August 7, 2024 • 42 mins
Discover how spiritual discipleship can transform business leadership as we sit down with Patrick Farrell, a true visionary in the investing space. Patrick shares his extraordinary journey from a high-powered consulting firm to the vibrant world of startups, driven by a deep spiritual calling. Learn from Patrick's firsthand experiences about the critical role of a founder's spiritual and emotional health in driving company success. Be inspired by his commitment to fostering a community of high-net-worth individuals and family offices dedicated to investing in mission-driven startups.
Early-stage entrepreneurs in innovation and technology won't want to miss Patrick's insights on the necessity of startup capital, often secured from friends, family, and angel investors, before institutional investors come into play. Patrick emphasizes the indispensable value of relational and spiritual support alongside financial backing. Hear personal stories that showcase the transformative power of a faith-based approach to business, from workplace discipleship to cultivating a familial company culture that nurtures personal and professional growth.
Lastly, delve into the unique structure and philosophy of faith-driven investing. Patrick reveals how Potomac Angel Capital creates meaningful relationships between investors and entrepreneurs through engaging networking events, portfolio updates, and rapid-fire pitch sessions. Explore how donor-advised funds can revolutionize impact investing, blending charitable giving with profitable ventures, and hear a heartwarming story of global impact investing in a third-world country. This episode is brimming with valuable insights on building community and fostering kingdom investments.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
In Revelation 7, John shares his vision of heaven,
with members from every tribe,tongue, people and language
standing in the throne roombefore the Lamb.
Yet today there are still over7,000 unreached people groups
around the world.
For the last six years, myfamily and friends have been on
a journey to find, vet and fundthe task remaining.
(00:28):
Come journey with us to theends of the earth as we share
the supernatural stories of Godat work for the men and women he
has called to reach theunreached.
Hello friends, Welcome back tothe Unreached Podcast, Season 3.
Dustin Elliott, here, your host.
I have a friend of mine,somewhat of a new friend, who
(00:49):
has recently been called to andmoved to Austin.
This is Patrick Farrell's storytoday and the story of Angel
Capital, the story of buildingfellowship and community among
Christian families withresources and something to give
back, something mentorship,discipleship, finances, et
cetera.
How do we come together andequip them and show them a way
(01:12):
to invest in Christian-ledcompanies and then bring those
up?
And so, Patrick Farrell,welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Dustin, thanks for having me.
Man so good to be here andexcited for the conversation
today, patrick let's start witha little bit about you.
Yeah, so I grew up in theWashington DC area, northern
Virginia, left for college, wentto Vanderbilt University in
Nashville, came back to DCreally just to work in a job and
eventually started inconsulting big 20,000-person
(01:38):
consulting firm, did that for acouple years and then decided to
join the startup space.
A couple of years into my careerI had this awesome startup
experience where I just learneda ton.
I was the director of corporatedevelopment so I helped the
business.
We had a family office that wasbehind us, so we had a growth
by acquisition strategy, helpedthe business acquire a couple of
companies and then integratethose companies.
(01:59):
And then we needed the people,processes and systems to scale
the business and so I moved overto director of operations role
and eventually that startup kindof exited in 2020 to a larger
startup, a larger cybersecuritystartup called Threat Connect.
So I got to see venture frombeginning to end, which really
was formational for me.
But most importantly, I wouldsay when I walked in the
(02:19):
business, I believed in Jesusbut wasn't really walking with
him by the time I walked out ofthe business.
I had an intimate relationshipwith him and that was mainly
because I was discipled in thebusiness context.
My manager and the president ofthe company was a strong
believer, saw I had potential,we had a good working
relationship and he started tojust patiently disciple me.
(02:41):
I mean I would come in honestlyguys.
I'd come in after weekendsdoing God knows what and just
being like in my head I thinksubconsciously, like I wonder if
he's going to tell me what I'mdoing is wrong.
I wonder if he's going to likehe's going to punish me for my
behavior.
And he was always patient andGod just kind of did the work in
my heart.
And so when I walked out ofthat business, not only did I
have an exit under my belt but Ialso had just a really strong
(03:05):
walk with God, a real intimacywith God that had been formed
and shaped in that period oftime.
I also left that business witha few strong convictions.
One is that the spiritual andemotional health of the founder
is essential to the businessbeing successful.
We've seen over and over againyou can have a great plan, you
can have a great team, but ifyou're not aligned in your
spirit, if you're not alignedemotionally, then things like
(03:27):
that typically fall apartbecause ventures are incredibly
difficult.
So I recognize the role thatthe founder had to play in the
success of the business, but Ialso recognize that businesses
can be mechanisms for kingdomgrowth.
Whether internally like mystory blessing employees,
discipling employees who I waswhen I walked in the business
and who I was when I walked outof the business were like two
(03:47):
different people.
So internally, but thenexternally we were in
cybersecurity mission drivencompany really felt like we were
making a difference on theworld at large, and so, with
those convictions, I decided tosay, okay, well, what does it
look like to support early stageentrepreneurs who are going to
be bold cultural witnesses, bygetting behind them with capital
and doing so in relationship?
(04:08):
And what emerged from that wasthe angel network model, which
is let's get a bunch of high networth individuals and family
offices together in communityand let's invest together,
relationally, in early stagefounders.
And so, long story short,started Potomac Angel Capital in
January of 2022 to do just that.
To date, we've done 17 deals.
(04:28):
We've deployed almost three anda half million in capital
across 14 companies.
Our portfolio is, by God'sgrace, performing incredibly
well, having some awesomemissions.
We're walking alongside someamazing founders.
As we were building thatbusiness, we started to realize
we had a unique model that we'dI don't want to say stumbled
into, but that God had kind ofled us to.
I was down here in Austin Southby Southwest 2023, and really
(04:54):
just validating the market,thinking about replicating into
a new city from DC, and I can'texplain it other than day one in
my time with Jesus, in themorning I felt like he had
invited me to move to Austin,and so that went through a
discernment process that, dustin, you know my folks I'd gone
through layers of guys I waswalking with that were praying
and they had all beenaffirmatively, but then I was
(05:16):
like, all right, lord, we'regoing to really test this.
I'm going to ask my parents tothink if they think I should
leave DC, where they were a 10minute drive from me.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
And involved in the business and involved as
investors and mentors and partof the network, right, totally,
yeah, all of the above.
So, hey, you're the main guyand we're not only parents to
you, but we're in business withyou and it's nice to have you
here because we have access toyou doing all these things,
leadership for this company andthese ventures.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
And then, hey, what do you think about me leaving?
Exactly that was theconversation.
I mean, the absurdity ofleaving my friend's family
investors in business in DC waslike it was mounting at that
period of time.
So the final test was really myparents, which were totally
incentivized to say no, um, andthey went back and prayed about
it.
And they came back and theywere like we hate this, but yep,
you gotta go.
And so it just felt sent, and soI came down here in the fall
(06:04):
really to build a second networkof investors and really double
down on how do we buildcommunity among stewards of
wealth who are looking to aligntheir capital with their faith.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I love it.
I love it.
