0:00

People probably hate when they hear people who've made a lot of money say

0:01

this, but I would say 95% of the

0:07

utility of money comes from not

0:07

having to worry about money. I

0:10

think a lot of times people are

0:10

focused on stuff and status.

0:16

That's really what they want

0:16

money for. And again, sounds

0:20

very cliche to say those will

0:20

not do very much for you for any

0:25

long period of time at all. On

0:25

the status part, no one gives

0:28

it, and on the stuff part, you

0:28

know this, anything you've ever

0:32

bought, you get a little bit of

0:32

a boost, and then it goes away.

0:34

So that really doesn't provide

0:34

that much utility, and maybe

0:37

even negative utility in many

0:37

cases. What I think provides the

0:41

utility is the peace of mind of

0:41

not having to worry about money.

0:50

You're listening to part two of my incredible interview with Graham Weaver,

0:52

the founder and CEO of alpine

0:55

investors, one of the highest

0:55

performing and fastest growing

0:59

private equity firms in the

0:59

world. If you haven't yet

1:02

listened to part one, be sure to

1:02

check that one out first. Now,

1:05

without further ado, here's part

1:05

two with my incredible interview

1:08

with Graham. So you started your

1:08

own fund. What's your advice to

1:12

the 28 year olds out there, or

1:12

the 25 year olds we all know,

1:16

and I'm sure there's people who

1:16

may even leave your firm. They

1:19

want to get their own firm, and

1:19

they can grow it, and they want,

1:22

a lot of them do it because they

1:22

want to grow it themselves, and

1:25

a lot of them will do it for the

1:25

money. But it's the same way in

1:28

the VC business, you know, you

1:28

want to start a fund. What if

1:32

you don't know Tom Steyer, and

1:32

what if you don't know somebody?

1:35

What's the what should you what

1:35

are the three things you should

1:37

do to start a fund? If you don't

1:37

have relationships, either go to

1:41

Stanford and you don't have

1:41

friends that have money,

1:44

yeah? And to be clear, I didn't know Tom. I'd never met before, but, but yeah,

1:46

but if I can't even pick

1:49

somebody, Yeah, same advice,

1:49

though. I think that the first

1:53

part is, so I'll use, I'll use a

1:53

real example for fun, for for

1:58

myself, because I can talk in

1:58

more detail about that. So let's

2:00

say you were raising a first

2:00

time you know, private equity

2:03

fund to do buyouts is the first

2:03

I talk about in sales. You know,

2:08

you first find your ideal

2:08

customer. That's the first part,

2:12

and that's huge. If you're

2:12

selling, no matter what you're

2:16

selling, you find the ideal

2:16

customer. So if you're raising a

2:18

first time fund that's going to

2:18

do industrials, for example,

2:23

let's find all the people who do

2:23

first time funds and do

2:27

industrials. Like I know it

2:27

sounds simple, but probably 95%

2:33

of investors are going to call

2:33

on are not even interested in

2:37

first time funds or industrials.

2:37

So you like the effort put into

2:44

creating a list of ideal

2:44

customers is a way better use of

2:49

energy than the effort put in

2:49

calling 100 people, 95 of which

2:54

are not ideal. So that would be

2:54

Advice number one, and there are

2:58

tons of investors that only do

2:58

first time funds or have

3:02

allocations to first time funds.

3:02

And so, you know, today with AI

3:06

and I mean, it's not going to be

3:06

that hard to find out who those

3:10

people are. So that's kind of

3:10

part. One is get rid of the 95%

3:14

figure and put all that energy

3:14

on building as big a pipeline as

3:18

you can to that 5% who's

3:18

actually going to buy your

3:20

thing. Second is, I always say

3:20

the second. So, first is ideal

3:24

customer. Second is irresistible

3:24

offer. So, you know, and, and so

3:29

what's your irresistible offer

3:29

like? If you sat on the other

3:32

side of you and you were, and

3:32

you were, you know, you had lots

3:37

of funds to look at, what would

3:37

make you have to say, yes, you

3:41

know, what is that thing? And in

3:41

my case, I had zero track

3:45

record. My irresistible offer

3:45

was conveying my will to win and

3:50

my how my track record from the

3:50

rest of my life and will to win

3:54

was going to translate into

3:54

running a private equity firm.

3:57

That was my irresistible offer.

3:57

It wasn't my track record of

4:00

three label deals that didn't

4:00

work out. You know, it was it

4:03

was it was it was my kind of

4:03

what I was saying, like, will to

4:07

win, like, I'm going to make this work come hell or high water. Here's the plan I have.

4:09

You know, that was kind of my

4:12

irresistible offer. And then the

4:12

last thing is, you could used to

4:15

need lots of at bats. So those

4:15

are the, I think that's the kind

4:20

of three part, simple formula,

4:20

really for selling anything, and

4:24

almost anything will yield to

4:24

that formula.

4:27

So you said that

4:27

first fund, I think you made

4:30

eight investments, five lost

4:30

money. The fund didn't make any

4:33

money, but you were sitting in a

4:33

room with Tom overlooking

4:40

Alcatraz, right? One of the

4:40

mistakes you made was you wrote

4:43

a memo to the investors that it

4:43

was impossible to lose money

4:47

right now, that's, that's not a

4:47

very good memo to write. So what

4:51

lessons did you learn? Yeah,

4:51

with that memo.

4:54

Well, the the

4:54

memo I wrote about impossible

4:57

lose money was because we bought

4:57

three companies below. Below

5:00

their net asset value, and that,

5:00

in my mind, said, Well, how

5:04

could you lose money paying

5:04

below net asset value? It turns

5:07

out you can, and we did. So the

5:07

first lesson was probably, you

5:13

know, I, you know, we were, we

5:13

were looking for, I was so

5:17

inexperienced and so fearful

5:17

that I was spending all my time

5:21

trying to buy businesses where I

5:21

was not going to lose, you know,

5:26

I was focused on not losing. And

5:26

the magic that I found

5:30

subsequently is the opposite of

5:30

that, like looking for ways

5:34

where, where, if things go

5:34

right, they go really, really,

5:37

really right. So, you know, I

5:37

use a term asymmetry and

5:41

investing. And you have, I'm

5:41

sure see this all the time in

5:43

venture capital too. I'm sure

5:43

that's a huge part of it. But,

5:46

like, I don't want to invest in

5:46

something that if it goes right,

5:50

is going to be a 3x deal. You

5:50

know, I that that's because I

5:56

know they're not all going to go

5:56

right. And I need, I need things

5:59

that if they go right, they can

5:59

be a 20x even in buyouts. I

6:03

need, I want to have deals that

6:03

are like that. And in the early

6:06

days, I was exactly flipped the

6:06

opposite. I was looking at

6:09

things that if they went right,

6:09

maybe they were going to be a 2x

6:12

but I thought there was a really

6:12

low chance they'd go wrong. And

6:15

it was just based on fear. You

6:15

know, it was just inexperience

6:19

and fear. But yeah, losing money

6:19

on that first fund was it was an

6:24

like, now, when we fundraise,

6:24

the first fund is kind of a fun

6:28

story to tell. It's like a

6:28

footnote. People really like

6:31

they kind of like it. They're like, Oh yeah. You know, most people had some hard things they

6:33

overcame. But at the time, it

6:37

was 11 years, you know, that

6:37

that wasn't like a footnote.

6:41

That was 11 years that we had to

6:41

work out that fund, and we had

6:45

11 years where we had longer

6:45

than that, where we had that

6:48

anchor hanging around our neck

6:48

from losing money on that fund.

6:51

So it was, I definitely do not

6:51

recommend, you know, having a

6:56

lot losing money on your first

6:56

fund. It was, it was really

6:59

tough. Steven

7:00

Romek is a good

7:00

friend FPA capital, I think they

7:04

managed $20 billion maybe $22

7:04

billion these days. He's been up

7:08

for Morningstar manager the

7:08

decade before, and I remember

7:11

having lunch with him one day,

7:11

and he's in a suit and tie. I

7:14

said, Steve, you look so nice.

7:14

What's up? He said, Oh,

7:17

something stupid. I said, What's

7:17

up? He said, Yeah, I've been

7:20

nominated for Morningstar

7:20

manager of the decade. Oh, I

7:23

said, Wow, that's incredible. Steve, wow. You know, congratulations. He said, it's

7:25

only a matter of time before I

7:29

look like a fucking idiot again.

7:29

And he meant it, yeah, right. So

7:34

I think you have to be very

7:34

humble and have humility as an

7:37

investor. Well, absolutely. It

7:37

really doesn't matter if you're

7:40

private equity, venture capital,

7:40

whatever the case may be, the

7:43

case may be, I

7:43

think that's the real benefit of us losing money on the first fund, was we had to

7:45

get better. Like we had to get a

7:50

lot better. We had to have one

7:50

of our core values of continuous

7:53

improvement. You know, I started

7:53

hiring executive coaches. I just

7:57

had this belief that I we needed

7:57

to get better. And that's never

8:03

ended, you know, I think if our

8:03

first fund had been like a good

8:05

fund, we'd say, Oh, we kind of

8:05

know what we're doing, you know,

8:08

we'll just keep doing that. And

8:08

it was the opposite. We just we

8:10

like we're right now. I mean,

8:10

I'm 23 years into running

8:14

Alpine. We've had a really

8:14

amazing run, and we're almost

8:20

starting over, like we're taking

8:20

our firm down to the studs.

8:24

We're, you know, really looking

8:24

hard at our strategy, the way

8:28

we're structuring our firm, our

8:28

I mean, we're not starting over,

8:31

but, you know, we're, we're

8:31

looking at, like, almost like,

8:33

I'm a day one CEO walking into

8:33

Alpine. What would I do, you

8:36

know, how would I structure the

8:36

firm, the investing team, you

8:39

know, what? How would I look at

8:39

sourcing? I mean, we're, we just

8:43

have a real intense focus on,

8:43

you know, getting better. And it

8:48

came probably from, from losing

8:48

money the first fund. I

8:52

think one of the

8:52

interesting things that you did,

8:54

and we'll fund an entrepreneur

8:54

for a second time, even though

8:59

they lost money on the first

8:59

time, depending on how they

9:02

handled the situation and the

9:02

communication. Yeah. So your two

9:58

investors invested in your

9:58

second fund. Again, they did.

10:02

They liked you. They backed you,

10:02

which is very hard to do. It's a

10:05

six to $8 million fund, yeah.

10:05

And then you had several things

10:09

happening during that fund. You

10:09

have a.com explosion, which I

10:12

was very fortunate and lucky to

10:12

be a part of. And then you had

10:17

Lehman Brothers blow up, yep,

10:17

and I think you had your first

10:22

child right around that time,

10:22

yep. And you had spent the last

10:27

dollar of that fund, and you

10:27

realized you needed to do

10:30

something different, so you

10:30

hired an executive coach. We're

10:33

going to talk about the details

10:33

of the lessons you learned. But

10:37

why did you say I need to hire

10:37

this guy? JP Flom, and because

10:42

most people don't have the self

10:42

awareness and would never hire

10:46

an executive coach.

