Welcome to the A16Z podcast. I'm Michael Copeland. On this segment of the podcast, Ben Horowitz sits down with Shaka Sengor, author of,

Writing My Wrongs, Life, Death, and Redemption in an American Prison. Sengor talks about his almost two decades behind bars,

the brutal rules of leadership on the inside, and Sengar's own life and redemption

on the outside. Ben Horowitz kicks things off.

How's everybody doing? I thought I'd introduce our speaker by just telling the story of how he

and I met, because it's an interesting story story and how we met and how we became friends. So it actually started with an event that some of you may have been at when I interviewed Oprah. Were any of you at that? So on the car ride over, I was like super nervous because I'm interviewing Oprah and like that's like trying to like give Albert Einstein a physics pop quiz or something like that.

And so I was like Oprah, please help me like teach me how to interview real quick. Before I interview you, I was like, what's the secret me, like, teach me how to interview real quick.

Before I interview you, I was like, what's the secret?

How do you get people to open up like that?

And she said, well, Ben, I always ask people, you know, before I interview them, I ask them, what are their intentions?

And she says, and I'll give you an example because you have to know their intentions.

And then, like, I have them trust me to help them get their intentions no matter what I ask.

And she said, so I just had this guy in my show, Shaka Sangor, who just got out, he was 19 years in prison and, you know, up for murder and all these things.

And he was like a big guy, scary-looking guy.

And so I asked him, I said, you know, Shaka, what are your intentions?

And he said, well, my intention is to let people know that just because you're in prison for 19 years

doesn't mean that you're a bad person or that's who you are.

You can change.

You can be redeemed.

And I want people to understand that.

It's very important to know.

And so she said, okay, I got it.

...