So there's only about 74different strings.
I want to pull on from what youjust said, but the first
thought I had.
So, just for the listeners,we've got a very diverse group
that listens to this, fromtraditional missionaries to
pastors at churches to businesspeople, international business
folks, et cetera.
So maybe just let's talkbriefly about venture capital,
(06:37):
stages of venture capital, angelcapital, walk us through kind
of the timeline capitalstructure.
How does a company get started,right?
So I decide I have an idea, Iwant to start a company, I've
got some way to innovate ordisrupt.
And I realize, ok, I need a fewbucks, right, I need, I need
some money to build this productor hire some folks.
(06:57):
And what happens next?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Typically when a business is in the idea stage,
sometimes you can kind of buildor grow organically, meaning,
hey, we're going to go and we'regoing to start a restaurant,
start a shop, something likethat, and we're not going to
really need to raise outsidecapital.
We'll just kind of organicallygrow our business.
But in other instances,especially when you're talking
(07:19):
about innovation, whether it'stechnology or something
otherwise that has an intendedlarge impact on the world at
large or is going to grow andscale to be a large business,
they often need startup capital.
Typically in the world at largethat will come from friends and
family, but often it'll alsocome from outside investors,
(07:39):
high net worth individualscalled angel investors.
Typically those angel investorsare investing in what we would
call the pre-seed round,pre-revenue round, which is when
the business is just an ideastage, it hasn't actually built
a product and launched tocustomers or just thereafter.
So we've built the product,we've kind of started selling to
customers and we just need somegrowth capital to start hiring
(08:00):
folks to see if this can reallytake off.
So you're investing reallybefore what we would call
institutional investors arecoming to the table venture
capitalists, private equityfirms, folks with large amounts
of capital coming to the tableto really get alongside the
business.
You have to kind of get thatfrom individuals and typically
family offices before you cankind of grow and scale.
(08:22):
However, obviously, at thatstage of the business, it's
obviously the most risky stageof the business because a lot of
these startups will fail, andso what you're really doing is
partnering with theseentrepreneurs in their missions
and getting behind them andtheir vision and saying I've got
your back, I want to providecapital to your business so you
can grow and scale, but also Iwant to be a resource for you as
(08:43):
you walk this incrediblytumultuous and tough journey.
I was talking to a partner ofmine earlier this week who was
talking about tech entrepreneursearly stage tech entrepreneurs
as the athletes of venturecapital.
It's tough to perform in theearly stage and really all the
pressures that come with it, andso if we can get relationally
in relationship withentrepreneurs when they're young
(09:07):
and their businesses are young,then we can help form and shape
their culture and their intentmoving forward and hopefully get
them past that vulnerable stageso they can actually have the
impact that they desire on theworld at large.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
It takes me to this concept and we've talked about
this before, but I think peopleare walking around living in one
of two dispositions they'reliving in a disposition of
scarcity or a disposition ofabundance, right?
I mean, if we really believe Godowns it all and we really are
walking around in a spirit ofyou know, he's going to take
care of the birds, he takes careof the animals, he's going to
(09:38):
take care of us.
I think a key for helping someearly businesses succeed, some
early missions succeed andmissionaries succeed A lot of
that is, you know, hey, we'regoing to hold the rope on the
finance piece.
We're going to fund you andhere's your runway.
Because if, if you're layingawake at night worried about how
you're going to pay the billsand keep the family fed, then
(10:00):
you're not being able to getinto the creative space of what
are the next steps and things weneed to do for the company,
right?
So I feel like when you add thebiblical narrative and the
discipleship piece to that,you're only.
You're not only providing someabundance, but you're also kind
of discipling.
The theory of abundance Is thatfair, that's super fair.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
And I think early stage entrepreneurs typically
fall into a scarcity mindsetvery quickly because there's so
many pressures.
And so if you can provide thatsort of financial arm and, more
than that, that relational space, safe space for an entrepreneur
to go and just be themselvesand be honest about how they're
(10:40):
feeling and help providespiritual guidance Because,
honestly, a lot of my investorsare serial entrepreneurs who
have been there, done that,exited businesses before, and so
they know what it's like.
But they're also followingJesus and they're typically
older, they typically had a fewmore miles under their belt.
When they meet an early stageentrepreneur and they get
(11:01):
alongside them, they can kind ofprovide that spiritual
discipleship that, honestly, isway more important than even the
financial piece, and that'sreally the goal for us is like
how do we not only discipleentrepreneurs but then help
equip investors to be able to dothat piece well and align their
capital well with the kingdom?
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Next thread next string here the gospel traveling
further and faster on the wingsof business than the
traditional missionary sense.
I think it's happening today.
I think the ramp up of that isincredible right now From the
leveraging technology standpoint, from folks like Switchboard
and what they do to connectpeople with a skill set to a
(11:40):
company or a mission with a needthere's that component to a
company or a mission with a needthere's that component.
But what I love is that you'rea guest who literally lived out
coming to faith, maturing inyour faith through the workplace
, and that's fairly rare.
I don't know that.
A lot of folks have experiencedthat.
But tell us.
(12:01):
I mean, what was the rhythm ofa work week?
You kind of talked about comingin on Monday, maybe a little
hungover and a little tired, butwhat was the rhythm of?
Did y'all do a Bible study?
Did he just spend one-on-onetime with everybody, like what
was this founder doing?
Speaker 2 (12:16):
that was different, I would say maybe a few key
characteristics of how thebusiness worked.
One the business was superfamilial, so it was about
relationships, about makingpeople feel comfortable.
It was about bringing peopleinto the fold.
We had a lot of company lunchesand things like that that were
just pulling people together inrelationship.
For clarity's sake, thebusiness, the CEO of the
(12:38):
business, was actually my dad,so Paul was the CEO of the
business.
His business partner, todd, wasmy manager.
We made the smart decision forme not to work directly for my
dad but to work for Todd, whichwas strategic in a number of
ways, but also Todd hadauthority over the business
units and areas that I was goingto plug into.
(12:58):
So it made sense practicallyspeaking as well.
But ultimately, as it relatedto me and Todd, I think what it
really started as is a goodworking relationship, like I was
showing up, trying to, to workto, to do well in my work, to
execute, um, and he was.
He was a great manager, and sowe started a good working
relationship and we were purpose, we were on mission together,
without even really knowing it,within the business.
(13:20):
And so once you get that trustand that rap, once that trust is
built and that rapport is builtthen it allowed Todd to start
me and Todd to start building apersonal relationship where he
started asking me about my life.
Todd has a really crazy story,but one of the key pieces of it
is just really rooted in prayer.
What does it look like toreally communicate with God and
(13:41):
let him tell you things aboutwho you are and about how
beloved you are?
So a little bit more on thecharismatic roots, which I had
never been exposed to before,and so when we started talking
about my life, we would Toddwould offer to like pray for us
and I would have theseexperiences of God that I
(14:01):
couldn't really explain and Icouldn't really.
I didn't know how to rationallythink through.
And so God started meeting mein that space through Todd, and
then Todd, as I mentioned, wasincredibly patient with me.