10:48

Yeah. Situation,

10:48

well, first at the time, I mean,

10:51

in 2000 Eight or 2009 the term

10:51

executive coaching was actually

10:55

pretty novel. People didn't know

10:55

what that meant. I didn't know

10:58

what that meant. But as I talked

10:58

to JP, who I was so lucky to be

11:02

introduced to him, I was like,

11:02

Yeah, this is kind of basically

11:06

another version of, going back

11:06

to the audio tapes, you know,

11:09

I'm like, Hey, I'm I'm gonna

11:09

just, like, really invest in

11:12

myself improvement and I can get

11:12

better as a leader and and JP

11:18

was just life changing because

11:18

he came from a background of

11:23

talent assessment and and

11:23

executive coaching, so he was

11:26

kind of the marriage of those

11:26

two things, and it was

11:30

absolutely life changing because

11:30

that I really, I really started

11:36

to just completely shift my

11:36

mindset. And you probably have

11:40

heard me say this before, but

11:40

like, by the by the end of our

11:44

engagement, or even in the

11:44

middle of our engagement, I

11:46

remember writing on this in my

11:46

in my notebook, like I am in the

11:50

talent business. Like, that's

11:50

actually the true business I'm

11:53

in, yes, I'm applying that to

11:53

software companies or services

11:56

businesses or private equity

11:56

firm, but like, the true

12:00

business I'm in as a talent

12:00

business. And then so the

12:03

realization of that, like at a

12:03

cellular level, was really

12:07

powerful. And then, and then the

12:07

application, the tactics of how

12:10

to actually roll that out, that

12:10

was what I I got from him, and

12:13

that was, that was absolutely,

12:13

you know, transformative.

12:17

I get lots of

12:17

emails, and I had lots of emails

12:20

coming in. Oh, I'll give you

12:20

some executive coaching. Most of

12:25

these are kind of ridiculous. We

12:25

talked about, you know, people

12:29

who have are teaching these

12:29

lessons online, who have never

12:31

managed to Starbucks before, how

12:31

did you evaluate? First of all,

12:35

how did you meet JP, and then,

12:35

how did you evaluate? At what

12:38

point did you realize, yeah, I

12:38

trust that guy, because at some

12:41

point it's a leap of faith. I

12:42

had a number of

12:42

meetings with him, and so I met

12:45

with him and really liked him.

12:45

He had, you know, I really, I

12:50

really, he was a real magnetic

12:50

person that was just speaking a

12:54

language that I understood, and

12:54

I could, kind of, like, I could

12:56

understand how what he was

12:56

pitching was really going to

13:00

help me. But this is actually

13:00

the story. This third time I met

13:03

with him, so I was with a

13:03

analyst. I don't remember why,

13:08

but I took him to lunch. So the

13:08

three of us are at lunch, and JP

13:11

is like, all right, I'm just,

13:11

let's just do a like, let's do

13:14

an actual, real thing here.

13:14

Okay, I'm not gonna explain this

13:17

in theory. Let's actually do it.

13:17

Said, Okay, great. He said, tell

13:19

me a problem you're having. I

13:19

said, Okay, I told my problem.

13:22

He said, Okay, so it sounds like

13:22

you're having this problem with

13:24

the CEO, and you need to deliver

13:24

this really tough message to

13:28

him. I said, Yeah, that's

13:28

exactly right. He said, Okay,

13:30

let's practice. Why don't you do

13:30

it? I'll be him. I'll be the

13:32

CEO. You be you. Okay, deliver

13:32

it, and I deliver it. And he

13:36

said, Okay, you got to amp it up

13:36

a lot, you know, you were, you

13:40

were really, kind of, like, you

13:40

weren't really getting your

13:42

point, you know, I want to see a

13:42

10, you know, on a scale of one

13:45

to 10, where you're being really

13:45

direct and really harsh. Give me

13:48

a 10. And I so I delivered it,

13:48

in my mind, I was a 12. I was

13:51

like, you know, just going at it

13:51

and, and then JP said, okay, so

13:56

how do you think you do? I said,

13:56

I think I did really well. He

13:58

turns to this analyst who's

13:58

sitting here. He goes, he goes

14:01

scale one to 10, and the analyst

14:01

goes to and then we worked on

14:07

it, and we worked it out, and,

14:07

and I got to, like, probably an

14:11

eight. I delivered the message

14:11

to the CEO, like, that

14:15

afternoon, and the CEO, like,

14:15

absorbed it, and we made we got

14:19

through the thing and that, and

14:19

I hired him, you know, because I

14:22

was like, Okay, that was, like,

14:22

that was actually worth, you

14:25

know, a price of probably your

14:25

first x months of coaching right

14:28

there, just with that exercise.

14:28

So he maybe that was why, you

14:33

know, I gave him a lot of credit

14:33

for that. I still joke with him

14:36

about it. Are you comfortable

14:37

saying what he

14:37

charged you? And then how did

14:40

you think about return on

14:40

investment? Oh,

14:43

yeah. I mean,

14:43

I'll he today. Could charge

14:47

anything he wants, and he's a

14:47

big deal. Yeah, he could. He

14:50

could charge whatever he wants

14:50

to charge, and people would pay

14:52

it. And he doesn't. I don't even

14:52

think he does coaching anymore.

14:55

Coaching anymore, but back then,

14:55

you know, he was scrappy, and I

14:59

think his normal fee for six

14:59

months at the time was like,

15:05

gosh, I might get these numbers

15:05

wrong, but directionally, let's

15:08

say it was like $150,000 or

15:08

something, which is a lot for

15:11

six months, a lot we, by the

15:11

way, didn't have management fees

15:14

coming in because we hadn't

15:14

raised the fund. It's the

15:17

recession. So, like, that's a

15:17

lot of money anytime, but back

15:20

then, so I think he cut it his,

15:20

you know, he was feeling the

15:23

recession too. So I think he

15:23

gave me like a half price. So it

15:26

was like $70,000 I think, which

15:26

is still a ton of money for us

15:31

at that time. And so I to this

15:31

day. I don't really know why,

15:34

what got me over it, but, but I

15:34

guess it was going back to the

15:38

Tony Robbins days, where I just

15:38

kind of like felt like I wanted

15:41

to make an investment in myself

15:41

and my self improvement. So then

15:44

I had an assignment with JP,

15:44

life changing, really. Shortly

15:48

after that, had another coach

15:48

named Tom vicola, who was I.

15:52

Complete Coach is like a word,

15:52

like leadership or so. I mean,

15:56

it means tons of things to

15:56

different people, like it's so

15:59

the second coach I had, this

15:59

guy, Tom Bucha and his wife,

16:02

Frances Fuji, they taught lean

16:02

manufacturing, which is crazy,

16:05

because you wouldn't think a

16:05

private equity firm would need

16:08

lean manufacturing. But then

16:08

that gave us practices like

16:11

process mapping and continuous

16:11

improvement, kind of the Kaizen

16:14

process that we use. I mean,

16:14

we've done, to this day, we've

16:17

done like, 130 Kaizen projects

16:17

at Alpine. That's just been life

16:21

changing. So I just had some

16:21

great coaches. I today, I have

16:24

three, and I I'm just, it's so

16:24

fun, like I just, I love

16:29

learning that things I love

16:29

getting better are we have, we

16:32

have 23 coaches now, and that

16:32

kind of on the Alpine platform.

16:37

And I think we're, I think we're

16:37

doing like 500 coaching

16:42

engagements right now across our

16:42

portfolio. So it's a, it's,

16:46

it's, it's just, I think it's

16:46

just phenomenal. It's just like,

16:49

it's these, it's leaders being

16:49

able to just invest in

16:52

themselves. So

16:52

talk about the

16:52

three promises that he instilled

16:56

in you, and then what, what are

16:56

they and how do they work? So

16:59

our

16:59

three promises at

16:59

Alpine, you mean, yeah, yeah. So

17:01

we, one of the things we came up

17:01

with is we came up with our

17:04

three pillars, which is, you

17:04

know, be the number one

17:07

performing private equity firm

17:07

in the world, as measured by net

17:10

moic. That was one of our

17:10

pillars. Tell people what see

17:14

means an investor gives you, you

17:14

know, ten million how much money

17:18

you give them back. A lot of

17:18

investors measure their

17:21

performance on IRR, which is the

17:21

rate of return that you're

17:24

getting. Rate of return kind of

17:24

takes care of itself if you give

17:28

them back a high a high number,

17:28

but you can play around with the

17:31

IRS. You could give someone back

17:31

1.2 times their money in a

17:35

really high IRR with, you know,

17:35

it's just, it's just, so we

17:39

focus on net moic. So we want to

17:39

be the number one performing

17:41

fund in the world as measured by

17:41

net mo I see we want to be the

17:45

place where the best people want

17:45

to work and spend their careers.

17:48

And then we want to be a place

17:48

that has social where we're a

17:52

force for social good. Those are

17:52

our three promises that we make.

17:55

And then if you look at pretty

17:55

much every activity that we do

17:58

falls into one of those three categories,

18:00

what was the main lesson that he taught you after when you were working with

18:02

him all this time with Tom dead?

18:05

No, that JP. JP, yeah, taught

18:05

you. I

18:07

mean, JP, is

18:07

biggest thing that he taught me

18:10

was probably, I mean, a number

18:10

of things, but the we're in the

18:14

talent business, and then how to

18:14

how to invest in talent, was

18:17

probably one of the biggest

18:17

ones. And then we just did, we

18:20

would always do a practice of

18:20

overcoming limiting beliefs. So

18:24

you'd throw out some incredible

18:24

goal, like a genie goal or

18:27

something, and then you get

18:27

flooded with all these reasons

18:29

you're not good enough, you're

18:29

not going to do it. And then we

18:32

kind of like write all those

18:32

down on a piece of paper and

18:34

overcome them one by one. And

18:34

that was a really, really

18:37

powerful way to go go through

18:37

that. So a lot

18:39

of people, when they're analyzing a problem and how to get better, they really

18:41

don't. They think about how to

18:45

fix all the things that we've

18:45

gone wrong. Yeah, what's wrong

18:48

with that?

18:49

So there's this

18:49

awesome book by Dan and shapith

18:51

called switch, and they have a

18:51

chapter in there called scale

18:54

your bright spots. That chapter

18:54

has probably made Alpine more

18:59

money than any any other chapter

18:59

in any other book I've ever

19:03

read, including any you could

19:03

all Warren Buffett's things. So

19:06

basically, what they say is the

19:06

best strategic statement of all

19:10

times is find what's working and

19:10

do more of that. It's the

19:13

simplest thing. It's better than

19:13

I've read 17 books on strategy.

