20VC: Robinhood Founder Vlad Tenev on The Single Most Important Thing Leadership is Responsible For, How To Manage Fear and Self-Doubt as a Leader & The Future of Fintech; Bundled or Unbundled

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The Twenty Minute VC

Finance, Venturecapital, Tech News, News, Siliconvalley, Technology, Investing, Startups, Business

4.4 • 637 Ratings

🗓️ 30 November 2020

⏱️ 36 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Vlad Tenev is the Co-Founder & CEO @ Robinhood, the company that provides commission-free investing, plus the tools you need to put your money in motion. To date, Vlad has raised over $2.2BN with Robinhood from some of the very best in the business including Sequoia, Greenoaks, Index, DST, Ribbit, IVP, Thrive, NEA, GV and more incredible names. Before Robinhood, Vlad started two finance companies in New York City.

In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Vlad made his way from Bulgaria to studying Math at Stanford to founding one of the fastest-growing companies of the decade in Robinhood?

2.) How does Vlad describe his own style of leadership today? How has this changed with the scaling of the business? What phase has been the most challenging? Why does Vlad think so much about "the tempo" of the company? What can you do to ensure the highest tempo?

3.) How does Vlad think about self-doubt as a leader when recognising the sheer size of the Robinhood team today being over 1,000? How does Vlad analyse the role that fear has to play in leadership? How does Vlad manage the weight of expectation? What works? What does not?

4.) What have been Vlad's lessons in what it takes to acquire the very best talent? Where do many founders make mistakes here? How does Vlad think about the role of mentorship with young team members? Why and how does Vlad bet so big on giving young team members responsibility?

5.) How does Vlad assess the current state of the fintech landscape today? Does Vlad believe we are entering a period of bundling or unbundling? Will we see the continued rise in the M&A activity we saw earlier this year? Why? What is likely to change in 2021?

Item’s Mentioned In Today’s Episode

Vlad’s Favourite Book: The Mars Project

As always you can follow Harry and The Twenty Minute VC on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Instagram here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is the 20 minute VC with me, Harry Stebbings, and I know what you're thinking.
0:03.3	My word 20 VC is on fire with its guests at the moment, but I can tell you it gets even better
0:07.9	today being joined by a guest who's reshaped their industry with beautiful, simplistic
0:11.9	consumer products.
0:13.1	Yes, I'm so thrilled to welcome Vlad Tenev, co-found and CEO at Robin Hood, the company that
0:17.8	provides commission-free investing, plus the tools you need to put your
0:21.1	money in motion. To date, Vlad has raised over $2.2 billion with Robin Hood from some of the very
0:26.2	best in the business, including Sequoia, Green Oaks, Index, DST, Ribbitt, IVP, Thrive, NEA, GV, and more
0:34.1	incredible names. Before Robin Hood, Vlad started two finance companies in New York City.
0:38.8	And I'd also have to say a huge thank you to Neil Maiter at Greeno's for the intro.
0:42.4	And then also Henrique at Brex, Mickey at Ribbitt and David Lowey for some fantastic
0:46.7	questions suggestions today.
0:48.1	I really did so appreciate that.
0:50.0	But before we move into the show today, I want to take a moment to mention HelloSign, a great example of a company that found success in building a product focused on user experience.
0:58.5	HelloSign is an effortless e-signature solution used by millions to securely send and request
1:03.6	legally valid digital signatures and agreements. They raised a total of $16 million in funding and
1:09.2	recently got acquired by Dropbox for an impressive
1:11.5	$230 million. Check out HelloSign.com forward slash 20VC to join the thousands of companies
1:18.2	and founders who value fast, secure and simple e-signatures. And speaking of beautiful products there,
1:24.0	and honestly, cutting the crap, there are a few products I truly could not live
1:27.5	without and used 10 plus times a day. Affinity, it's a home screen app for me. And not just me,
1:33.1	it's the number one venture capital CRM, allowing you to manage deal flow so much more efficiently,
	...

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