So even when I was kind of evenhaving these experiences and
starting to slightly change mylife, everything was everything.
Not everything was superaligned, and so there was
(14:23):
moments in time where I wouldkind of backslip or come in and
be like, yeah, I wonder, is thisthe moment where God's going to
be like no, like you, you suck,you got to get your act
together, right and, and Godnever did that and Todd never
did that.
And so, as God worked on myheart, I was able to start
trusting God that I could makedecisions that aligned with his
(14:44):
will.
And then Todd, to this day,would say that he would pray
like, all right, lord is todaythe day that I need to tell
Patrick to stop doing that.
And God would be like,absolutely not, I'm gonna do it
myself.
And so his patience inrelationship personally, god did
the work in my heart, um, andso that was.
(15:10):
And so really our tag ups, Iwould say to answer your
original question they startedwith like an hour of like, all
work and by the end of our timethere, it was like 10 minutes of
work and 50 minutes of life inrelationship, um, which, um, we
were still getting work done andwe were still being excellent
in our work.
I'm not trying to suggest thatwe were taking company time to
only do discipleship, but by theend he was forming me as a
(15:30):
person and then I was able to goout and execute in the business
.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Well, man, it's a beautiful thing to just model
how to act for somebody and prayfor them and ask God do you
want me to engage in this manneror not?
And listen, god gave you someexperience.
He gave you some real lifestuff that lets you see things
in a founder, in a leader and ina company that you can tell
(15:54):
your investors or your potentialinvestors about.
So let's pivot to the network.
Those groups, y'all cometogether monthly, monthly
meetings, yep, okay, and at amonthly meeting, tell us what a
monthly meeting looks like.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah, so the monthly meetings have actually been part
of our I wouldn't say secretsauce, but part of the thing
that makes it so valuable isconsistent in-person
relationships between high networth individuals and stewards
of wealth.
As you all know, it can be verylonely Now no one's crying for
somebody who's been blessed withwealth but typically they comes
(16:27):
with a whole bunch ofchallenges that no one really
sees behind the scenes and it'svery hard to have a shared
relationships where you feelopen and able to share about
some of the struggles thatyou're having with your capital.
And so that consistent monthlymeeting just allows
relationships to form amongpeople who typically don't have
spaces like that in their lives.
So that's been a key piece themonthly meetings.
(16:48):
The way we structure it is we'lldo about an hour of dinner
networking, letting people justkind of free flow, organically
create relationships.
We'll take about 30 minutes andI'll give updates on the state
of our portfolio, what's goingon with entrepreneurs, and then
we'll take about 30 minutes andI'll give updates on the state
of our portfolio, um, the what'sgoing on with entrepreneurs, um
, and then we'll also share atestimony or story.
So most of the time we'll havea member get up and just talk
(17:10):
about, like, here's my been, mywalk with Jesus, here's what
I've learned about faith-driveninvesting, um, all across the
spectrum of folks who are brandnew to folks who have been
investing for years now and whatit means to them and how it
plays out.
So we either do that or we'llbring in like an external
speaker to talk about aparticular subject or just kind
of educate the group.
So we'll do a little bit offellowship, a little bit of
(17:32):
admin, a little bit of testimony, and then the back half of the
meeting we'll have three pitches, so three entrepreneurs will
come virtually or in person.
We, we go, we try to it reallydoes.
So it does feel a little bitlike Shark Tank in the way that
we're moving through it 10minutes of pitch, 10 minutes of
Q&A, then the entrepreneursleave and it's 10 minutes of
investor discussion, we're on tothe next one.
I mean, it's fast and whatwe're really trying to do is get
(17:55):
investors to see if they'reinterested in the opportunities
opportunities before we spend alot of this founder's time.
So on one hand, it is a sharktank.
On the other hand, what we'vetried to build a culture of is
we're not going to tear anyonedown.
We're going to bless all theentrepreneurs we're going to
give, but we're going to givestrong and transparent feedback
at the same time.
It doesn't help an entrepreneurif they're up there, um, uh,
(18:15):
being vulnerable beingvulnerable pouring themselves
out and you're just tearing themdown.
But it also doesn't help them ifyou're just not telling them
why you're not interested.
So we try to strike thatbalance really well.
But it is in some ways aChristian shark tank just behind
closed doors with a closedcommunity of folks who can
actually put capital to work andcome along to these
entrepreneurs.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
So let's keep going here.
So we've heard, we've prayed,we've had fellowship, we're
building community, we'regaining trust among the families
that are involved.
And a pitch comes and there'sinterest.
There's interest.
Do all 20 families invest inevery company, or can six or
eight families pick one thatthey really like?
And what happens after?
Speaker 2 (18:54):
that Our investors make individual decisions on
which companies to invest in andwhich not to, and how much they
want to invest.
So think of me as more of agrand facilitator.
I'm finding the opportunities,I'm hosting the meetings, and
then we have a proprietarydiligence process that is highly
professional, that we help ourinvestors evaluate opportunities
, risks, risk and opportunitieswithin deals so they can
(19:14):
understand whether they want toinvest or not.
Because typically after aconversation or two you really
got to get underneath thesurface, underneath the hood of
the car, so to speak, to get toknow the founder better and the
business better, to understandwhether we're willing to accept
the risks for the upside of therelationship, the impact and
then obviously, the returns.
After there's interest from ameeting, we will go through a
(19:36):
proprietary diligence processwith the founder.
We'll create a report.
We'll share that with ourinvestors, we'll kind of bring
them along in the process andthen we'll decide whether to
invest or not.
We'll invest directly.
We only do equity deals.
So we're not, we're not doingdebt, we're not doing anything
like that.
We're we're, we're getting onthe cap table, becoming part
owners of the business.
We think that that aligns therelationship for in the
(19:58):
incentives in the long run forsuccess.
And then after that that'sreally where the key pieces
start to come into play.
So myself, or a number of ourinvestors, will likely get in
relationship with theentrepreneurs that we've made
investments in.
We build that relationshipthrough the process.
We kind of set some of thoseexpectations throughout the
(20:19):
process that we don't want tojust write a check and walk away
.
We want to be resources andthere'll be varied ways of
engaging or depths of how weengage with founders.
Some founders we're walkingwith monthly, consistently,
getting on the phone with themall the time, like really really
in lockstep.
Others, we're just availablewhen they need us.
We want to lean more and moretowards the former, where we're
(20:40):
really deeply in relationship,the proactive kind of version.
yeah, Totally.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And now, when you say we, I know you mean you, but I
think, right, some of thefamilies or men and women who
have been in business and thenare now investing in a business
who maybe have an expertise forthat business.
They're part of the ongoingengagement, right?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yes, yeah, and again, it depends on how the
relationships form during theevaluation process and what the
entrepreneur is looking for,what the investor is looking for
.
But yes, oftentimes it's notjust me walking alongside the
entrepreneurs.
I'm getting calls from myinvestors saying, hey, I talked
to Mike yesterday, I talked toVinit yesterday.
Here's what's going on.
Here's how I'm helping.
That's amazing.
(21:18):
We love that.