19:17

Those nine words, find what's

19:17

working and do more of that is,

19:21

is, is the best strategic

19:21

statement that I've ever come

19:24

across. So it applies to

19:24

absolutely everything. So you

19:28

have a great employee who's

19:28

crushing it and doing amazing

19:32

things get find ways to give

19:32

them more capacity, give them

19:37

more resources, more capital,

19:37

whatever. So find what's working

19:41

and do more of that. We launched

19:41

a CEO and training program. We

19:45

had a couple people in there

19:45

that were doing really well.

19:47

Okay, that's great. There's a

19:47

bright spot there. We've scaled

19:50

that. You know, here's some

19:50

industries that have worked out

19:52

really well for us. Let's find

19:52

more that look like that. You

19:56

know, we had really a great luck

19:56

with this one. You know,

19:59

particularly way of sourcing

19:59

deals direct to founders. Let's

20:02

just scale that so it's just

20:02

been, it's just and it's just

20:06

way more fun. You know, you're

20:06

focusing on your strengths.

20:09

You're focusing on the things

20:09

you're good at, you're you're

20:12

holding your best companies

20:12

longer. You know, it's just,

20:16

it's the simplest way to run,

20:16

run a run a firm.

20:21

At what point

20:21

should people get an executive

20:25

coach? Does everybody need one?

20:25

And how do you find one? If

20:28

you have no idea

20:28

where to go? I would say yes.

20:31

And the reason I think everyone

20:31

needs one is I'll use myself

20:35

example like I'm probably in the

20:35

top 1% of the world in setting

20:41

goals, you know. Let's just say,

20:41

I mean, I write them down, you

20:44

know, I teach classes on it. You

20:44

know, I'm and I still love i.

20:52

Benefit tremendously from having

20:52

a coach just create space to

20:57

hold me accountable, to setting

20:57

and then looking at how I'm

21:00

doing against my goals. Like, so

21:00

it's like a personal trainer for

21:03

your life. Like, I don't need a

21:03

personal trainer to go figure

21:06

out what waste lift, but what if

21:06

you had a personal trainer who's

21:09

just making sure that you're on

21:09

your life path? Like, it like

21:13

there's, I don't think there's a

21:13

better investment. You could

21:15

make therapists do that, though,

21:15

therapists, a lot of times, are

21:18

looking backwards. I mean, this

21:18

is the simplest way people

21:21

define the difference between a

21:21

coach and a therapist, and I

21:23

don't it's a blunt way to

21:23

describe it, but therapists are

21:25

going to want to know, like,

21:25

Hey, tell me about mom and dad

21:28

and all that. Coaches are

21:28

looking forward. Where do you

21:30

want to go? Where do you want to

21:30

be? What's What are your goals?

21:33

What's your dream, what's your

21:33

vision, what's your path? And I

21:35

think, and so, so it's a

21:35

personal trainer for like, you

21:39

being on your life path. I mean,

21:39

I think everyone should have

21:42

one. The other thing is, you

21:42

activate different parts of your

21:44

your brain, when you talk than

21:44

when you write or you think. So

21:47

you have someone here that

21:47

you're talking and you're

21:50

activating, you know, your

21:50

energy to go, you know, in the

21:52

direction you want to go. So I

21:52

think, I think coaching is

21:55

incredible in terms of how to

21:55

find them. I mean, there's a

21:59

whole bunch of platforms that

21:59

you could look at online. I

22:02

don't, I don't know that I have

22:02

a great algorithm for that, but

22:08

there's international coaching

22:08

Federation. There's better up,

22:10

there's Tony Robbins coaching.

22:10

There's co active coaching.

22:13

Those are all resources that you

22:13

could give to your listeners.

22:18

And then you you know you do

22:18

like a trial with a number of

22:21

coaches and see how you know if

22:21

there's a fit. Because you

22:23

really, definitely want to have

22:23

a have a good fit with the

22:26

coach. Most people listening to

22:26

this show cannot afford a coach.

22:30

So what do you do if you can't

22:30

afford one, I would say, find

22:34

one of your really close friends

22:34

that shares your passion for

22:38

personal improvement, and coach

22:38

each other. So I did this with

22:41

my roommate in business school.

22:41

I had a my roommate and I, we

22:46

used to get together and we

22:46

would basically coach each

22:49

other. You know, we'd spend 30

22:49

minutes. We'd go on a walk and

22:51

spend 30 or 45 minutes talking

22:51

about him, and we turn around,

22:54

spend 3040 minutes talking about

22:54

me. So you can, you can just do,

22:58

you could do this with a really

22:58

close friend, and then the magic

23:01

of that is you'll have, you'll

23:01

actually, you'll actually your

23:05

friend will know you really

23:05

well, and you'll also create a

23:07

really deep friendship with that person. Many

23:09

people in the

23:09

private equity business go into

23:12

it, because not only are they

23:12

interested in but they go in for

23:15

the money. Yeah, we all know,

23:15

you read the four 400 and I

23:18

don't know how many private

23:18

equity people are on, but I'm

23:20

guessing 10% or more in the

23:20

private equity. And I've had,

23:23

I've had some of those people on

23:23

my show who've been great. The

23:26

way to make money in the private

23:26

equity business on something

23:29

called carried interest. Yep,

23:29

you were making $100,000 for the

23:33

first 14 years, right? Of your

23:33

business, which is crazy, right?

23:38

Net of tax, and you're married,

23:38

and I don't know, is that

23:41

$70,000 after tax? Yeah, and you

23:41

got a family, and you started

23:47

making a carried interest

23:47

finally, and you're in your

23:50

third fund, and you were

23:50

depressed, right? Why that

23:55

doesn't make sense. Yeah, and

23:55

you stopped drinking,

23:58

yeah, as well.

23:58

Yeah, it's a good question.

24:01

Like, I think, I think what

24:01

happened is, I'd bet, I think I

24:06

realized at that time I'd been

24:06

driving for so long, you know,

24:09

starting when I was 12, mowing

24:09

lawns, all the wrestling and

24:13

starving myself, getting into

24:13

college, getting grades in

24:16

college, Wall Street, raising a

24:16

fund, X 14 years of plowing

24:22

through, and then I had this

24:22

financial event. We sold our

24:27

last company in our second fund,

24:27

and that created this big

24:31

carried interest check, and I

24:31

saw the money go in my bank

24:34

account, and then I just

24:34

thought, Oh, I thought that was

24:39

going to feel different. Wait a

24:39

sec, you know? I thought, I

24:43

thought that would feel different. And it was really exciting for a couple days, and

24:45

then I just had this big let

24:48

down. And I don't mean it to

24:48

sound like, oh, you know, I

24:51

mean, I'm very grateful that I

24:51

was able to have financial

24:54

security. It wasn't like I could

24:54

never work against money. It was

24:58

money that I could exhale a

24:58

little bit. But I just thought

25:01

it would feel different. You

25:01

know? I thought I'd been working

25:03

all this time to have this

25:03

outcome, and you know what? I

25:06

was still it was still me. I was

25:06

still there, and I had still had

25:10

all the same demons and same

25:10

problems. And it didn't, it

25:14

didn't make all that go away.

25:14

And so it was, it was hard, you

25:17

know, I felt like I'd worked for

25:17

probably 25 years, 27 years, or

25:23

something like that, to get to

25:23

this point. And I just thought

25:26

it would I thought it feel

25:26

different. So, yeah, I actually,

25:30

actually was clinically

25:30

depressed, like I I had a hard

25:33

time getting out of bed. I felt

25:33

just tired all the time. I was

25:36

in a bad mood all the time, and

25:36

there was probably actually one

25:40

of the lowest points of my life.

25:42

How'd you come

25:42

out of it? So

25:46

I little by

25:46

little. So I started doing a lot

25:50

of research on depression. Yeah,

25:50

because, because, I think, I

25:53

think I took, like, a survey or

25:53

something online, I don't

25:56

remember, and I answered all

25:56

these questions. It's like,

25:59

Yeah, you, you might have

25:59

depression. And so I started

26:02

doing a lot of research, and

26:02

then I started looking up, like,

26:05

like, it was some, some basic

26:05

stuff. Well, first I went on

26:08

antidepressants, and then I, but

26:08

I fired all kinds of bullets. So

26:13

I I saw, you know, alcohol was

26:13

really highly correlated

26:16

depression, as you would

26:16

imagine, I wean myself off

26:19

alcohol. Did

26:20

you have a

26:20

drinking problem? Or you I don't

26:22

know that I

26:22

had a drinking

26:22

problem, but I drank most

26:25

nights. I think it interfered

26:25

with my sleep more than I

26:28

realized. I wouldn't say I

26:28

wasn't, I wasn't by any stretch.

26:31

You know, had a had a drinking

26:31

problem, but it was, it was

26:34

definitely just not serving me.

26:34

So, and if you go, you know,

26:39

Google depression, it's like, on

26:39

every single list was alcohol,

26:42

it's a depressant, you know. So,

26:42

so I cut alcohol out of my diet.

26:47

I got my food, believe it or

26:47

not, food allergies showed up a

26:50

bunch on those lists. So I got

26:50

my food allergies tested. I had

26:53

a severe intolerance to gluten,

26:53

which was probably 60% of my

26:57

calories at the time. I gave up

26:57

gluten. I stopped having

27:00

sleeping pills, which I needed

27:00

because the alcohol. I started

27:03

just eating way healthier. I

27:03

started working out a lot more

27:07

and little. It didn't all happen

27:07

at once, but little by little, I

27:09

started to realize a lot of it

27:09

was just daily habits and that,

27:15

you know it. And so I started,

27:15

you know, started talking to

27:18

therapist, and so little by

27:18

little, started doing that. I

27:21

wean myself off antidepressants

27:21

and and haven't looked back. So

27:26

I still have all those, all

27:26

those habits, you know, I still,

27:29

I still don't, you know, don't

27:29

drink, don't eat gluten, don't

27:31

have sleeping pills.

27:33

Someone told me

27:33

a long time ago that if someone

27:35

tells you they're not interested

27:35

in money, they're full of shit.

27:39

So what part of making money was

27:39

a motivator for you in starting

27:44

this fund? And what's your

27:44

advice to people who are

27:48

motivated by money as a number

27:48

one important

27:52

Well, I think, I

27:52

think you go through a phase of

27:55

of money. The first phase is,

27:55

like, survival, right? Can you

28:01

pay your rent? And can you, you

28:01

know, can you actually, you

28:05

know, pay your car payment and

28:05

pay rent? And I never, I never,

28:11

to be fair, like I was never

28:11

really up against that. Like I

28:16

saved money starting in college

28:16

with this business, I saved

28:21

money when I was on Wall Street.

