🔥 Fireside Chat: Shawn Xu (Floodgate & Anchor List)
Lessons from building Anchor List, what top operators have in common, creating your own serendipity to learn and stay curious, and two topics Shawn is interested in now.
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Meet Shawn.
Shawn Xu is a Senior Associate at early-stage venture capital firm Floodgate. I first heard of Shawn because he is the curator of the Anchor List, an annual honor roll that celebrates talented operators and advisors in tech building the world’s fastest-growing startups.
In this fireside chat, we dive into lessons learned from Anchor List and how Shawn learns and stays curious. Let’s go!
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Applicable Lessons.
Lesson #1: Sometimes the quietest operators are the best operators. Find the “hidden gems” and “diamond in the rough” talent by (1) listening to what their teammates, people who work for them, and their Founders/CEOs say about their work; (2) understanding their thought process on how they approach problems; and (3) not caring about how much noise they get in the public sphere.
Lesson #2: Top operators who have gone from zero to one (1) exhibit long-term vision for the company to build a massive business; (2) have a positive-sum attitude that is a force multiplier with cross-functional partners; (3) is constantly building the culture as the company scales; (4) empowers their team to think big and experiment; (5) displayed high-velocity growth of [insert key metrics such as users or revenue]; and (5) have clear answers to their biggest wins and failures.
Lesson #3: Foster a culture of experimentation. Companies have different styles and cultures, however, the top companies have a culture where the employees feel empowered, have an owner’s mindset, and are self-starters who experiment (startup operators will wear many hats).
Lesson #4: Work backward from how you can build a community flywheel that creates strong network effects.
Prior to Floodgate, Shawn was a Managing Partner of First Round Capital’s Dorm Room Fund. The network has grown from 10 to 100+ and the “Dorm Room Mafia” has become a real community of founders, operators, and investors.
Lesson #5: Expose yourself to seers (people who are living in the future and thinking about those problems 24/7). Shawn learns and stays curious by (1) talking to the smartest people he can find; (2) creating his own serendipity (listen to our chat to hear how Shawn organized a “Hacker House” in NYC with half of the people he met on Twitter); and (3) staying on top of Twitter and newsletters.
I am a big fan of single-threaded dinners with a group of six curious minds. Cut through the small talk and go deep on specific topics.
[Pay Attention] Two topics Shawn is interested in (1) Consumer Metaverse — for many younger people, digital reality is more real than physical reality, how do you create products/experiences for them; (2) Next Generation Infrastructure / “America Next” — sustainable supply chain, space race 2.0
Keep an eye out for the 2021 Anchor List winners and the “Anchor List Mafia” that Shawn is building. If you are building something exciting (especially within the Consumer Metaverse and/or Next Generation Infrastructure) or have questions about Anchor List, email Shawn — shawn@floodgate.com
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“Fly High, Burn Bright, Be Curious.”