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Earlier this year, I had coffee with the chief investment officer of a large public pension fund. His fund doesnt invest directly into venture (they have a fund of funds position instead), so my new CIO friend doesnt usually get pitched directly by VC funds. He doesnt spend a ton of time in tech circles either. When he does dip his toe in VC waters, he gets culture shock. I have trouble understanding VCs, he said. (Im paraphrasing.) By his estimation, people in traditional finance are easier to read. Their goal is to maximize returnsand the progress toward this goal is concrete, transparent, and measurable. Its really easy to understand what an asset managers motivations are when youre across the table from them in a professional capacity. People in politics are also easier to read. Their goal is to build power and wield influence. So when you talk to them, you can assume thats what theyre looking for in the relationship. Of course, both characterizations are limitingI know bankers who care about impact and at least one politician who cares about people (hes my cousin, so I can vouch). But as far as sweeping generalizations go, I can see where CIO is coming from. In sharp contrast to financiers and politicians, VC investors are slippery creatures. CIOs have a hard time decoding our language. Venture capitalists are asset managers, but we talk like superheroes. We speak in hyperbole and aim, unironically, to change the world. We are incessantly crushing it, even though our portfolios are laughably unprofitable. We sit on boards but dress in jeans and sneakers. We are herd animals who claim to be contrarian. Its hard for a CIO to judge how much of it is serious and how much of it is bullshit. And really, can you blame him? We sound like this because of founders I had a good laugh listening to that CIO, seeing this portrait of my industry from the eyes of one of its capital originators. But I do have a theory of where this language comes from, and why its mostly legit. It starts with founders. For most people, founding a companythe kind that scales massivelyis an irrational choice. Its extraordinarily difficult. You could be making way more money and working way fewer hours doing almost anything else. Chances are that youre going to fail, and youll have a pretty miserable time of it in the process. You have the odds of success of a lottery ticket, except that this particular lottery ticket costs 100% of your time, attention, and resources. Nobody in their right mind would do this for the money. There simply has to be a greater purpose. And for founders, there usually is: a problem they are compelled to solve. A mission they feel called to achieve. A chip on the shoulder and something to prove. Sometimes, they simply cant imagine doing anything else with their lives. Take it from an economist: These are all economically irrational reasons. You literally cannot buy a founders time with stability and a high salary. Its why founders rarely sound like mercenaries or power-hoardersbecause theyre neither. They are motivated by something much greater. And to rational people like the CIO, it all sounds lofty, bordering on ridiculous. Note, however, that this irrational exuberance makes for better, more resilient companies. It inspires angel investors and early employees, who forgo salary and stability for a dream. It keeps founding teams motivated for way longer than money alone does. Sometimes it even attracts customers and builds loyalty. Because a resonant mission takes you places that money alone cannot. In other words: In our industry, irrationality is a feature, not a bug. Venture is not a rational asset class VC investing is also predictably irrational. VC funds are not capital conservation vehiclestheyre long-term illiquid, unpredictable, and alpha-seeking. There are thousands of other, safer ways you could be deploying your capital, so when you choose VC, you do it for the dream. To quote Recast Capital founder and managing partner Courtney Russell McCrae: “Nobody invests in venture to make median returnswere all aiming for the top, plain and simple.” Thats what my CIO friend said, too. He said his company invests (a very tiny portion of its AUM) in venture because it is the only asset class that offers unlimited upside. Its the lottery ticket of finance. Asset managers sell a product to limited partners (LPs). VCs sell a dream. The same dream that founders sell to us. And that is why we all sound a little kooky. Not all VCs are equal Last year, I went viral for saying that megafunds are no longer venture capital funds. My argument is that theyre investing in consensus founders and consensus companiesnot in early-stage, high-risk, contrarian bets. Their largest deployments are into companies that are all but foretold to be winnersliterally too big, with too many giant powerful stakeholders, to fail. The bulk of their assets are being invested later and expected to generate faster and more predictable returns. In finance, they call this type of risk “beta.” Its fundamentally different from the “alpha” risk you underwrite when you invest in day-one, early-stage, non-consensus founders. These days, megafunds are making gobs of money on beta-seeking models. And it begs the question: Why do they still sound like VCs? Why do they want to hold on to the venture capital nomenclature, even when VC is a tiny proportion of their portfolio, just like CIOs? What do they lose if theyre called something else? It occurs to me that these guys fundamentally dont want to be just bankers and stewards of capitalthey want to be visionaries. Certainly, theres a coolness factor, and the influence that comes with investing in the bleeding edge. But also, I bet you can measure the difference between banker and visionary by the size of their management fees. For the record: I run a microfund, a fundamentally different vehicle and strategy than a megafund. I do not believe our funds should be analyzed togetherthey are fundamentally different assets, and warrant separate allocations, where you can compare like with like. If youre an LP, you are making bad decisions if you bucket all types of funds into a single giant VC bag. Youve been warned. Boutique VC is an irrational choice, too Speaking of irrational: Raising an early-stage microfund is an irrational choice, too. When you make all your money in carry, and very little in fees, youre betting completely on the upside, the