That's what we really.
That's really where we want ourvalue to be is not only just me
doing it, but also ourinvestors getting alongside as
well.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yeah, just for the audience, look, we'll get.
We get to some stories, Ipromise, cause you know, you
know we've got to tell somestories, we're going to get
there.
But I really want everybody tograsp this concept because I
think this is a significant newmethod.
We always talk about we neednew methods.
We need new methods.
How are we going to do it?
People coming together infunding companies is not new,
(21:47):
but people coming togetherintentionally in relationship
and fellowship and prayer tobring the best of them and
various backgrounds and variousskill sets, and then pour that
into a founder and their companyand various skill sets, and
then pour that into a founderand their company.
The relationship that builds isjust incredible.
It's just different.
There's another layer to it,right.
(22:08):
It's a triple rated cord.
Maybe is a way to think of it,right?
Speaker 2 (22:17):
For a capital allocator or somebody who's
looking for their capital toreally have some purpose to it.
It's in the relationships wherea lot of that meaning is found,
and so we've been blessed thatnone of our portfolio companies
have gone under yet.
But you can see a scenariowhere an investor has been in a
relationship with anentrepreneur, pouring into them
aligned, praying for them and,let's say, the company goes
under.
The investor can still say, man, that was worth it because of
(22:39):
all the meaning that my dollarswent towards and all of the
relationship that was built herethey can feel good about.
And, trust me, we want to dogood deals, we want to make
strong returns.
We are not investing withoutexcellence.
No doubt we are pushing forexcellent businesses because
they're not going to have theimpact that they're going to
have unless they get sustainableand scale and grow.
(23:00):
But in the case that things gowrong, at least you can say, man
, my dollars were alignedtowards where God had obediently
called me in this relationshipwith this founder, and that's
incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
And they learned some lessons and they're probably
going to start another company,and I may be here to invest in
that one as well, or they mightjust do really well in another
space, and this is part of thesteps of their journey.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Totally.
And Gary V, who's obviously asecular investor, famously said
I bet more on the jockey thanthe horse because it might not
work this time around.
But if I trust you and Ibelieve in you, then I'm going
to bet that the second, third orfourth time it's actually going
to work out.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
So, coming back to this concept of new methods,
this concept of how do we finishthe task remaining, how do we
get the gospel where it's not?
How do we plant healthychurches in the hardest to reach
places?
Right, how do we translatescripture into languages that
don't have it yet?
Into languages that don't evenhave a written language yet?
Right, all of this work that'sgoing in is to accomplish a task
(23:54):
which we mostly know as theGreat Commission, right, which
is to get to Revelation 7, tosee this reality of a future
event happen, possibly in ourlifetimes or maybe soon
thereafter, and I think you'replaying a pivotal role.
Now I want to go to the threadof the spiritual component and
the discipleship, because ifsomeone's hearing this and
(24:15):
they're like, hey, I want to bea part of this, right, I want to
allocate some resources to somecompanies.
I realize the risk, I realizethat this may not all make a
financial return, although somemight make a very large one, but
I know that this capital, it'salmost like a gift, tithes and
gifts, right, and actually canbe a gift.
(24:37):
We talk a little bit about howyou don't have to do this with
for-profit dollars, right, youdo have some investors that are
using their private foundationor their donor advised fund.
Talk about that strategy.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
In the concept of it's all God's.
And so the question becomesokay, lord, how do you want us
to align our capital?
There are wise strategies outthere.
We want to align with them, butoftentimes God is just calling
folks to say, hey, invest in theearly stage because we know
it's risky.
But the ones that hit are notonly going to do financially
very well but they're going tohave a huge impact.
And so that's where a lot ofour investors come to the table,
(25:10):
as they say how do I do this?
Well, obviously a lot ofinvesting, especially in the
early stage, comes from personalfunds towards for-profit
companies.
That's pretty standard.
When you're thinking aboutinvestments, you put an
investing cap on and you say isthe returns worth the risk?
And you kind of walk throughthat.
But one of the vehicles thatwe've used a lot is a vehicle
from a group called the ImpactFoundation that allows donor
(25:33):
advised fund capital, charitablecapital, to be invested in for
profit businesses and then, ifreturns are created, they go
back into the donor advised fundand can either be reinvested or
given away to a nonprofit.
And so the donor advised fundfor those who aren't familiar
with it is basically a vehiclewhere you have a liquidity event
(25:56):
on December 30th and you wantto take a tax write-off and you
don't know, man, how are wegoing to give all this money
away on December 31st?
You can put it in a donoradvised fund and it's going to
stay as charitable capital.
You take the write-off in thecurrent year but then you can
give that capital out years andyears in the future.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Yeah, oftentimes it makes a lot of sense when you
talk about a liquidity event toreduce the taxable event in that
year.
So you could almost front loadyour giving for a number of
years, right, while kind ofredirecting Uncle Sam's dollars
to the causes you care mostabout?
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Totally, yeah, and I should have let you explain that
because we're giving you abackground.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
You're doing a great job.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
You're going to be able to do it better than I can,
but yeah, so the donor advisedfund just a great vehicle just
in terms of a wealth strategy,part of a wealth strategy of a
high net worth individual Shouldbe a part of everyone's,
everybody yeah, absolutely.
And so if you capital towardsfor-profit businesses, well then
now we can create a multiple Onyour giving capital, on giving
(26:56):
capital, but also we can get forsome folks this is where
talking about the Unreachedpodcast, this is where a lot of
folks are leaning is saying, hey, we're investing in a business
in a really hard to reach placesomewhere around the world
that's going to be spreading thegospel.
That's probably not going toprovide the type of return
profile that we would look forin our personal portfolio, but
if it's successful, man, is itgoing to have a huge impact, so
(27:19):
you're able to take thatcharitable capital that you'd
otherwise give away and put ittowards a mission that could
likely be sustainable, and someof these may not be huge
investments.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I think it's helpful for the audience to hear this.
I mean, if you just look at themath, with 20 families and
three and a half million, andwhat 18 companies 17 deals, 14
companies.
Yeah, yeah.
So you see that the hit rate orthe capital per is not huge.
So you're not talking aboutmulti-million dollar investments
here.
No, you're talking about 10sand 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s.
(27:48):
A lot of times, right Sure.
Sure To close the loop on thisdonor advice fund concept.
I've said this before but Iwant everybody to hear it again
Cash is the least tax-efficientgift you can make, and so if
you're in a situation right nowwhere you're doing your tithes
and your offerings and you'regiving to causes you care about
via a check or a wire or acredit card, swipe at an event,
you really need to talk tosomebody about setting things up
(28:10):
differently.
If you have an investmentportfolio or you have a company
or you have real estate orsomething with long-term capital
gains in it, it makes way morefinancial sense to use a DAF, a
donor-advised fund, to gift andnot pay taxes on those long-term
capital gains but right offthat full amount.
So that's my little plug forthe day.
(28:30):
So let's go to stories, BecauseI know there's some sensitivity
in some of the companies thatyou've invested in and we can't
say all the names and all theplaces, but there is some.