28:21

So I was never up against it,

28:25

where I'm like, I don't think

28:25

I'm gonna make rent this month.

28:27

So I've been very lucky that I

28:27

don't, I haven't been there, but

28:31

the first but then it's like,

28:31

okay, can I pay my mortgage? Can

28:35

I put my kids through college?

28:35

You know, I have obligations now

28:38

to family and that. So the

28:38

first, the first kind of bar is

28:42

like, just survival. And that

28:42

was probably the most intense

28:47

desire to make money. Was like,

28:47

just literally survival. Then I

28:51

think the next bar is probably

28:51

financial security of just kind

28:56

of like being able to exhale,

28:56

and maybe slightly above, but

28:59

that is, you just don't worry

28:59

about money. You know, you're

29:02

not, you're not thinking about

29:02

it. And I would say, like, if

29:07

I'm, if I'm being like, I know

29:07

people probably hate when they

29:11

hear people who made a lot of

29:11

money say this, but I would say

29:16

95% of the utility of money

29:16

comes from not having to worry

29:23

about money that I've

29:23

experienced. I mean, I have more

29:28

recently in the last couple

29:28

years, I bought a nice house,

29:31

but I never drove a nice car

29:31

until, till I was, like, in my

29:34

late 40s. Like it was never

29:34

about the stuff. I think I

29:38

realized, yeah, 95% of, maybe

29:38

even higher than that, is just

29:42

not having to stress about money

29:42

and, and I don't mean, like,

29:46

just the car payments and

29:46

things, but more like, oh, I

29:48

have to, I have to change a

29:48

flight. Or, you know, my car

29:51

breaks down, just like,

29:51

literally, like not spending any

29:55

emotional energy stressed about

29:55

money is and you can actually

29:59

get there without too much

29:59

money, and more, it has more to

30:03

do with your expenses, actually,

30:03

than your your income. What's

30:07

your advice to

30:07

people who are motivated by

30:10

money? A lot of people, I bet if

30:10

you took an anonymous poll,

30:13

yeah, all the employees, people

30:13

are super motivated. Yeah. You

30:16

know, I bet money would be

30:16

number one on 90%

30:19

I think if, like,

30:19

if I sat down with someone for

30:23

an hour or so and, like, we

30:23

actually, we actually said,

30:27

Okay, let's say they were nice

30:27

enough to be honest about the

30:30

fact that they were motivated by

30:30

money. Okay? Anonymous poll,

30:32

yeah, and I'd say, okay, like,

30:32

let's talk about it. Like, what

30:37

is it about this that you're

30:37

really excited about? Oh,

30:39

because I want to have a cool

30:39

car. Okay, great. So how much is

30:43

that going to take? Oh, when I

30:43

want to have a nice house. Okay,

30:45

great. But I think a lot of

30:45

times people are focused on

30:51

stuff. And status, that's really

30:51

what they want money for. And

30:59

those, those are both sometimes

30:59

related in their head, like, if

31:01

I have a house, if I have a car

31:01

or a watch or whatever, so stuff

31:05

and status is where we're like,

31:05

their energy is going. And

31:09

again, sounds very cliche to

31:09

say. Those will not do very much

31:13

for you for any long period of

31:13

time at all. On the status part,

31:17

no one gives a shit, right? And

31:17

on the stuff part, you know

31:20

this, anything you've ever

31:20

bought, you get a little bit of

31:22

a boost, and then it goes away.

31:22

So stuff and status, like, if

31:26

people actually understood that

31:26

that really doesn't provide that

31:30

much utility, and maybe even

31:30

negative utility, in many cases,

31:33

what I think provides the

31:33

utility is the peace of mind of

31:36

not having to worry about money.

31:36

So if you could shift someone's

31:39

mindset to be like you can still

31:39

be really fired up about money,

31:44

but maybe you're fired up

31:44

because you could help people

31:46

that you care about or you don't

31:46

have to worry about it and

31:49

stress about it. And focusing on

31:49

that, I think, I think would

31:53

make you a lot happier. It would

31:53

also shift how much money you

31:56

need, how much money you spend.

31:56

And I think it'd be way

31:59

healthier.

32:00

Most people,

32:00

including me, including mentees

32:03

and even my friends, we talk

32:03

about this all the time, have

32:08

had and it shifts over time, as

32:08

you get older and you have

32:11

family and homes and other

32:11

things, a financial goal of how

32:16

much money you want to have.

32:16

Yep, did you have one at a young

32:19

age? What was it? Has it

32:19

changed? And what is it now?

32:25

Yeah,

32:25

I mean, I'm

32:25

really putting that's fine. I

32:28

mean, I'm gonna go there. So I

32:28

think, I think in the early,

32:31

early days, it was probably,

32:31

like a million dollars, you

32:35

know, that was mine. That seemed

32:35

like all the money in the world,

32:38

I mean, and that, I mean, I

32:38

couldn't even, I couldn't even

32:42

imagine what that would be like.

32:42

And so that was probably my

32:47

goal, from, like, being really

32:47

young till, I don't even know,

32:52

in my well into my 30s, maybe

32:52

even, or, you know, it was, like

32:55

a million dollars and then, and

32:55

then I shifted, and I said,

33:00

Okay, if I had, if I had $20

33:00

million in in the bank earning

33:08

like in treasuries, I could live

33:08

off the Treasury income, and I,

33:12

and I would have that, like,

33:12

security blanket, and I'd never

33:15

have to then anything else that

33:15

happened, I'd be fine, like, if

33:19

I kept my lifestyle and in

33:19

check. So that was kind of my,

33:22

my next goal. But not like, rap, how

33:24

old were you when you had that? That

33:25

was probably,

33:25

like, you know, late, probably

33:29

in the early 40s. I was like,

33:29

okay, that and then that was

33:32

kind of like, my to use the

33:32

term, kind of fucking money,

33:34

like, I never have to worry

33:34

about anything again, presuming

33:39

I didn't increase my living

33:39

expenses too, too big. And I

33:43

thought that was a great goal,

33:43

because I felt like, and I did

33:46

achieve that goal. And then once

33:46

that happened, I felt like, at

33:50

that point, I'm playing with the

33:50

houses money. And I actually

33:52

became a better investor. I, you

33:52

know, I, I think I've made

33:57

better decisions, and I haven't

33:57

reset another goal. So I have,

34:01

like, the 98% of my wealth is in

34:01

Alpine, my business in private

34:07

investments, and I love having

34:07

it there. I feel really good

34:10

about it. And so I get to be

34:10

that voice of let's do what's

34:16

right for investors, and then

34:16

let's find liquidity for the

34:19

people in my firm or the people

34:19

in the management team. Let's do

34:22

that separately. Maybe we raise

34:22

a separate round to get them

34:24

secondary money. But I'm not

34:24

personally making a poor

34:29

decision because of my own

34:29

financial needs or my situation,

34:33

I've hit my goal, and so I can

34:33

now just do what's best for, you

34:38

know, my investors, or the firm,

34:38

which, in many cases, has hold

34:40

these companies for a really,

34:40

really long period of time.

34:43

My mom told me a

34:43

long time ago, don't count other

34:46

people's money, but obviously

34:46

you've made more than $20

34:49

million in your in your

34:49

lifetime, you're going to

34:51

continue as your firm grows.

34:51

It's exponential, actually,

34:54

right? It is, you know, you get

34:54

you're probably the biggest

34:58

shareholder in your firm at this

34:58

point. And we all know what the

35:02

top performing private equity

35:02

firms make, and some of the best

35:05

firms, you know, some, if you

35:05

just look at those firms who go

35:07

in public, you got founders

35:07

making $100 million a year,

35:10

yeah. And so, how do you think

35:10

about money? And as a dad,

35:17

having all that money in your

35:17

children and raising your

35:19

children in a normal, humble

35:19

environment, on the

35:22

making money

35:22

part, and how I think about it?

35:24

I think about it as I honestly

35:24

think about my goal is to be the

35:29

number one performing private

35:29

equity fund in the world, and

35:32

that's the scorecard I have,

35:32

there will be lots of financial

35:35

gains that come with that, but

35:35

the absolute North Star is our

35:40

net moic performance at Alpine,

35:40

which, which runs counter

35:43

actually, to making more money,

35:43

because there's, we could charge

35:45

more carry than we do. We could,

35:45

you know, kind of take liquidity

35:49

earlier and raise more. You know, there's a lot of things we could do, but I want to be the.

35:51

One performing fun in the world.

35:54

And that's, that's, that's kind

35:54

of the North Star, to be honest.

35:58

And then with the kids, it

35:58

actually worked out really

36:01

interestingly. I never planned

36:01

this, but my kids had almost the

36:05

exact same situation that I had

36:05

as a kid, where their dad

36:09

started a business when they

36:09

were born. You know, didn't make

36:12

money. Notes drove, you know,

36:12

worked really hard. They saw the

36:17

grind. They saw they saw it

36:17

start with nothing, where they

36:20

would come to like a Alpine

36:20

event, and there'd be the whole

36:23

firm, was seven people, and then

36:23

they've watched it kind of grow,

36:26

and they've seen all the work

36:26

that went into that. And I think

36:29

I gave them that they absorb

36:29

that. That's how they're showing

36:33

up in their life and and I love

36:33

that for them, you know, it's

36:37

almost the same thing that my,

36:37

you know, I had what I had with

36:40

my dad. So they, my kids are

36:40

really driven, you know, they're

36:44

getting up at 5am and going on

36:44

runs when no one's looking.

36:47

They're, they're they're doing

36:47

those things. And I, I never

36:50

told them to do that. They they

36:50

just, they're doing those

36:53

things, all three of them. I

36:53

honestly am not exactly sure how

36:57

we're going to structure giving

36:57

them money, or if we're doing

36:59

like a charity trust or, you

36:59

know, I have, you'd think I

37:01

would have that all figured out.

37:01

I don't. I don't have a great

37:04

answer for you yet on that. When I was

37:05

young and I didn't have money, I go into the Porsche dealership every year,

37:07

and I'm sorry if I'm repeating

37:10

the story for those people who

37:10

listen to the show, but I sit in

37:13

the Porsche every year and said,

37:13

One day I'm gonna buy this, this

37:17

Porsche. And when I finally, our

37:17

company went public, and I had

37:19

the opportunity to do it, it

37:19

took me a year to buy the

37:22

Porsche. And like you said, at

37:22

some point, you know, the oral

37:25

wears off, I felt guilty. Was

37:25

$107,000 I still have it today.

37:29

22 years. Oh, that's awesome.

