really didn't have their voice, which was these evangelical Christians. And so they brought them into the fold. And when they brought them into the fold, they brought in certain conservative values. So being anti-abortion, being anti-gay, being, to a certain extent, a bit of racism embedded in that.
00:57:30
Speaker
And that started to take root within the the Republican Party. And that was pretty anathema to me. And then they also still had the billionaires and the people who wanted low taxes. And it it became this incongruous mishmash of deeply conservative, generally not wealthy people with wealthy people.
00:57:53
Speaker
And it became this awful cauldron that was just waiting for someone like Donald Trump. And when Donald Trump showed up, he could tap into that disaffection amongst them.
00:58:05
Speaker
and really, as we were talking about earlier, try to eliminate open society in the US. So, you know, I think people might remember that when I was at INSEAD, you said I was im probably only one US born, US raised, never lived overseas.
00:58:18
Speaker
Like I was dogmatically pro-American, like wildly pro-America. And I think now with the wisdom of time at INSEAD, friends from around the world, and age, I can look at it and identify that there are fundamental flaws here. um And this administration scares the living hell out of me.
00:58:35
Speaker
um And I think it should scare the living hell out of the world.
Concerns about US Political Climate
00:58:39
Speaker
um And part of the problem we have here in the US is that you know you've got this weird coalition that came together for the Republicans, you have an equally weird coalition that's come together for Democrats. And it's very, a combination of centrist people like a Bill Clinton or even a Barack Obama.
00:58:55
Speaker
Then you've got a very fringe left element. And unfortunately, the way we have our primaries set up in the US,
00:59:03
Speaker
To be a Republican nominee, you have to win over all the crazy Republicans. To become a Democratic nominee, you have to win over the crazies. So then you end up with a hard right running against a hard left. And pretty much everybody in America, maybe not everybody, but a huge percentage, just want a centrist. Like just know someone who will respect civil liberties, not spend, I think federal debt just went above GDP for the first time yesterday.
00:59:28
Speaker
And it's just a weird time to be in America. and You know, my girlfriend's son has a theory that empires only last 250 years.
00:59:39
Speaker
Well, we're celebrating 250 years here in the U S and getting an arc to go with it. We're getting an arc. We're getting a ballroom. We're getting, i think they're naming all the battleships after Trump. I mean, it's like, it's ridiculous. Um, and by the way, they just announced that they're gonna billion dollars into the ballroom. It's ridiculous.
00:59:59
Speaker
amazing <unk>s ridiculous um I thought it was all going to be privately financed. So like point of the whole thing.
01:00:11
Speaker
but by the way, I would rather that the people spend a billion than 10 billionaires put up the money to build the what like in what world do people accept donations to build the fricking white house?
01:00:24
Speaker
Right? In that one. I mean, the the grift and the graft and all of that is just outrageous. And the problem is is, I just don't see a path back to normalcy for the United States.
01:00:36
Speaker
We swing from pendulum to pendulum to pendulum. And... it's destabilizing for us here and I think it's destabilizing for the world. um And, you know, I think some of you probably know that I'll just do a pitch here.
01:00:49
Speaker
Alex Kellogg, who is one promotion of above us, is running for Congress right now. um And he's a centrist and he's a normal guy. And I'm supporting him. I hope he gets through. But, you know, he's going to end up with something. He has a chance.
01:01:05
Speaker
I haven't seen polls, so I don't actually know. but yeah a lot of NCI people are supporting him. it's like That's the kind of person we want running for Congress. um Probably seven years ago, they approached me to run, and I said, no way. like i don't want to expose. Well, and Crystal was like, absolutely no way.
01:01:24
Speaker
like we just You don't want to expose your personal life. like all But apparently now you can do anything in your personal life, and it's not disqualifying. so For as long as it lasts, right? And then, but and I mean, eventually it comes back with a vengeance because as you said, it's a pendulum and it's swinging all the time. So ah there you go. So ah yeah, interesting times.
01:01:50
Speaker
So you mentioned the girlfriend and so far we haven't mentioned that. So tell me about that Central Park picnic. Yeah, so it goes back to...
Unexpected Relationships and Life's Unpredictability
01:02:00
Speaker
can't make a plan.
01:02:01
Speaker
So I wasn't planning on having a girlfriend. I was out with a buddy of mine in the Hamptons. We got known at like four in the morning. i got up at eight.
01:02:12
Speaker
I walked around my house quietly so he wouldn't wake up. Finally at noon, I was like, seriously, dude, like i got to go. And I opened the garage and his car was gone. called him. I'm like, where are you? It's like I'm pulling into my house in Greenwich, Connecticut. I'm rethinking everything about my life after last night.
01:02:27
Speaker
so I do that just to give you a framework for where my head was at. And ah drove back to the city, went to a picnic, met an amazing woman. And we've been together for a year and a half.
