Yesterday we had Bruce Dulnevie in our Entrepreneurship & VC class. Bruce is one of the founding partners of Benchmark Capital, the VC firm behind companies like eBya, Palm, and AOL.
When asked about what pattern he has seen in successful return his reply was:
1. Competitive instinct
2. Smartness - they give u the answer to ur question right away
3. Stamina - this is no easy trip
I am feeling there are certain things I would have enjoyed doing while I was here for the past 18 months, but for some reason or another I didn't end up doing them. Things like discussing whether Hijab's importance with that EE student from Iran, organizing that tennis over music day, bumping into this CS student with a pony tail that is a little short on social skills but VC's are giving $5 million, asking my intercontinental friends to come and get squeezed in my little living room to watch a French movie, or simply going up to the city more often and enjoying its more lively spirit.
I have four months to go. They wouldn't seem little time. I could have just came for four months and would be pumped up to do the above and more. However, the fact that I've been here 18 months places some considerable inertia.
So the challenge is to try to forget all about these 4 months and imagine I just set foot at the GSB.
