Counterfactual Impacts in Venture Capital

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CNN's John Sutter talks about the idea of counterfactual impacts. He says it can be hard to know if you're really changing the world or just doing something slightly before someone else did it. But he argues that some ideas are accelerated dramatically by a single set of founders going after them. The most important thing is not to let technology take too long to develop, Sutter says.

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What are "variance-amplifying" and "variance-dampening" institutions? Has the world been getting weirder recently? Should entrepreneurs aim for variance amplification or variance dampening? What percentage of people should be entrepreneurs? What traits and skills are necessary for successful entrepreneurship? How has ambition changed over the course of history? How can entrepreneurs know if they're really changing the world, or just doing something slightly before someone else did it, or just doing something that would have happened anyway? How can entrepreneurs avoid getting mired in "tar pit" ideas?

Matt Clifford MBE is cofounder and CEO of Entrepreneur First, the leading technology company builder that invests in top technical individuals to help them build world-class deep technology startups from scratch in six locations across Europe, Asia, and Canada. Since 2011, Entrepreneur First has created over 500 startups worth over $10bn including Magic Pony Technology, Tractable, and CloudNC. Matt is also Chairman of the UK's new Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA), which aims to enable exceptional scientists and researchers to identify and fund transformational research that leads to new technologies, discoveries, products, and services. Matt sits on the board of Code First Girls, which he co-founded in 2013 to teach young women how to code, and is a member of the Innovate UK Council. Matt started his career at McKinsey & Co. and holds degrees from Cambridge and MIT, where he was a Kennedy Scholar. He was awarded an MBE for services to business in the 2016 Queen's Birthday Honours. Follow him on Twitter, interact with him on LinkedIn, or learn more about his work at Entrepreneur First.

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