Like your portfolio is reallycool.
It's very diverse acrossdifferent sectors of the economy
, almost like a small-cap fund,and it's got, I would say,
(28:52):
global.
It's not international and it'snot all American right, so it's
kind of a small cap global fundin the angel pre-venture super
early stage phase right.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
So tell us a couple of stories yeah, that's a good
way to characterize it, and Ithink I mean just some high
level stats and then we'll getinto some stories.
Our portfolio is probably 80,85% US-based companies and
target markets in terms of whothey're selling their product to
and, as we've talked about,we're looking for strong
founders with intentional impactand market rate or above
(29:22):
returns.
We want to be excellent in thetype of deals that we're doing.
However, every once in a while,we'll see an international
opportunity where the impact isso strong and we're seeing the
value of that founder that we'llget behind that and it's not
concessionary returns.
We're investing in excellentbusinesses that we think are
going to be successful, but theyjust might not have the return
profile that we would expect,the asymmetric return profile
(29:44):
that you'd expect when you'reinvesting in an early stage
company in the US target towardsa US target market.
A couple of stories I'll picktwo one from kind of our typical
blend and one from that sort ofinternational, more impact
heavy blend, or one or two fromthe second category.
In 2021, a guy named AndrewAsher was building a company
called Lucid Drone Technologiesin Charlotte, north Carolina,
(30:05):
and Andrew's vision was how dowe take drones and put them in
dangerous and dirty jobs andautomate what humans are doing
right now?
So if you've been walking downthe street in a downtown area
and you see guys with thesqueegees up 10 stories against
a building washing the windows,andrew just felt like that was a
dangerous thing that technologyshould be able to automate.
(30:27):
He built a really high techdrone to be able to handle that
sort of workload and we investedin with him very, very early on
and then subsequently investedwith him in 2022 in his next
round and then recently, earlierthis year, invested with him
again in his Series A and keptbringing more investors into the
(30:47):
fold.
But what's most cool about thatexperience is not only the
impact that they're having, thekind of lives that they're
saving legitimately and the sortof opportunities that they're
providing to the blue collarworkforce to really automate
their work and scale theirbusinesses the process alongside
a few of our other investors,and just to watch his openness,
his growth, his ability to learnwhat God is trying to tell him
(31:21):
right now to help grow himpersonally, and watching how
that personal growth translatesto business growth almost every
time.
So just to see the longevity ofAndrew's journey over the last
three plus years has been just ajoy and, by the way, the
investment's looking pretty good, so we're excited about that.
Another story, just kind of onthe international front.
We invested in a business in athird world country.
(31:42):
They're doing a pretty cool.
They're in a commoditiesbusiness and the founder of that
business had been plantingchurches in this kind of hard to
reach area of this country fora long time, oh yeah yeah, here
we go.
Here we go.
Here we go Unreached podcast.
So he had been a pastor to themfor a decade almost and had
been able to plant among thisunreached people group and is
(32:02):
now planning a business there tohelp uplift this tribal
community out of some of theirpoverty and try to give them
jobs and opportunities.
But as he's doing that, he waspreaching recently on missions
and after the service a lot ofthese folks from his church
community came up and said, well, you were on mission, like we
want to go.
And he was like blown away,right, because we're talking
(32:27):
really impoverished people whohave never left their 10 square
mile radius of where they'vegrown up and been a you know,
been a part of this church.
And they're saying that we wantto go to the nations and so, um
, the founder exactly Jerusalem,judea, samaria, the ends of the
earth right.
The spirit is just totallyrested on these people and said
(32:48):
let's go, um, which I thinkshould be a challenge for us.
You know, sitting here in thisroom and here listening to the
podcast on, like, these arefolks that are getting called,
like, are we open to the voiceof Jesus telling us where to go
and how to get there and askingus to take risks?
I mean it should be inspiring tous.
And what's really cool is thefounder now has this business
(33:09):
where he's thinking aboutreplicating to another hard to
reach place and he can.
After the people in his churchare trained on the job, he can
now send them to that place witha job and an intent purpose so
they can go share the gospel.
So it's like it's a mechanismfor these folks to be actually
be able to go on mission.
Where they're not good, they'renot going to be able to raise
(33:31):
support from their friends andfamily.
So they're able, but they'reable to now be missionaries in a
place where they would neverhave a shot of doing that
previously.
So it's just a beautiful storyof how that business has
potential to really reach evenmore of the nations and kind of
bring other folks into the fold.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Love it, love it.
I want to talk about measuringreturns.
Okay, so to invest withexcellence, to speak to
investors, credited investors,qualified purchasers, folks that
really have the capital andexperience in the space, they
want to measure returns.
Historically, you're talkingabout market rate returns are
better.
We're thinking IRR, we'rethinking MOIC.
(34:08):
We're thinking these differentconcepts of just how is my money
doing?
When is it going to come backto me?
Can I borrow against it?
Can I have liquidity if I needit?
A lot of these concepts, butthere's a lot of folks right now
talking about how do we build amechanism for measuring the
impact?
Right, and it's happening inthe secular and the sacred space
(34:31):
right now.
What are your thoughts on thatconversation?
Sure, yeah, I mean, I thinkit's definitely in the secular
and the sacred space right now.
What are your?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
thoughts on that conversation.
Sure, yeah, I mean I think it'sdefinitely an evolving space.
I'm not sure I've found aframework that has totally
figured it out.
So, before I even answer thequestion, I'm not sure there's
like a go-to, like this is theway that we do this.
A lot of organizations aretaking stabs at it.
So Praxis is an acceleratorprogram out of New York.
They're great partners of ours.
(34:56):
We've invested in a few of theirportfolio companies and they
have these ORIs Opportunitiesfor Redemptive.
I think it's Opportunities forRedemptive Impact where they've
kind of classified the type ofimpacts that they want to see
and then are trying to measureagainst like how are we moving
against these kind oftheoretical goals?
And then are trying to measureagainst like how are we moving
against these kind oftheoretical goals?
Problem is it's hard to connectthose with actual metrics of
(35:17):
like how much have we improvedpoverty in this place?
Or how many folks have wereached with the gospel, or
whatever that metric is forimpact, whether it's spiritual,
social or environmental.
The hard part is getting from atheory of change to a KPI where
we're saying we're seeing this.
Oftentimes, when we're doingdiligence on companies, really
we look at like a few core areasand, again, we haven't
(35:39):
perfected this, but some of itis.
Yeah.
What is that theory of change?
What are the KPIs?
What are we actually measuringto show that we will have had
the impact that we're trying tohave?
Key performance indicatorsCorrect, yeah, sorry, metrics
metrics, you could call them, um, or just measuring the impact
in some way, shape or form?
Have you even started to thinkabout what those key performance
indicators are and like how youwould measure them and where
(36:02):
you would integrate those?
So those are some of thequestions we're asking asking,
but we're also asking thingslike founders.
Founder impact alignment issomething we think about a lot,
which is like what part of thefounder's story has led them to
this particular problem and whyare they passionate about it?
Because it's one thing to say Iwant to have impact.
