Hemant Taneja (General Catalyst) - Build, Don’t Break
Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL)
Stanford eCorner
4.5 • 740 Ratings
🗓️ 17 March 2021
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Hemant Taneja is a managing director at General Catalyst, and has been an early investor in market-leading companies like Digit, Grammarly, Gusto, Livongo, Mindstrong, Samsara, Snap, and Stripe. His 2018 book Unscaled articulates the need for accountability, transparency, and explainability in AI technologies, and his 2020 book UnHealthcare proposes a new model for impactful healthcare innovation. He is also the author of the influential Harvard Business Review article “The Era of ‘Move Fast and Break Things’ is Over.” In this conversation with Stanford professor Tom Byers, Taneja discusses recent technological paradigm shifts, and urges founders and investors to build responsibly and drive positive social change by measuring and valuing impact as much as financial returns.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Who you are defines how you build. |
| 0:06.7 | This is the entrepreneurial thought leader series. |
| 0:10.7 | Brought to you by Stanford E. Corner. |
| 0:14.1 | On this episode, we're joined by Hamith Tenasia, managing partner at the venture capital firm General Catalyst. |
| 0:24.6 | Here's host and Stanford professor Tom Byers. Today I'm really delighted. I mean, generally delighted that I get to spend this time with Hayman. |
| 0:32.6 | He's the managing director at General Catalyst. He also is an author, and I recommend all of his publications. |
| 0:42.6 | One of them in 2018, we're going to talk a little bit about today. |
| 0:45.4 | It's called Unscaled, and it was regarding the need for accountability and transparency |
| 0:50.0 | and explainability and AI technologies. |
| 0:54.2 | Then there's a piece that is heavily influencing me |
| 0:57.9 | as we work on this ethics and entrepreneurship project. |
| 1:01.4 | And this is the piece that the Harvard Business Review article |
| 1:04.3 | in 2019 called The Era of Move Fast and Bright Things is over. |
| 1:10.6 | So we'll talk a little bit about that today. |
| 1:13.0 | But in addition to this, let me just talk about what he does in his spare time, |
| 1:17.0 | besides writing books and being a world-class venture capitalist. |
| 1:21.0 | He's co-founder of the Advanced Energy Economy, |
| 1:23.9 | an organization focused on transforming energy policy in America. |
| 1:29.2 | He's the founding board member of the K-Lab School, non-profit K-12 school dedicated to classroom innovation. And he sits |
| 1:37.3 | on the board of fellows right here at Stanford University in the School of Medicine. He also, |
| 1:43.2 | and this really makes me happy to share, that he teaches a terrific computer |
| 1:48.5 | science course, not this year because his partner is on sabbatical, but next year, so for |
... |
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