37:29

Has 57,000 miles. First day, I

37:34

took it home, Graham, I washed

37:34

the car, like, Oh, this is gonna

37:36

be great. And I dropped the

37:36

bucket on the car. I filled the

37:39

water, but it still has a little

37:39

quarter size ring on the car.

37:42

But I bought, I bought the

37:42

Porsche, yeah, I bought my dream

37:46

home, and I treat myself to nice

37:46

art, which has become an

37:51

investment more than anything

37:51

else. What is the nicest thing

37:56

you've bought yourself? Are

37:56

there any extravagances that you

37:59

said, I mean, or Ferrari?

38:01

I mean, yes, I up

38:01

until two years ago, my answer

38:06

would have been like, I just

38:06

spend money to save time. So I,

38:09

you know, have administrative

38:09

assistant, I have accountants,

38:13

you know, things that I just

38:13

take all the stuff I don't want

38:16

to do, and I do none of it. And

38:16

that is the best extravagance,

38:21

okay, but then two years ago, I

38:21

had this one label company that

38:24

I bought during business school,

38:24

the very last one I bought. And

38:29

we got very lucky, we had Trader

38:29

Joe's as a customer, and it

38:32

grew. I hold. I held the

38:32

business for 21 years, and we

38:35

sold it in 2022 and it was, it

38:35

was on a on a net investment. It

38:40

was the best investment I ever

38:40

made, because I put in a tiny

38:43

amount of money, and it became a

38:43

really big business. So we sold

38:46

it in 2022 I wasn't counting on

38:46

it. I i wouldn't say I forgot

38:50

about it, but it was kind of

38:50

like not part of my daily

38:53

planning. And so I had this a

38:53

big amount of money come in from

38:56

that sale, and I used that to

38:56

buy a house in Hawaii. So that

39:00

was my, that was my, my one kind

39:00

of extravagance and and I love

39:05

it. I love having, I don't think

39:05

I'm gonna buy any more houses,

39:08

because it's, it's a lot of

39:08

work, and it's, you know, you

39:11

can rent, you don't have to own,

39:11

but, but I have a really sweet

39:14

house in Hawaii. That's where

39:14

we're in Hawaii. It's in Maui,

39:16

nice, yeah, and it's, and I

39:16

really do enjoy, and I do feel

39:20

really proud when I'm in it, and

39:20

it makes me really happy. So

39:24

that's, that's my big

39:24

extravagance. But that, I mean,

39:27

I was 50 years old when I, when

39:27

I did that, and, but, but I it

39:33

has, it has been kind of nice. I

39:33

always

39:35

said, I'm never going to a second home, because, like you said, it's a lot of

39:37

work. It's expensive. Yeah, we

39:39

have the money where we can go

39:39

where we want, and I didn't want

39:42

to feel tied down. Yeah? Now we

39:42

went up to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho,

39:44

and then we saw this incredible

39:44

house, and we bought the house,

39:48

and it's been the best thing

39:48

we've ever done as a family.

39:50

Yeah, exactly. Because I have

39:50

younger kids. I have three,

39:53

three kids from a previous

39:53

marriage. They all want to go,

39:56

and it's just been the best.

39:56

Yeah, you know, we've

39:58

done, you nailed

39:58

it. And exactly like, you know,

40:01

my kids are now, I have two kids

40:01

in college, and, you know,

40:05

during spring break, they want

40:05

to go to Hawaii, and they bring

40:08

their friends and their

40:08

girlfriend. And so that that's

40:11

been awesome is just keep, you

40:11

know, keeping having the having

40:14

the family together. So that's

40:14

that's been really, that's been

40:17

really, really nice. Yeah, I,

40:17

you could probably tell from

40:20

just talking about, I feel kind

40:20

of guilty about for some reason

40:23

I but it has been, has been really

40:24

nice. You know,

40:24

I felt guilty about my house as

40:27

well. And this may seem so

40:27

weird, and I know, and people

40:29

are gonna write in on this, and

40:29

it's gonna be a weird concept,

40:33

but we learn a beautiful home

40:33

here, but a lot of our friends

40:36

also have beautiful I mean, we

40:36

have friends who live month to

40:39

month, but, you know, our kids

40:39

go to school. You're friends

40:41

with the parents. We live in

40:41

Brentwood, California, home,

40:43

yeah, very, very expensive,

40:43

yeah. And so it's normal to have

40:46

a nice house, maybe not as nice

40:46

as ours, but there's a lot of

40:50

very, very nice homes. When I

40:50

bought. My second home, and I'm

40:54

sitting up there in our we have

40:54

a beautiful view of the lake,

40:57

and I just, I feel at peace

40:57

there. I never want to leave,

41:00

and I don't want to work while

41:00

I'm there, but I have my summer

41:02

intern program. It's summer

41:02

only, but it's, this is gonna

41:05

sound so weird. It's the only

41:05

place where I really thought and

41:10

I felt successful. Wow. Yeah, I

41:10

mean wow, yeah, it's weird.

41:20

That's really cool. Thanks for sharing that.

41:23

Let's talk about

41:23

the word asymmetry, yeah, which

41:26

you've used already, and you

41:26

said there are four things you

41:30

can do to have a great life.

41:30

Yep. And when I read this, I

41:37

thought, I've never heard

41:37

anything like this before. It

41:41

actually one of the things about

41:41

having great guests on the show,

41:44

like we talked about before, I

41:44

get to meet lots of people, and

41:49

I like to take things from each

41:49

show. But this one was like,

41:52

Holy shit, that's amazing. So

41:52

talk about, talk about the four.

41:56

These are things that I'm going

41:56

to do and I'm going to adopt,

41:58

and I've written them down so

41:59

well. Thanks.

41:59

Thanks for that compliment. So

42:03

the concept was what we were

42:03

talking about before, about

42:06

investing where you know you, if

42:06

you're if you plant, you want to

42:11

play for the upside, not protect

42:11

the downside. And so I kind of

42:14

thought about my life as I

42:14

started to uncover that for

42:18

investing, I started to realize

42:18

I was doing the same thing in my

42:21

life. I was playing small. I was

42:21

playing not to lose. And so I

42:25

started to kind of think about

42:25

what was were the principles

42:28

that if you stack them on top of

42:28

each other, would lead to a

42:32

wildly asymmetric life, just

42:32

like principles of investing

42:36

would lead to wildly asymmetric

42:36

investments. So the first one

42:40

was, do hard things. And that

42:40

that is, I think maybe they're

42:45

all really important, but do

42:45

hard things probably comes

42:48

first, because I had, I had this

42:48

expression that everything you

42:52

want in life is on the other

42:52

side of worse first. So if you

42:56

really think about you know you

42:56

want a better body. Okay, it's

42:59

going to get worse. First,

42:59

you're going to go to the gym.

43:01

You're going to have a diet you

43:01

might not like as much as the

43:04

old diet. You know, if you want,

43:04

you know to do better at your

43:07

job. You know you're going to

43:07

have to work a little bit more.

43:09

You're going to have to study

43:09

harder. You know, every

43:11

everything that you want is on

43:11

the other side of doing

43:13

something you don't want first.

43:13

And so when I, when I cut weight

43:18

wrestling I started, I just

43:18

realized I had a very, very high

43:23

capacity to do hard things,

43:23

which has been good. So that's

43:26

that's kind of principle one.

43:26

Principle two is, do your thing.

43:31

And the idea there is that if

43:31

you are doing something that

43:36

you're doing because you think

43:36

you know it's the you know that

43:39

it's going to make you money, or

43:39

it's going to it's a thing that

43:43

your friends are going to be

43:43

impressed by your parents, or

43:46

something you're supposed to do

43:46

like you're you're not, you're

43:50

not going to stay with that for

43:50

a long period of time. So you

43:52

talk about, yeah, people could

43:52

do investment banking for a

43:55

couple years, but like, like it,

43:55

you want to align. I said this

43:59

earlier. You want to align your

43:59

soul with your day, you know.

44:04

And if, if, when those things

44:04

are happening, you're

44:07

unstoppable when you're doing

44:07

something that you're you really

44:10

want to be doing, and you,

44:10

you're going to do it for a long

44:13

period of time. You're going to,

44:13

you're going to you're going to

44:15

work early and late, and so,

44:15

like, you're not going to do

44:17

that doing someone else's thing.

44:17

So find out what your thing is,

44:21

and get on a path to doing that.

44:21

Like I don't, I don't think

44:24

there's any, almost any

44:24

exceptions to that. Now, it

44:26

doesn't mean you can do it

44:26

tomorrow. Maybe you have some

44:28

financial things you have to

44:28

sort out in your current thing,

44:30

but get on that path there's

44:30

some time in your lifetime.

44:33

Number three is, do it for

44:33

decades. And this is kind of

44:36

like the, just the power of

44:36

compounding over time. You know,

44:41

I'm, I'm in my 23rd year running

44:41

Alpine, like, I'm pretty good at

44:46

running a private equity firm at

44:46

this point. You know, we've done

44:49

600 deals. I've hired a lot of

44:49

people. I've hired a lot of

44:52

CEOs. I've seen a lot of

44:52

industries. I've tried

44:55

everything you can imagine. I'm

44:55

trying new stuff. I've had new

44:58

coaches, like, I'm better in

44:58

year 23 than I was in year 22

45:02

and 21 and so, you know, that

45:02

gets asymmetric over time too.

45:06

You just get, you get so much

45:06

better. So you do things over a

45:08

long period of time. I mean, if

45:08

I think, if I stopped Alpine in

45:11

year 14, it got, it got kind of

45:11

asymmetric, you know, at the

45:16

longer I, I stayed with it. So

45:16

do it for decades. And the last

45:19

one is, write your story. And

45:19

this is really the, maybe even

45:24

the predecessor this. But like,

45:24

you get one life. So like, take

45:27

the time to really step back and

45:27

think about, if you know what,

45:34

what? What is that? What is the

45:34

picture you want to paint? What

45:37

is the life that you want to

45:37

have? And imagine, imagine it as

45:40

though you could have anything that you wanted, and get as clear as you can on that,

45:42

because that's the hardest part.

45:46

Bringing that to fruition is

45:46

usually just kind of working

45:48

backwards. And then I like to

45:48

say, you know, almost any, any

45:51

goal that. You can set you can

45:51

you can work backwards and

45:54

create an endogenous set of

45:54

activities that will yield that

45:58

goal over a long enough period

45:58

of time. But most people don't

46:02

know exactly what they want, so,

46:02

so that's the fourth one, is

46:05

write your story.

46:06

And for write

46:06

your story, you're talking about

46:08

a five year story, yeah, a five

46:10

year story like,

46:10

what? What's nirvana? What would

46:12

you do if you knew you wouldn't

46:12

fail? And what would you do and

46:14

if you knew you didn't fail in

46:14

your relationships, your career,

46:17

your body, spirituality, you

46:17

know in your friendships, you

46:21

know in all those areas, like

46:21

what's what do you want? You

46:24

know, and take the time to

46:24

really explore that, which is

46:26

the thing I do a lot with my executive coaches.