dream. In the short term, you could be making way more money elsewhere. Thats why I see the same motivation among emerging venture capital fundsor boutique VCs, as the megafunds prefer we call ourselvesthan I do in founders. Nobody chooses to do this for rational reasons. We do it for unlimited upside. We do it for mission or lov of the craft. We do it because the future of technology and the future of humanity are all being written by early-stage startups and scientists and inventors and R&D labs, and we want to have a say in it. I personally do it because it is the purest incarnation of the American dreamthe idea that anyone can be the next founder to change the world, whether theyre consensus or not. This is what drives me. Its why I immigrated to America in the first place. I know now what I sound like when I say this. Maybe my pension fund friend is right to be confused. Maybe we do all sound like were full of shit sometimes. But the reason we sound like thisthe reason we talk about doing good and having impact and changing the world and making a differenceis because some of us founders and VCs actually mean it. And we wouldnt be doing this otherwise. This story was originally published in Leslie Feinzaigs Venture with Leslie newsletter.
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Ill never forget the first time I heard someone say, This meeting couldve been an email. You can probably imagine exactly the voice they said it in (and what their face looked like). Youre probably heard it many times yourself. The meeting in question was a project check-in with multiple departments, where wed spent an hour listening to one person giving an update that could have been written in a few bullet points. The rest of us just sat there, nodding along, waiting for it to end. No one really needed to speak, no one gave feedback, and no one asked any questions. As we all shuffled out, someone muttered, Well, that was a waste of time, and I couldnt help but agree. The wasted hour likely meant Id be working an extra hour that night with my laptop cracked open on my couch. It got me thinking: Should we cancel these types of meetings altogether and just rely on email updates? Whats the point of meeting if its not helping anyone? Ditch the conference room One of the biggest misconceptions about meetings is that they always need to be in a formal conference room with a set agenda and an hour on the clock. In reality, the most effective meetings dont always look like that, especially depending on your industry or the makeup of your team. For example, if youre working in health care, manufacturing, or retail, your meetings might take the form of pre- or post-shift huddles. For teams that work remotely or across different time zones, you may turn instead to asynchronous communication methods, like shared documents or video updates, instead of meeting in real time. The key is to adapt your meeting style to the needs of your team. But effective meetings arent just about planning; theyre also about how you engage with your team during them. This is where active listening becomes essential. For managers, using the Pause-Consider-Act framework can help ensure your meetings are effective and purposeful. Its all about stopping to think about the structure, content, and timing of your meetings. 1. Pause Take a step back and assess your current meetings. Are they too frequent? Too far apart? Are you meeting with no real purpose? Look at your schedule and figure out where things might need to be adjusted. If you find your team members constantly knocking on your door or sending chat messages because they dont have scheduled time with you, its a sign you might need more regular time with your team members. 2. Consider Think about the purpose of each meeting. What are you trying to accomplish? For one-on-ones, the goal might be to check in on progress, provide feedback, or support your team members development. Team meetings could include brainstorming, decision-making, or updates. Be clear about what each meeting is for, and make sure your team knows whats expected of them. Consider teammates perspectivedo they feel like theyre too busy for the meeting? Are they feeling overwhelmed and just need more structure? Or do they feel like you already know everything and dont see the need to communicate details? Looking at these angles, adjust your approach accordingly. (Remember that if you fear overcommunicating, that rarely happens. Its more often the opposite: team members would love to hear more from you, not less.) 3. Act Implement changes that make your meetings more structured and intentional. Use shared agendas to help your team prepare, and make sure youre prepared, too. Show up on time, be present, and make sure your team walks away with clear action items. For example, if youre setting up a one-on-one, include questions about workload, challenges, and opportunities for growth. Make these meetings actionable by leaving each one with the next steps for both you and your team members. Let them know their concerns have been heard, and show them how youre going to support them moving forward. Moving your meetings along You dont want people dreading a meeting invitebut some might be. Not to your face; more likely to each other, or quietly hoping it gets cancelled. That usually happens when meetings lack a clear purpose and feel like they exist just for the sake of existing. Every meeting should have a reason to get that specific group together. Sometimes its about business needssharing information, making decisions, solving problems. Other times its about something thats equally important: building connection, and recognizing the humans doing the work. When meetings have intention, they make work easier, not harder. They help people understand what matters, whats expected of them, and how their work connects to everyone elses. But that only happens when someone is deliberate about it, and that someone can be you. When you Pause to take a real look at the meetings youre running, Consider what your team actually needs from that time together, and Act to structure (or restructure) them with purpose, you turn time spent into time invested. And sometimes the best compliment youll ever get as a manager will be someone walking out of the room saying, That was actually a really good meeting. Adapted from The Manager Method: A Practical Framework to Lead, Support, and Get Results by Ashley Herd (Hay House Business, February 2026).