It's another thing to bepassionate about that impact and
then really resonate with thatperson.
(36:23):
And you know they're going to goto bed thinking about it and
they're going to wake upthinking about it A hundred
percent Not that that'snecessary for having impact or
even having a successfulbusiness, but it's a good
indicator for like whether ornot the founder is really going
to engage well in that space.
You know.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
The reality is what I think you're doing.
That is beautiful is itsconnection and its fellowship
and its intentionality, and it'sgetting to know the founders
and the founders getting to knowthe investors.
And, man, I just commend you.
It's great to see someonetaking a leadership position in
this space.
Effectively, man, you're amissionary, you are working in a
(36:58):
space leading people to Christthrough redemptive investing,
and it's beautiful.
And I'm so glad that I've gotto know you.
And so the next question I have, because I think everybody's
wondering you're here in Austin.
You've been here for 10 months,10 months, 10 months.
Okay, you said you came here toreplicate to see can this be
done again?
Where are we at?
Well, you know when.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
I got here in late August of last year.
I kind of came in open-handedjust saying I have this
experience, I think I havesomething unique in DC, but I
don't want to be prescriptivefor what God is doing in Austin,
so let me just build somerelationships and kind of see
where it's going with theintention of I'd love to
replicate what we've done in DCand have that same impact here.
We've been buildingrelationships for about 10
(37:38):
months.
We have enough commitments toget a network launched here in
Austin in September Praise God,man, that's great.
So we're moving towards that.
We'll start with seven to 10investors and we'll be bringing
now 30 plus families to thetable.
When we're thinking aboutopportunities and be building a
community here in Austin, andwhat we're hearing, experiencing
, hearing from our customers,hearing in prayer is this is
(38:01):
really double down on community.
How are we providing a spacefor folks to really get equipped
and activated to go deploytheir capital for the kingdom,
whether it's early stage orbeyond?
How are we creating those sortof experiences and fellowship
among high net worth individualsand family offices that are
faith aligned so that they canreally feel equipped to go do
(38:21):
this work?
We're working on continuing tobuild the strategy.
I'm kind of an entrepreneur ofentrepreneurs, right Like I'm
investing, but I'm also buildingthis network in this community
and thinking through where Godis leading, and so just very,
very excited to be a part of thecommunity here in Austin, Very,
very excited to start investingwith folks here in town and
excited to see where God bringsthis vision in the next few
(38:43):
years and where else the visionends up going.
I think God has called me here,so I'm not sure how it
replicates across cities beyondthat, but that's part of the
equation that we're going tostart trying to think about is
like, really, where does this gooutside of Austin and DC?
Cause it?
You know there should be acommunity like this in every
major city in the world.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Well, look, I do not hesitate to share with the
listeners that we're going to bepart of this.
My family's excited to be apart of this.
My family's excited to toengage in this, learn with you
in this, share what we'relearning so that the network and
others can learn as well.
And you know, if it ends upbeing God's plan, that this is
something that should replicateto other places, like we want to
(39:21):
be there to help that in anyway we can.
So, man, just in closing, today, you know what we do here is we
always ask the guests to prayfor the listeners.
So I want to ask you to prayfor everybody.
But I just want to say again,man, I just I'm grateful for you
.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
Looking forward to these next chapters together.
And thanks for the kind wordsand I'm excited about your
partnership in particular, justthe level of influence you have,
the vision that you see, it'snot often that you meet somebody
who kind of you just kind ofget it Like.
You see, you're seeing what I'mseeing and you're seeing the
potential for where this isgoing to go, and it's just so
encouraging when you got peoplecoming alongside you that are
(39:54):
like no, no, no, I see you, Igot you, and I really appreciate
the kind words.
Speaker 1 (39:58):
Same thing you're doing for these founders, right,
same thing you're doing forthem, you know, it's the same
thing we hopefully we're doingfor all the relationships that
God brings into our life is justtaking time to sit down and
listen and say I hear you, I seeyou, I'm with you, let's go,
let's go take this, let's gotake this next step together
100%.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
I'm excited that you're going to be one of those
people for me.
Speaker 1 (40:17):
Right for us.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
That's amazing.
So, yeah, let me play for us.
Wow, jesus, thank you for theamazing ways that you're
establishing your church andthat you're allowing us.
We get the unique privilege ofparticipating in your redemptive
story for the world at largethrough our capital, through our
(40:39):
vocation, through ourrelationships.
Lord, that you're the one who'sbuilding and we just get to be
a part of that.
And who are we to be able toparticipate with the sovereign
Lord and his purposes and hisways, man, it's just such a
privilege and such a benefit ofthe gospel and benefit of
knowing you.
Lord, I thank you for all of thebusinesses here in the United
States that are blessing theiremployees, living missionally,
(41:00):
hoping to accomplish things, andall the struggles and
challenges that come with that.
Pray that you'd be with theirleaders and their employees as
they move throughout the world.
And then also, lord, especiallyfor those businesses throughout
the world that areintentionally going to hard to
reach places so that peoplemight know the real you and
might be able to experience lifeand peace and salvation.
(41:22):
Lord, we just pray that thosebusinesses would be established.
We pray for new models.
We pray for new strategies.
We pray right now, in your name, for more folks to be called to
that space.
So right now we just pray foranybody listening to the podcast
that's feeling led that youwould just that, jesus, that you
would call them to these spacesand places so we can have more
(41:44):
workers working towards bringingabout God's redemptive story.
So, lord, thank you for Dustin,thank you for the Unreached
podcast and thank you for whatyou're doing here.
We pray you'd establish yourwork and we pray all these
things in Jesus' name.
Amen and amen.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Thank you for listening to Unreached.
Our sincere desire is that whatyou've heard today will cause
you to see the mission of Goddifferently and your role in it
more clearly.
If this adds value for you andwe hope it does would you please
rate and review the podcastwherever you listen.
Also, share with your family,your friends, your church, your
life group, small group, d group, wherever you do life, and if
(42:21):
you want to connect with us,find us on Instagram at
unreachedpodcast, or email us atunreachedpodcast at gmailcom.
In Revelation 7, John shares his vision of heaven,
with members from every tribe,tongue, people and language
standing in the throne roombefore the Lamb.
Yet today there are still over7,000 unreached people groups
around the world.
For the last six years, myfamily and friends have been on
a journey to find, vet and fundthe task remaining.
(00:28):
Come journey with us to theends of the earth as we share
the supernatural stories of Godat work for the men and women he
has called to reach theunreached.
Hello friends, Welcome back tothe Unreached Podcast, Season 3.
Dustin Elliott, here, your host.
I have a friend of mine,somewhat of a new friend, who
(00:49):
has recently been called to andmoved to Austin.
This is Patrick Farrell's storytoday and the story of Angel
Capital, the story of buildingfellowship and community among
Christian families withresources and something to give
back, something mentorship,discipleship, finances, et
cetera.
How do we come together andequip them and show them a way
(01:12):
to invest in Christian-ledcompanies and then bring those
up?
And so, Patrick Farrell,welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Dustin, thanks for having me.