46:28

You made an

46:28

Instagram post, I don't know, a

46:31

few months ago that said I read

46:31

every self help ilk in the

46:33

world, and these are the four or

46:33

five things that you need to do.

46:39

And one of them was to, I'm

46:39

going to summarize, and I'm not

46:43

going to get it right, but maybe

46:43

you can fill in the details. But

46:46

it was, get a notepad out, make

46:46

a five year goal and write. And

46:51

you did this in college,

46:51

essentially, it's where it

46:54

began. And write your goals

46:54

down, high goals, not those that

47:01

you think you're going to hit.

47:01

And write three things down

47:04

every day that you did to

47:04

achieve those goals. Exactly.

47:07

Yeah, and I think that's genius. It's

47:08

so simple and

47:08

like, what I would also say is,

47:11

like, if you really look at

47:11

successful people, I think that

47:16

what gets the most underrated

47:16

thing is like, the tediousness

47:19

of being successful, like, it's

47:19

tedious. It's like having,

47:22

having a great body, is tedious,

47:22

you know, it's reps in the gym,

47:27

it's hours, you know, running,

47:27

it's, you know, it's, it's not,

47:32

it's not hard. It's just

47:32

tedious, you know, and achieving

47:36

a goal is not difficult. It's

47:36

tedious. It's daily, writing it

47:41

down, writing the three things

47:41

you want to do toward that goal

47:44

down, and then doing those

47:44

things, and then getting up

47:47

tomorrow and doing it again like

47:47

and I think, I think people

47:51

mistake. They think it's going

47:51

to be these big, sweeping,

47:54

sweeping motions, because they

47:54

hear about that, but they don't

47:57

realize that there was 25 years

47:57

of work that went into whatever

48:00

that outcome was. And those 25

48:00

years are tedious, right? I

48:03

think one of the things too, I mean, we have a summer intern program. They work

48:05

on tedious things. We work on

48:10

sandy which is getting data

48:10

points. We're have built, we've

48:13

built the largest beach database

48:13

in the world for the $5 trillion

48:17

year beach tours of business.

48:17

There's nothing like it. We've

48:19

cataloged 100 categories of data

48:19

from now more than 140,000

48:24

beaches in 212 countries. And

48:24

it's a lot of work. It's manual

48:28

work. Is there a bathroom there?

48:28

What's the cell service there?

48:31

These are things that people

48:31

want to know before they visit

48:33

the beach, and that's one use

48:33

case is for people going to the

48:36

beach and planning a beach

48:36

vacation. The average person

48:40

before they plan a beach

48:40

vacation looks at 38 different

48:42

websites before they visit

48:42

there. So we're trying to cut

48:45

all that down, yeah, and really

48:45

put everything on one beach

48:49

page, but that includes pictures

48:49

of beaches, and it's laborious

48:53

to get the licenses and make

48:53

sure we have the right licenses

48:56

for the photos. We have drone

48:56

videos now I think of, I don't

49:00

know, 20,000 beaches as well

49:00

that we've manually got on

49:05

YouTube. We put the link back to

49:05

YouTube on as people want to

49:07

really see video of it. We've

49:07

compiled now a list of every

49:12

shark attack last 100 years.

49:12

We're about to launch a shark

49:15

map as well, and we've done some

49:15

really, really cool things. I

49:19

love it. And we have all these

49:19

interns come in, right? And we

49:22

tell them before the summer,

49:22

said you're gonna be doing shit

49:26

work the whole summer, what

49:26

you're doing is beneath your

49:29

intelligence level. Wait,

49:29

because we've kids. We got kids

49:32

from Stanford and Harvard and

49:32

all the best schools. But we

49:35

also have kids from San Diego

49:35

State or a firm like college

49:41

like Biola. Which do you know

49:41

Biola? I do not know. Okay, most

49:45

people don't. Yeah, it's a small

49:45

Catholic school outside of Los

49:48

Angeles. That's where Matt

49:48

Hickerson goes. His Best Intern

49:51

we've ever had, and best right

49:51

hand that I've had as well, but

49:55

it's like these kids don't want

49:55

to do it. And throughout the

49:58

summer I said, you're going to

49:58

get bored. You're going to

50:00

complain. I said, complaining is

50:00

a cancer. I better not hear one

50:03

complainer. We're going to have

50:03

a gnarly meeting in my office.

50:07

But what I tell the kids is, I'm

50:07

doing the same work. I'm sending

50:12

my team emails. Hey, what? Why

50:12

don't we have a photo here? Is

50:16

this really a nude beach, right?

50:16

Is this really a gay beach? You

50:19

know? Try to try to try to find

50:19

it. I'm doing the work too. I'm

50:23

uploading photos onto our

50:23

website. And that's, that's the

50:26

thing. It's tedious. It is hard

50:26

work. I mean, everyone wants to

50:29

sell company for a billion

50:29

dollars gold, a huge, huge fund,

50:32

and we've seen the today. It's

50:32

different than when we start

50:38

recovery. You're in a highly

50:38

competitive business, so you're

50:41

getting the best of the best.

50:41

I'm not saying that we're not

50:43

getting the best of the best,

50:43

but the work ethic today and

50:46

what the expectations are, in a

50:46

world where everyone's making

50:48

gobs, Oh, totally Yeah, it's

50:48

just a different game. Yeah.

50:52

Yeah, but I love, I love the I

50:52

love that story. I

50:55

hope, I hope

50:55

everyone who your listeners

50:57

really understand what you were

50:57

just saying about the

50:59

tediousness. I mean, it's my

50:59

favorite quote of all time. Is

51:03

Michelangelo. He says, if people

51:03

know how hard I work to gain my

51:07

mastery, it wouldn't seem so

51:07

wonderful. And I think, you

51:11

know, it's like, you know,

51:11

teaching at Stanford is, it's

51:15

like each class is meticulously

51:15

planned, minute by minute who

51:21

I'm going to call on, in some

51:21

cases, you know, the exact, you

51:25

know, characters I'm going to

51:25

assume. And I mean, it's like,

51:28

it's just like we talked about

51:28

it in the green room,

51:31

preparation. And it's, and it's,

51:31

it's tedious, you know, we just

51:36

had an off site yesterday, and I

51:36

was, I was telling Audrey before

51:41

we were meeting here. I mean, I

51:41

think I wrote, or I was involved

51:46

in just about every single

51:46

PowerPoint slide that was shown

51:49

over the entire, you know, two

51:49

day period. You know, just how

51:52

many minutes are we going to

51:52

give for this exercise? Is this

51:56

flowing? Right? I mean, it's

51:56

just, yeah, it's tedious.

52:00

Let's talk about

52:00

preparation for a minute,

52:02

because it's one of the things

52:02

been the hallmark of my success.

52:05

And I'm teaching something. I'm

52:05

giving talks at colleges. I'm

52:08

going to be doing some paper

52:08

public speaking. I'm writing a

52:10

book on preparation, on extreme

52:10

preparation. So how important

52:15

has extreme preparation been to

52:15

your success? That means, how

52:20

preparing everybody, I

52:21

think it's been

52:21

the the character

52:23

characteristic. I mean, if I, if

52:23

I go back to high school grades,

52:29

I mean the, you know, I would

52:29

have a geometry test. The

52:33

teacher would say, Hey, here's

52:33

the last eight geometry tests. I

52:36

would do every problem on all

52:36

eight, understanding it, you

52:39

know, and, and, you know, if, if

52:39

I, you know, we had for rowing,

52:44

I put in probably, on average,

52:44

an extra hour a day, at least on

52:48

the rowing machine. My classes I

52:48

meticulously prepare for the

52:56

speech that you were referencing

52:56

about an asymmetric life.

52:59

Probably took six months to

52:59

write that. And, you know,

53:02

there, you know, there were four

53:02

principles, but we started off

53:05

with like 12, you know, and had

53:05

to test them and see, you know,

53:09

and, and so it, I think it's a

53:09

superpower. It can also be,

53:14

sometimes can be a negative,

53:14

because sometimes it keeps me

53:17

from engaging in things where I

53:17

don't have that ability to

53:22

prepare for it. So I might just

53:22

say no to something where, you

53:25

know, I'm not, I'm not going to

53:25

be as prepared. So I think there

53:29

is a negative side to that, you

53:29

know, like you it sounds like

53:32

I'm a perfectionist, so that

53:32

that can be a negative. But in

53:35

general, over preparation has

53:35

been, has been a real key tool.

53:39

But even more than that, it's

53:39

like when I'm over prepared, I'm

53:44

really confident too. So I think

53:44

I just show up differently

53:47

knowing that I did the work. You

53:47

know, I'm ready for the speech,

53:51

or I'm ready for the class, and

53:51

I know the material, so that

53:55

that helps a lot to less anxious

53:55

you're doing the reps. Yeah,

53:58

exactly. It's, it's, it's

54:01

really helped me

54:01

a tremendous amount as well. I

54:03

mean, you're phi, beta, kappa in

54:03

college. And for those people

54:05

don't know it's, it basically

54:05

means you're graduating the top

54:08

2% of your class. And for me, it

54:08

was because I outworked

54:13

everybody. I don't consider

54:13

myself the smartest person in

54:16

the room, and I tell people, if

54:16

you're the smartest person in

54:19

the room, you're probably in the

54:19

wrong room. But if I have to go

54:21

back and look at all those

54:21

semesters in college, maybe

54:24

there were five or eight tests

54:24

where I knew I may not get an A.

54:28

I got 1b plus in college first

54:28

semester, I was pissed, but it

54:34

was really something you can

54:34

control the outcome of. And I

54:37

also think that's true of work

54:37

ethic as well. So what's your

54:42

advice to people who don't want

54:42

to get there at five o'clock in

54:47

the morning? Can you be

54:47

successful if you work on

54:49

average, like everybody else?

54:51

I don't. I mean,

54:51

I think if, if you know, it's

54:55

funny, I have a hard time giving

54:55

advice that I don't follow

55:00

myself. So I can only share

55:00

what's worked for me, you know.

55:05

And what's worked for me is

55:05

like, if I'm going to take

55:08

something on, you know, I'm

55:08

going to have a bar of wanting

55:11

to be the best in the world at

55:11

that particular thing, and I'm

55:15

going to put in the work to do

55:15

that, and that's really

55:19

invigorating for me. And so, you

55:19

know, it's hard for me to give

55:23

advice to someone to say, hey,

55:23

you know what? Why don't you

55:26

just try to be average at that?

