In 'Stumbling on Happiness,' Daniel Gilbert delves into the human capacity to imagine the future and why we are often poor at predicting what will make us happy. Gilbert argues that our imagination is flawed in several ways: it adds or removes details, extrapolates from the present, and fails to account for the psychological immune system that helps us cope with undesired outcomes. The book uses scientific research from psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and behavioral economics to explain why we consistently misjudge our future satisfaction and how this affects our decisions. Gilbert also suggests that understanding these biases can help us make better choices and gain more control over our pursuit of happiness.
In *How Not to Die*, Dr. Michael Greger examines the top 15 causes of premature death in America, including heart disease, various cancers, diabetes, Parkinson's, and high blood pressure. He explains how nutritional and lifestyle interventions can often be more effective than pharmaceutical and surgical approaches in preventing and reversing these diseases. The book includes Dr. Greger's Daily Dozen, a checklist of foods to consume daily for maximum health benefits, and is backed by extensive scientific research and evidence.
Arif Janmohamed is a Partner @ Lightspeed Venture Partners, one of the leading firms of the last decade with a portfolio including the likes of Snapchat, Mulesoft, Max Levchin’s Affirm, AppDynamics and many more incredible companies. Some of Arif's most notable companies that he has led or been involved with for LSVP includel; TripActions, Blend, Nutanix, AppZen, MoveWorks and more. Prior to Lightspeed, Arif worked in the corporate business development team @ Cisco as part of transaction leadership and execution on a number of deals including WebEx. Before WebEx, Arif founded WVP Ventures, a student-run venture capital organization.
In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:
1.) How Arif made his way into venture and came to be one of the valley's leading enterprise investors with Lightspeed?
2.) We are seeing pricing hit 100x ARR multiples, does Arif believe we are seeing enterprise investing as past it's peak? Are we seeing late-cycle momentum investing? Would Arif agree with matt Harris, "Series A pricing does not matter anymore?" How does Arif assess his own price sensitivity today? How has it changed over time?
3.) Why does Arif believe that market risk is the most dangerous risk to underwrite as a VC? How does Arif think about and assess market timing? What has changed over the last few years to unlock such quantums of capital into the enterprise market? With the acquisitions of Duo, Mulesoft, Qualtrics, will we have a next-gen incumbent set or will it be an environment of existing incumbent consolidation?
4.) What does Arif specifically believe founders need to get right when it comes to company design, in order to scale to a $5-10Bn market leader? In terms of the go-to-market, who does Arif think has nailed it most recently? Why? How does Arif test for a founding team's ability to execute on go-to-market when meeting them early on?
Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:
Arif’s Fave Book: Stumbling on Happiness, How Not To Die: Discover the foods scientifically proven to prevent and reverse disease
Arif’s Most Recent Investment: TripActions
As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Arif on Twitter here!
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch 