Man so good to be here andexcited for the conversation
today, patrick let's start witha little bit about you.
Yeah, so I grew up in theWashington DC area, northern
Virginia, left for college, wentto Vanderbilt University in
Nashville, came back to DCreally just to work in a job and
eventually started inconsulting big 20,000-person
(01:38):
consulting firm, did that for acouple years and then decided to
join the startup space.
A couple of years into my careerI had this awesome startup
experience where I just learneda ton.
I was the director of corporatedevelopment so I helped the
business.
We had a family office that wasbehind us, so we had a growth
by acquisition strategy, helpedthe business acquire a couple of
companies and then integratethose companies.
(01:59):
And then we needed the people,processes and systems to scale
the business and so I moved overto director of operations role
and eventually that startup kindof exited in 2020 to a larger
startup, a larger cybersecuritystartup called Threat Connect.
So I got to see venture frombeginning to end, which really
was formational for me.
But most importantly, I wouldsay when I walked in the
(02:19):
business, I believed in Jesusbut wasn't really walking with
him by the time I walked out ofthe business.
I had an intimate relationshipwith him and that was mainly
because I was discipled in thebusiness context.
My manager and the president ofthe company was a strong
believer, saw I had potential,we had a good working
relationship and he started tojust patiently disciple me.
(02:41):
I mean I would come in honestlyguys.
I'd come in after weekendsdoing God knows what and just
being like in my head I thinksubconsciously, like I wonder if
he's going to tell me what I'mdoing is wrong.
I wonder if he's going to likehe's going to punish me for my
behavior.
And he was always patient andGod just kind of did the work in
my heart.
And so when I walked out ofthat business, not only did I
have an exit under my belt but Ialso had just a really strong
(03:05):
walk with God, a real intimacywith God that had been formed
and shaped in that period oftime.
I also left that business witha few strong convictions.
One is that the spiritual andemotional health of the founder
is essential to the businessbeing successful.
We've seen over and over againyou can have a great plan, you
can have a great team, but ifyou're not aligned in your
spirit, if you're not alignedemotionally, then things like
(03:27):
that typically fall apartbecause ventures are incredibly
difficult.
So I recognize the role thatthe founder had to play in the
success of the business, but Ialso recognize that businesses
can be mechanisms for kingdomgrowth.
Whether internally like mystory blessing employees,
discipling employees who I waswhen I walked in the business
and who I was when I walked outof the business were like two
(03:47):
different people.
So internally, but thenexternally we were in
cybersecurity mission drivencompany really felt like we were
making a difference on theworld at large, and so, with
those convictions, I decided tosay, okay, well, what does it
look like to support early stageentrepreneurs who are going to
be bold cultural witnesses, bygetting behind them with capital
and doing so in relationship?
(04:08):
And what emerged from that wasthe angel network model, which
is let's get a bunch of high networth individuals and family
offices together in communityand let's invest together,
relationally, in early stagefounders.
And so, long story short,started Potomac Angel Capital in
January of 2022 to do just that.
To date, we've done 17 deals.
(04:28):
We've deployed almost three anda half million in capital
across 14 companies.
Our portfolio is, by God'sgrace, performing incredibly
well, having some awesomemissions.
We're walking alongside someamazing founders.
As we were building thatbusiness, we started to realize
we had a unique model that we'dI don't want to say stumbled
into, but that God had kind ofled us to.
I was down here in Austin Southby Southwest 2023, and really
(04:54):
just validating the market,thinking about replicating into
a new city from DC, and I can'texplain it other than day one in
my time with Jesus, in themorning I felt like he had
invited me to move to Austin,and so that went through a
discernment process that, dustin, you know my folks I'd gone
through layers of guys I waswalking with that were praying
and they had all beenaffirmatively, but then I was
(05:16):
like, all right, lord, we'regoing to really test this.
I'm going to ask my parents tothink if they think I should
leave DC, where they were a 10minute drive from me.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
And involved in the business and involved as
investors and mentors and partof the network, right, totally,
yeah, all of the above.
So, hey, you're the main guyand we're not only parents to
you, but we're in business withyou and it's nice to have you
here because we have access toyou doing all these things,
leadership for this company andthese ventures.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
And then, hey, what do you think about me leaving?
Exactly that was theconversation.
I mean, the absurdity ofleaving my friend's family
investors in business in DC waslike it was mounting at that
period of time.
So the final test was really myparents, which were totally
incentivized to say no, um, andthey went back and prayed about
it.
And they came back and theywere like we hate this, but yep,
you gotta go.
And so it just felt sent, and soI came down here in the fall
(06:04):
really to build a second networkof investors and really double
down on how do we buildcommunity among stewards of
wealth who are looking to aligntheir capital with their faith.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
I love it.
I love it.
So there's only about 74different strings.
I want to pull on from what youjust said, but the first
thought I had.
So, just for the listeners,we've got a very diverse group
that listens to this, fromtraditional missionaries to
pastors at churches to businesspeople, international business
folks, et cetera.
So maybe just let's talkbriefly about venture capital,
(06:37):
stages of venture capital, angelcapital, walk us through kind
of the timeline capitalstructure.
How does a company get started,right?
So I decide I have an idea, Iwant to start a company, I've
got some way to innovate ordisrupt.
And I realize, ok, I need a fewbucks, right, I need, I need
some money to build this productor hire some folks.
(06:57):
And what happens next?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Typically when a business is in the idea stage,
sometimes you can kind of buildor grow organically, meaning,
hey, we're going to go and we'regoing to start a restaurant,
start a shop, something likethat, and we're not going to
really need to raise outsidecapital.
We'll just kind of organicallygrow our business.
But in other instances,especially when you're talking
(07:19):
about innovation, whether it'stechnology or something
otherwise that has an intendedlarge impact on the world at
large or is going to grow andscale to be a large business,
they often need startup capital.
Typically in the world at largethat will come from friends and
family, but often it'll alsocome from outside investors,
(07:39):
high net worth individualscalled angel investors.
Typically those angel investorsare investing in what we would
call the pre-seed round,pre-revenue round, which is when
the business is just an ideastage, it hasn't actually built
a product and launched tocustomers or just thereafter.
So we've built the product,we've kind of started selling to
customers and we just need somegrowth capital to start hiring
(08:00):
folks to see if this can reallytake off.
So you're investing reallybefore what we would call
institutional investors arecoming to the table venture
capitalists, private equityfirms, folks with large amounts
of capital coming to the tableto really get alongside the
business.
You have to kind of get thatfrom individuals and typically
family offices before you cankind of grow and scale.
(08:22):
However, obviously, at thatstage of the business, it's
obviously the most risky stageof the business because a lot of
these startups will fail, andso what you're really doing is
partnering with theseentrepreneurs in their missions
and getting behind them andtheir vision and saying I've got
your back, I want to providecapital to your business so you
can grow and scale, but also Iwant to be a resource for you as
(08:43):
you walk this incrediblytumultuous and tough journey.
I was talking to a partner ofmine earlier this week who was
talking about tech entrepreneursearly stage tech entrepreneurs
as the athletes of venturecapital.