55:26

And, and that's going to be

55:30

fine. Now, if that's someone

55:30

else's own, you know, kind of

55:33

compass, and that's where they

55:33

are then, you know, I guess they

55:36

can, they can show up however

55:36

they want. But, you know, I've

55:39

just found a lot more joy in

55:39

trying to, like, throw yourself

55:41

into things 1,000%

55:44

so you work at a

55:44

sexy, you started a sexy firm,

55:46

right? Private equity, and

55:46

again, we talked about money

55:50

and, and I think there's a

55:50

traditional. Path, which is

55:53

banking, investment banking, and

55:53

most bankers I know want to go

55:56

into private equity. It's not as

55:56

harsh in terms of the time

55:59

commitment, the hours and the

55:59

weekends only. It doesn't mean

56:02

that you you don't work hard.

56:02

How does someone get a job at

56:06

Alpine? And would you hire and

56:06

do you hire students from lesser

56:13

known colleges that don't have

56:13

straight A's and maybe have a

56:17

3.2 grade point average. Yeah,

56:19

so I think, like,

56:19

what we're trying to do, we

56:22

hire, say, 12 summer interns to

56:22

do investing. And what we're

56:27

really just trying to do is is

56:27

find the highest yield that we

56:32

can have. You know, we want all

56:32

12 to be successful. We want all

56:35

12 to work out. We have found it

56:35

to be very highly correlated.

56:40

You know, the under

56:40

undergraduate grades and

56:43

performance has been really

56:43

correlated to doing well on the

56:47

job. And it probably is less

56:47

about the grades themselves and

56:51

more about the work ethic that

56:51

went into the grades, more about

56:53

the preparation and things that

56:53

went into that. So we've, we've

56:57

found that, for better or for

56:57

worse, to be really highly

56:59

correlated. So, you know, we're

56:59

not, you know, we're, we're

57:03

typically indexing on grades

57:03

when we're, you know, making

57:06

those, those hires.

57:08

What's the best

57:08

interview question that someone

57:12

has asked you, and for 23 years,

57:12

my

57:15

favorite, I'm

57:15

going to steal two questions

57:18

that my all time. Favorite

57:18

question probably is Peter Thiel

57:23

his question, which is, what's

57:23

something you believe that not

57:25

that many people agree with you

57:25

on? I think that's a great

57:29

question. And then Elon Musk has

57:29

a question he asked, which is

57:33

something like, you know,

57:33

what's, what's the most

57:36

difficult problem you've ever

57:36

had to solve, and how did you

57:39

solve it? I think those are

57:39

great questions. Yeah, I think

57:42

you'd learn a lot about people

57:42

with with those two,

57:45

I read one, and

57:45

I love this question. And again,

57:47

I teach this one, which is, what

57:47

are the three things that I can

57:52

do after six months that would

57:52

help me be successful and add

57:56

value to your firm.

57:57

Oh, I love that.

57:57

That's a quote. Oh, you're

58:00

saying. What

58:00

would it that's

58:00

a student. Yeah. Sorry,

58:02

I thought. What was I asking?

58:04

Well, okay, so

58:04

let's turn around. So what?

58:07

What's the best question someone

58:07

has asked you that you said,

58:10

Holy cow, that's a great question.

58:15

Yeah, probably similar to what you just said, something about, like, what are

58:17

the attributes that I would

58:20

have? Or, you know, how would I

58:20

be showing up that I would be

58:23

the best analyst that's ever

58:23

come at this firm, you know,

58:25

give me the playbook. Tell me

58:25

what to do. What would that look

58:28

like? You know, and they

58:28

actually are really intent on

58:30

wanting to know. They're not

58:30

saying that because they heard

58:32

they were supposed. But you can

58:32

tell they actually want to be

58:34

the best. Want to be the best

58:34

analyst that we've ever hired.

58:37

And you know where they're

58:37

asking me for that Formula

58:39

One of one of

58:39

the mistakes I think people

58:42

make, and I again, this is

58:42

something that I think people

58:45

should really think of when

58:45

they're interviewing for a job.

58:49

I me not value add, value add,

58:49

value add. Do you see that as

58:55

well, where in the interviews,

58:55

people are just saying, I'm

58:58

great for this role, because I'm

58:58

this, I'm this, I'm this, as

59:00

opposed to how it can add value

59:00

to your firm.

59:04

I don't know that

59:04

I could count on maybe one hand

59:08

the number of conversations I've

59:08

had where someone has talked

59:10

about adding value to my firm.

59:10

So yeah, I think that's really,

59:13

really rare, and I think it

59:13

would be a really refreshing

59:17

conversation, if I were to have

59:17

that for sure.

59:20

So if someone

59:20

from a lesser rank school sends

59:23

you this incredible analysis of

59:23

a company where you say, Holy

59:27

cow, this person has done a 40

59:27

page presentation. He or she is

59:31

a 3.0 grade point average.

59:31

They've really mapped out

59:35

everything that you could ever

59:35

imagine, and they said, not only

59:38

can I do this, but I hear other

59:38

ways that I could add value to

59:42

your firm, and I'll work for

59:42

free for six months, you don't

59:47

have to pay me, and after six

59:47

months, if I've done good

59:51

things, then you put me on the

59:51

payroll. That'd be

59:53

super compelling.

59:53

I love it. It's a great pitch.

59:55

That'd be really, really compelling.

59:57

I love it. Let's

59:57

talk about something that you

1:00:01

said as well that really hit

1:00:01

home with me in being

1:00:05

successful, is time management.

1:00:05

And I thought what you said

1:00:09

about that was really profound,

1:00:09

and I hadn't really thought

1:00:12

about it in the way that you

1:00:12

said it. I think about it. Think

1:00:14

about all the clover that comes

1:00:14

on my desk. I think about, Gosh,

1:00:17

I'm spending so much time on

1:00:17

these worthless emails. What's

1:00:21

your view on time management,

1:00:21

and what should people be doing

1:00:24

to and focusing on during their

1:00:24

day?

1:00:27

So I think the

1:00:27

best formula that I've come up

1:00:30

with for time management goes

1:00:30

back to you knowing really

1:00:33

clearly what your top goals are,

1:00:33

and then putting time on your

1:00:37

calendar to work on those goals.

1:00:37

So you know, my my three goals

1:00:41

are 123, here are the activities

1:00:41

I need to do, to hit one and two

1:00:45

and three, and then scheduling

1:00:45

those blocks on your calendar.

1:00:48

And we're, you know, using your

1:00:48

calendar to work on your things

1:00:51

that. Are moving you to where

1:00:51

you want to go. Email, if you

1:00:55

think about it, is really what

1:00:55

everyone else wants from you.

1:00:59

You know, like it's, it's, it's

1:00:59

people telling you all the

1:01:02

things they need from you. And

1:01:02

so if you find yourself reacting

1:01:05

to emails, there's almost a 0%

1:01:05

chance that that's moving you

1:01:08

toward your goals. It's moving

1:01:08

you maybe toward other people's

1:01:11

goals. So you and certainly you

1:01:11

have to return emails, but like,

1:01:15

I think that needs to fit in

1:01:15

around. You know, you really

1:01:17

blocking the time on the things

1:01:17

you want to do,

1:01:19

right? So as

1:01:19

part of your advice, and

1:01:23

summarizing all of those five

1:01:23

year goals and writing free

1:01:27

things down each day, I'm I

1:01:27

bought a Lucite frame eight by

1:01:31

10. I'm going to put it in the

1:01:31

frame and in my notebook. I'm

1:01:34

also going to put down in each

1:01:34

of the three things I did each

1:01:38

day, how long each one took. I

1:01:38

love that. And I'm also going to

1:01:43

put down how much of my time was

1:01:43

devoted to emails or things that

1:01:48

had no value to the success of

1:01:48

those goals.

1:01:51

Yeah, a lot of

1:01:51

times, a lot of times, like,

1:01:53

I'll coach one of our CEOs, and,

1:01:53

you know, the CEO knows what I'm

1:01:59

that, you know, we say we're in

1:01:59

the talent business. They know

1:02:02

how much I care about talent. So

1:02:02

I'll coach one of the CEOs, and

1:02:07

I'll say, Well, how much, if you

1:02:07

had to guess, what percent of

1:02:10

your time do you think you're

1:02:10

you're spending on, you know,

1:02:12

building a great team and

1:02:12

building talent, and they'll

1:02:15

say, oh, a lot of my time I'm

1:02:15

spending a lot. Like, why don't

1:02:19

you pull out your calendar and

1:02:19

let's go look at the last two

1:02:22

months and look at how many, how

1:02:22

much time you spent on building

1:02:25

a great team. And they look at

1:02:25

me like they their face turns

1:02:29

white, because the answer is,

1:02:29

they're like, Oh, well, HR does

1:02:32

that. And, okay, what you just

1:02:32

said, your top priority is

1:02:36

building a great team and

1:02:36

talent. And yet, if I look at

1:02:39

the last two months of your

1:02:39

calendar, you spent no time on

1:02:42

it, yeah, but I had to do this.

1:02:42

And we had this customer, and we

1:02:45

had that and, like, that's what

1:02:45

I'm talking about. It's like you

1:02:48

have to, you have to, like, take

1:02:48

your top priorities and really

1:02:52

align your schedule. This

1:02:52

Stephen Covey has this great

1:02:57

matrix where he says, what's

1:02:57

urgent and what's important, and

1:03:00

he says that all the magic

1:03:00

happens in the quadrant of your

1:03:03

life that is important but not

1:03:03

urgent. That's where all the

1:03:07

magic is. And so but we all we

1:03:07

spend all our time on the things

1:03:10

that are urgent. So the unlock

1:03:10

is to take all the important

1:03:14

things, like working on your

1:03:14

management team, working with

1:03:17

your team, on your goals, maybe

1:03:17

designing a new product,

1:03:20

innovating things that are

1:03:20

important but not urgent, and

1:03:23

schedule them that makes them

1:03:23

urgent when they show up on your

1:03:26

calendar as a meeting with a

1:03:26

team to work on this really big

1:03:29

priority, all of a sudden it's

1:03:29

you've made the important

1:03:32

Urgent. And that's kind of the

1:03:32

unlock about how to how to get

1:03:36

in that quadrant of important

1:03:36

things. You're becoming

1:03:39

very well known.

1:03:39

You're a great professor. I'm

1:03:41

sure people reach out to you on

1:03:41

LinkedIn every day, yeah. And

1:03:44

maybe you get some things that I

1:03:44

get every day, which is, oh,

1:03:48

Graham, I'm so impressed with

1:03:48

you. Do you have 15 minutes for

1:03:51

a cup of coffee? Yes. And I get,

1:03:51

I get a lot of there's 10 of

1:03:55

those a week, yes, and the

1:03:55

answer for me is no, but if you

1:04:00

want to join my summer

1:04:00

internship program, you get a

1:04:02

whole 12 weeks with me. Nice. So

1:04:02

how does somebody earn a meeting

1:04:06

with you? Obviously, that's not

1:04:06

going to work. Yeah.