01:02:40
Speaker
Couldn't be happier. not Again, not what I expected, but it's working out pretty well. she Indian? She's not Indian. No, as my mom says, if you put a tan on her, she would look Indian.
01:02:52
Speaker
She's Portuguese. Okay. right. So, yeah, they're a little bit happier with that than a blonde. hi Blue-eyed, blonde, blue-eyed. So, and and wrapping it up, we're coming close to it, but um ah summarize what your business does, because that was a model I wasn't, I mean...
01:03:17
Speaker
fully aware of. The strategy I'm running. So what's it called? What's it called is GP seating. And what and i love this because I've tried to be an an entrepreneur and it didn't work.
01:03:28
Speaker
And when i was at Soros, I helped to seed some of the most prominent firms in the world, including a firm called Blue Owl, which you guys may know. were the first investor with them, one of the first investors. um And so what we do is we try to be the first anchor LP when someone is launching a new fund.
01:03:45
Speaker
And in exchange for that, we get permanent ownership in their GP. And we become their actual partners. And then I mentioned my partner, Federico, helps to identify the investment talent.
01:03:56
Speaker
And then I help to identify the entrepreneurial talent who's actually going to go build a big business. um And I love it because my job is on the one hand, fundraising, obviously. um And then the other part is meeting with two, three hundred people who want to launch their own firms every year and then picking two or three that will back.
01:04:16
Speaker
And it lets me from a distance be an entrepreneur. So I'm not taking the entrepreneurial risk, but I'm taking the entrepreneurial ride with these people. um And it's, we've been at it for about two years now.
01:04:28
Speaker
Mentioned earlier, in my partnership with Federico is amazing. Our team's amazing. um and it's just fun. Very well. ah Lastly, what did I want? ah Yes. My very last question is what On that up and down and up again road, what are you wishing for and what are you hoping for going forward? Your personal, I mean, could be professional, personal, but your...
01:05:03
Speaker
So I've learned I never answer that question because then it never happens. So i'm going to go back to what I said at the dinner. I'm just looking for clarity. Clarity. All right. Well, I like that word. And I think it's good for each one of us to take the time often enough to step back and ask questions.
01:05:23
Speaker
for clarity. So I do like that. It does show your your heritage superstition, which is one that we have in Eastern Europe as well or in Bulgaria for sure. So um yeah, there you go. um Born and grown in America, but as superstitious as the heritage. Absolutely. Yes. So listen, thank you so much for your time. Thank you, first of all, for reaching out. I love because this becomes a dialogue.
01:06:02
Speaker
between people. I'm just the facility i'm just the vessel. And it's just I love how that's happening very organically in our class. And thank you, of course, for making a donation to the Kaplan Partnership Fund. And thank you for opening up and for the time you share and and the insight of yourself that you shared. Because as you said,
01:06:28
Speaker
you're a very private person and not used to talking ah about deep stuff in public. So much, much appreciated. Thank you for doing this, Mjolnir. We all appreciate you. And let's see what Mike is going to say. I'm just kidding.
01:06:49
Speaker
But who knows? Maybe someone else from that group is going to be like, well, that is not what happened there. ah but I'll leave you with one last story. And and at this point, everybody everybody's going to know everybody who was at the dinner, which was not my intention. But I decided to stay an extra day after everybody left to get clarity.
01:07:11
Speaker
And the other guys were like, you're skiing great. like Don't just sit at the house. Go ski. Go ski. And I went skiing. They all left to go home. And I fell. And I broke four ribs and I broke my arm.
01:07:23
Speaker
and um you were looking for clarity right no yeah i didn't take the purpose side state and uh there was one guy who had not was still at the airport and i called him and i was like i'm in bad shape like i'm at the clinic And I'm not going to say who it was.
01:07:42
Speaker
He knows who he is and he should do your next podcast. Oh, there you go. That's becoming ah like the ice bucket challenge now. but that we He left the airport, changed his flight, came and got me and boom bought me a bottle of bourbon and some THC.
01:07:59
Speaker
And I got through the night and the next morning he put me on the plane and sent me back to New York. So you know who you are. You should be on next. there you go i'll have to forward the episode and tell him listen listen to this episode just in case all right thank you so much vip that was great and uh we'll speak again soon
01:08:24
Speaker
You were listening to The Republic of INSEAD now in its 2026 O3D Limited Podcast Edition. It is my hope to remind everyone what an interesting and dare I say colorful bunch of people we are and how much we can contribute to each other, be it through life experiences, ideas, knowledge or mere inspiration.
01:08:47
Speaker
the podcast is inspired by the original republic of inciad yearbook produced on paper now 23 years ago by oliver bradley and team thank you ollie and team for this contribution to our class's memory and for letting me continue in the tradition title and inspiration included Creator and author of The Republic of Insead 2026-03D Limited Podcast Edition MI, Milena Ivanova.
01:09:12
Speaker
Original music by Peter Dundakov with help from Dare Film Productions. Stay tuned for more as and when it comes. Thank you for listening.