33voices interviews Victor Hwang, co-founder and Managing Director of T2 Venture Capital and author of The Rainforest.
What you can learn from Silicon Valley
Growing up in Washington, DC, I’ve always had great admiration for the vibe of Silicon Valley. From a distance, it was impossible to gauge the essential ingredients that make the Valley such a rich ecosystem, but even to an outsider, it was clear that its environment was the big differentiator. People in the Valley simply behave differently – They have an unwavering belief that the future will be vastly different from the present. They embrace loyalty and reciprocity as a way of life; and perhaps more importantly, they understand that relationships and reputations are the hallmarks of any successful endeavor. As an executive and an entrepreneur, I work hard to embody that mindset and to continually learn new ways to build such an inspiring environment. Venture Capitalist, Victor Hwang has written a brilliant book – The Rainforest – to give us a glimpse of what makes Silicon Valley tick. In it, he uses the natural Rainforest metaphor to propose that when a community operates like a rainforest ‘not controlling the specific processes, but instead helping to set the right environmental variables’, it will likely foster the social behaviors necessary to maximize the ‘free flow of talent, ideas, and capital in a human network.’ Here’s how the rules of The Rainforest, can help improve your odds of success….