1:04:09

I mean, that's a great question, and it's something that I actually really

1:04:10

struggle with over the last

1:04:14

couple years as I've gotten more

1:04:14

and more those requests. Because

1:04:17

in the early days, I was just

1:04:17

honored. I said yes to 100% of

1:04:21

the time, and I thought it was a

1:04:21

real blessing that someone

1:04:24

wanted to talk to me and I and I

1:04:24

still feel that way, and so but

1:04:29

I just I can't I don't have the

1:04:29

capacity. I can't fill my

1:04:32

calendar, so I kind of have to

1:04:32

just prioritize and say, okay,

1:04:36

at the very top of the list is,

1:04:36

you work at Alpine, you're going

1:04:40

to get on my calendar, you know,

1:04:40

probably right under that as

1:04:42

you're taking my class right

1:04:42

now. You're enrolled in my

1:04:45

class, you know, I'm going to

1:04:45

spend time, you know, I have

1:04:48

office hours, and you can be in

1:04:48

my class, probably right under

1:04:51

that as you have taken my class

1:04:51

in the past years. And then, you

1:04:54

know, below that might be you currently are enrolled at Stanford, because it is part of

1:04:56

the job of a professor to meet

1:04:59

with students. And so I want to,

1:04:59

and then, you know, I so I try

1:05:02

to have this kind of algorithm

1:05:02

of, how do I, how do I

1:05:05

prioritize those requests? I do,

1:05:05

to your point earlier about

1:05:09

persistence. If someone writes

1:05:09

me and did a ton of work and

1:05:13

research and has something

1:05:13

smart, and they send me 17

1:05:16

emails, I will 100% meet with

1:05:16

them, like they they 100% will

1:05:20

get a meeting. So they get jump,

1:05:20

they can jump the queue of that

1:05:25

prioritization. But I wish I had

1:05:25

a I wish I had an infinite

1:05:28

amount of time. There's probably

1:05:28

some other unlock, like your

1:05:31

internship like, maybe I could

1:05:31

have, like, online office hours

1:05:35

on, you know, on Instagram or

1:05:35

so, I don't know, I haven't

1:05:38

thought about that, but, but I

1:05:38

really do try to get to as many

1:05:43

of those requests as I can and

1:05:43

and I still have to,

1:05:46

unfortunately, not not do a lot of them

1:05:49

when you're

1:05:49

successful, and there's a you.

1:05:52

Spectrum of success, we get more

1:05:52

and more busy, and as we get

1:05:57

older, we've got kids. I mean,

1:05:57

I've got five kids. You've got

1:06:00

kids. I'm into philanthropy.

1:06:00

You're into philanthropy. So you

1:06:04

really don't have a lot of time.

1:06:04

But I think mentors are very

1:06:07

important in our success. And

1:06:07

for me to earn a mentorship,

1:06:11

it's not sending 17 emails as

1:06:11

people who write me long letters

1:06:16

listen every podcast exactly,

1:06:16

they're pulling names out of my

1:06:20

mentors. Yeah, when I was

1:06:20

younger, how does somebody

1:06:23

become one of your mentees?

1:06:25

I mean, probably

1:06:25

the actually being a mentee of

1:06:28

mine, I just probably don't have

1:06:28

capacity. I mean, just because

1:06:31

I, I mean, I'm trying to give as

1:06:31

much of that time to the people

1:06:35

who work at my firm and I have

1:06:35

current students, so it'd be,

1:06:39

it'd be really hard for someone

1:06:39

that I've never met, no matter

1:06:42

what they're sending me, to

1:06:42

become, like, where I'm gonna

1:06:45

actually have ongoing, you know,

1:06:45

weekly or monthly or something

1:06:49

relationship. I just, at this

1:06:49

point, probably don't have

1:06:52

capacity for that. Or we're

1:06:53

at the end of

1:06:53

our show right now. And I always

1:06:55

concluded by a game I played.

1:06:55

Fill in the blank to excellence.

1:06:58

Are you ready to play? Fill in

1:06:58

the blank for excellence. Okay,

1:07:01

so of all the coaching you've

1:07:01

done, what are the biggest

1:07:05

lessons you've learned?

1:07:06

You can have just

1:07:06

about anything you want if

1:07:08

you're willing to do the work.

1:07:08

My number one professional goal

1:07:12

is build a number one performing

1:07:12

private equity firm of all time.

1:07:16

My number one personal goal is

1:07:16

try to live my life in a way

1:07:20

that I'm creating as much impact

1:07:20

on everyone who's in my life as

1:07:23

I can.

1:07:24

The biggest

1:07:24

regret in my life that I've had

1:07:26

is probably

1:07:28

missing some

1:07:28

early things with my kids. When

1:07:31

I was in the early years of

1:07:31

building Alpine, my biggest fear

1:07:34

in life is, I guess, that I will

1:07:34

die having not, you know,

1:07:39

fulfilled what I feel like I'm

1:07:39

on this earth to do, which I'm

1:07:41

still kind of figuring out.

1:07:43

The craziest

1:07:43

thing that's happened to me in

1:07:46

my career is

1:07:47

the entire

1:07:47

journey of starting Alpine, from

1:07:50

dorm room to where it is now,

1:07:50

has just been an unbelievably

1:07:54

crazy journey.

1:07:55

The funniest thing that's happened in my career is,

1:07:58

oh gosh. I mean,

1:07:58

I could go back to so many crazy

1:08:03

management meetings of visiting

1:08:03

companies in the early days when

1:08:06

we had no idea what we're doing.

1:08:06

And craziest one would be

1:08:09

probably my partner and I met

1:08:09

two guys who were so stoned they

1:08:15

never turned the lights on in

1:08:15

the meeting. I mean, that was

1:08:20

probably the craziest thing.

1:08:20

Yeah,

1:08:22

the best advice

1:08:22

I've received in my career is

1:08:26

ask yourself what you would do if you knew you wouldn't fail, and then go do

1:08:28

that thing. 10 years from now,

1:08:31

I'm going to be doing probably

1:08:31

very much, a lot of the same

1:08:35

things I'm doing now, hopefully

1:08:35

just a little bit with I'll have

1:08:41

a little more people helping me,

1:08:41

particularly at Alpine, where my

1:08:45

role will hopefully be a little

1:08:45

bit less than it is now. 20

1:08:49

years from now, I would hope,

1:08:49

I'd hope similar, but probably

1:08:52

I'm a lot more mentoring people

1:08:52

than doing myself.

1:08:56

If you could

1:08:56

pick one trait that would

1:08:59

contribute most to someone's

1:08:59

success, it would be

1:09:02

persistence. The most important

1:09:02

thing that's contributed to your

1:09:05

success has been persistence. I

1:09:05

love that. Out of the hundreds

1:09:10

of books that you've read over

1:09:10

the years, self help,

1:09:13

motivational. The one book that

1:09:13

you would recommend, above all

1:09:17

others, to somebody is, I'm

1:09:19

gonna go, I'm

1:09:19

gonna go old school and say,

1:09:22

Dale Carnegie, How to Win

1:09:22

Friends and Influence People,

1:09:25

which has sold

1:09:25

over 250,000 copies. I think he,

1:09:28

he wrote that book in something

1:09:28

like 1936 Yeah, it's the first

1:09:32

book I recommend to people. It's

1:09:34

got a lot of

1:09:34

sexist stuff, so you got to look

1:09:37

past that. It's, you know, it's

1:09:37

it's old, but it's the content

1:09:41

of that book. Is life changing

1:09:41

if you actually internalize it.

1:09:44

The one thing I've dreamed about doing for a long time, but haven't, is I've

1:09:46

been

1:09:49

trying to do a

1:09:49

standing back flip for about a

1:09:51

year and a half, and I'm gonna

1:09:51

land it. I'm gonna land it in

1:09:54

the next 12 months.

1:09:55

Are you taking

1:09:55

gymnastics? I'm

1:09:57

working on it. Yeah, I keep getting injured. Is the problem. I've had like four

1:09:59

injuries,

1:10:04

trying to do that back, but I'm gonna get it. Yeah, the best entrepreneur of

1:10:05

all time is

1:10:08

I'm gonna go Elon

1:10:08

Musk, other than

1:10:11

you and Warren

1:10:11

Buffett, the best investor in

1:10:15

the world is,

1:10:16

I mean, Jim

1:10:16

Simons has the best track record

1:10:19

of all time. Yeah. So I'll go

1:10:19

with, I'll go with Jim Simons.

1:10:23

If you could

1:10:23

go back and give

1:10:23

your 21 year old self one piece

1:10:27

of advice. What would it be

1:10:28

my I would say

1:10:28

it's gonna be okay. It things

1:10:32

are gonna turn out fine, and I

1:10:32

would have saved myself a whole

1:10:35

lot of stress and worry. The

1:10:37

one question you

1:10:37

wish I had asked you but didn't,

1:10:39

is, what's the meaning of life?

1:10:39

What's the meaning

1:10:43

of life? Shoot, I

1:10:43

think you're going to say that.

1:10:45

That's the quest I've been on

1:10:45

for the last, like, two, three

1:10:49

years. And it's, I think, the.

1:10:49

But the ultimate question i i

1:10:55

think the meaning of life is for

1:10:55

each person to find their

1:10:59

meaning of life and and for me,

1:10:59

my meaning of life is probably

1:11:05

to live like fully, you know,

1:11:05

throw my entire soul into

1:11:11

whatever I'm doing, you know, at

1:11:11

all times, whatever that is, but

1:11:15

I think each person has to kind

1:11:15

of answer that question for

1:11:17

themselves.

1:11:18

I'm grateful for

1:11:18

you coming today, I've learned a

1:11:21

ton. I've interviewed tons and

1:11:21

tons of people, some of the most

1:11:23

successful people in the world,

1:11:23

and I've said this to my team,

1:11:26

and I want to say it too. I've

1:11:26

been so excited for the

1:11:29

interview today, because doing

1:11:29

all the research it really has,

1:11:32

I've learned so much, and I'm

1:11:32

doing things that I think will

1:11:35

change my life, starting with

1:11:35

the Lucite and all the things

1:11:38

that you said, I'm big on

1:11:38

coaching different people. I

1:11:43

mean, you've coached me without

1:11:43

actually giving me any direct

1:11:46

coaching. So I appreciate you

1:11:46

being here. Super excited, super

1:11:49

grateful, and hopefully we'll

1:11:49

get the chance to know each

1:11:51

other better.

1:11:51

I really appreciate the interview, and you asked amazing questions, did

1:11:53

incredible amount of research,

1:11:56

and it's been a real pleasure.

1:11:56

Thanks so much. Randall. You.