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E-Commerce
QR codes have become a convenience of modern life. Just scan the black and white mosaic with your phones camera and you can do everything from connect to your hotel room Wi-Fi to pay for that public parking space to pull up a restaurant menu. But QR codes can also leave you vulnerable. Thats because scammers, organized criminal gangs, and shady nation-states are using the unassuming tech to get you to hand over your data unwittingly. Heres how theyre doing it, and how you can protect yourself. People love the convenience of QR codesbut so do scammers Its hard to believe that something nefarious can lie within a QR code, but it can. In order to understand why, it helps to know how a QR code works. Short for quick response code, a QR code is essentially a more advanced version of UPC bar codes that have been found on packaged products for decades. An old-school UPC code (short for universal product code) is a one-dimensional image composed of vertical bars of different widths that represent different numbers. When the barcode is scanned, the numbers are read and compared with a database to identify the related product. QR codes are two-dimensional images with glyphs of various sizes that store not just numbers, but text. When scanned, your phone extracts the encoded information and can act on it. For example, QR codes often embed URLs, allowing you to scan, say, a parking meter to launch a webpage where you can pay online. For sure, this is a lot more convenient than manually typing a URL into your phones browser to load the payment page. But our desire forand unquestioning acceptance ofthis convenience is now being exploited by scammers through what has become known as quishing. The growing threat of quishing Increasingly, everyone from scammers to nation-states are trying to exploit our willingness to use QR codes. They do this by embedding malicious links in them and sending them to a person via email, often purporting to be from their bank or an online service they use. Alternatively, individual malicious actors have been known to print QR codes with malicious links embedded and physically place them over authentic QR codes on parking meters, restaurant tables, and in hotel rooms. Unsuspecting individuals then scan these QR codes, not realizing that the URL embedded in them leads to a scam site designed to mimic the real one. These look-alike sites are designed to steal the users login credentials, credit card details, or other sensitive data. If this sounds a lot like the old school phishing weve been dealing with since the dawn of the internet, thats because it isjust updated for a QR-coded world, hence the term quishing. How to protect yourself from fake QR codes Quishing is becoming a growing problem, but there are ways you can protect yourself against it. The first is by adopting healthy skepticism about QR codes. Just because a QR code is on the hotel room nightstand, below the parking meter dial, or in an email that looks to be from your bank doesn’t mean its benign. Understanding that is your first step toward protecting yourself. The next step is to carefully examine QR codes before scanning them. Scammers often place fake QR codes over real ones in the physical world. So, before you scan a QR code on a restaurant table, take a moment to inspect it for signs that it might be a sticker covering the authentic code. Look for rough edges, tears, or black squares from a deeper QR code showing through the white space, as these can indicate that the QR code isnt one you should be scanning. Likewise, be extremely cautious of QR codes you receive in emails, especially from senders purporting to be your financial institution or online services you useand particularly if these emails contain messages that use language like scan the code now to secure your account. Scammers rely on urgency to compel people to enter their login details hastily on fake websiteslogins the scammers will then use to access your accounts on the real website. Finally, never enter information on a web page that was loaded from a scanned QR code without first manually checking the URL in your web browser. The web page might look like your banks login screen, but a scam website will have a URL that doesnt match the authentic websites address. When in doubt as to whether a URL is authentic, its best to open up another browser window, do a Google search for the website in question, and click on the link Google gives you.
Category:
E-Commerce
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