It's tough to perform in theearly stage and really all the
pressures that come with it, andso if we can get relationally
in relationship withentrepreneurs when they're young
(09:07):
and their businesses are young,then we can help form and shape
their culture and their intentmoving forward and hopefully get
them past that vulnerable stageso they can actually have the
impact that they desire on theworld at large.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
It takes me to this concept and we've talked about
this before, but I think peopleare walking around living in one
of two dispositions they'reliving in a disposition of
scarcity or a disposition ofabundance, right?
I mean, if we really believe Godowns it all and we really are
walking around in a spirit ofyou know, he's going to take
care of the birds, he takes careof the animals, he's going to
(09:38):
take care of us.
I think a key for helping someearly businesses succeed, some
early missions succeed andmissionaries succeed A lot of
that is, you know, hey, we'regoing to hold the rope on the
finance piece.
We're going to fund you andhere's your runway.
Because if, if you're layingawake at night worried about how
you're going to pay the billsand keep the family fed, then
(10:00):
you're not being able to getinto the creative space of what
are the next steps and things weneed to do for the company,
right?
So I feel like when you add thebiblical narrative and the
discipleship piece to that,you're only.
You're not only providing someabundance, but you're also kind
of discipling.
The theory of abundance Is thatfair, that's super fair.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
And I think early stage entrepreneurs typically
fall into a scarcity mindsetvery quickly because there's so
many pressures.
And so if you can provide thatsort of financial arm and, more
than that, that relational space, safe space for an entrepreneur
to go and just be themselvesand be honest about how they're
(10:40):
feeling and help providespiritual guidance Because,
honestly, a lot of my investorsare serial entrepreneurs who
have been there, done that,exited businesses before, and so
they know what it's like.
But they're also followingJesus and they're typically
older, they typically had a fewmore miles under their belt.
When they meet an early stageentrepreneur and they get
(11:01):
alongside them, they can kind ofprovide that spiritual
discipleship that, honestly, isway more important than even the
financial piece, and that'sreally the goal for us is like
how do we not only discipleentrepreneurs but then help
equip investors to be able to dothat piece well and align their
capital well with the kingdom?
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Next thread next string here the gospel traveling
further and faster on the wingsof business than the
traditional missionary sense.
I think it's happening today.
I think the ramp up of that isincredible right now From the
leveraging technology standpoint, from folks like Switchboard
and what they do to connectpeople with a skill set to a
(11:40):
company or a mission with a needthere's that component to a
company or a mission with a needthere's that component.
But what I love is that you'rea guest who literally lived out
coming to faith, maturing inyour faith through the workplace
, and that's fairly rare.
I don't know that.
A lot of folks have experiencedthat.
But tell us.
(12:01):
I mean, what was the rhythm ofa work week?
You kind of talked about comingin on Monday, maybe a little
hungover and a little tired, butwhat was the rhythm of?
Did y'all do a Bible study?
Did he just spend one-on-onetime with everybody, like what
was this founder doing?
Speaker 2 (12:16):
that was different, I would say maybe a few key
characteristics of how thebusiness worked.
One the business was superfamilial, so it was about
relationships, about makingpeople feel comfortable.
It was about bringing peopleinto the fold.
We had a lot of company lunchesand things like that that were
just pulling people together inrelationship.
For clarity's sake, thebusiness, the CEO of the
(12:38):
business, was actually my dad,so Paul was the CEO of the
business.
His business partner, todd, wasmy manager.
We made the smart decision forme not to work directly for my
dad but to work for Todd, whichwas strategic in a number of
ways, but also Todd hadauthority over the business
units and areas that I was goingto plug into.
(12:58):
So it made sense practicallyspeaking as well.
But ultimately, as it relatedto me and Todd, I think what it
really started as is a goodworking relationship, like I was
showing up, trying to, to workto, to do well in my work, to
execute, um, and he was.
He was a great manager, and sowe started a good working
relationship and we were purpose, we were on mission together,
without even really knowing it,within the business.
(13:20):
And so once you get that trustand that rap, once that trust is
built and that rapport is builtthen it allowed Todd to start
me and Todd to start building apersonal relationship where he
started asking me about my life.
Todd has a really crazy story,but one of the key pieces of it
is just really rooted in prayer.
What does it look like toreally communicate with God and
(13:41):
let him tell you things aboutwho you are and about how
beloved you are?
So a little bit more on thecharismatic roots, which I had
never been exposed to before,and so when we started talking
about my life, we would Toddwould offer to like pray for us
and I would have theseexperiences of God that I
(14:01):
couldn't really explain and Icouldn't really.
I didn't know how to rationallythink through.
And so God started meeting mein that space through Todd, and
then Todd, as I mentioned, wasincredibly patient with me.
So even when I was kind of evenhaving these experiences and
starting to slightly change mylife, everything was everything.
Not everything was superaligned, and so there was
(14:23):
moments in time where I wouldkind of backslip or come in and
be like, yeah, I wonder, is thisthe moment where God's going to
be like no, like you, you suck,you got to get your act
together, right and, and Godnever did that and Todd never
did that.
And so, as God worked on myheart, I was able to start
trusting God that I could makedecisions that aligned with his
(14:44):
will.
And then Todd, to this day,would say that he would pray
like, all right, lord is todaythe day that I need to tell
Patrick to stop doing that.
And God would be like,absolutely not, I'm gonna do it
myself.
And so his patience inrelationship personally, god did
the work in my heart, um, andso that was.
(15:10):
And so really our tag ups, Iwould say to answer your
original question they startedwith like an hour of like, all
work and by the end of our timethere, it was like 10 minutes of
work and 50 minutes of life inrelationship, um, which, um, we
were still getting work done andwe were still being excellent
in our work.
I'm not trying to suggest thatwe were taking company time to
only do discipleship, but by theend he was forming me as a
(15:30):
person and then I was able to goout and execute in the business
.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Well, man, it's a beautiful thing to just model
how to act for somebody and prayfor them and ask God do you
want me to engage in this manneror not?
And listen, god gave you someexperience.
He gave you some real lifestuff that lets you see things
in a founder, in a leader and ina company that you can tell
(15:54):
your investors or your potentialinvestors about.
So let's pivot to the network.
Those groups, y'all cometogether monthly, monthly
meetings, yep, okay, and at amonthly meeting, tell us what a
monthly meeting looks like.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah, so the monthly meetings have actually been part
of our I wouldn't say secretsauce, but part of the thing
that makes it so valuable isconsistent in-person
relationships between high networth individuals and stewards
of wealth.
As you all know, it can be verylonely Now no one's crying for
somebody who's been blessed withwealth but typically they comes
(16:27):
with a whole bunch ofchallenges that no one really
sees behind the scenes and it'svery hard to have a shared
relationships where you feelopen and able to share about
some of the struggles thatyou're having with your capital.
And so that consistent monthlymeeting just allows
relationships to form amongpeople who typically don't have
spaces like that in their lives.
So that's been a key piece themonthly meetings.
(16:48):
The way we structure it is we'lldo about an hour of dinner
networking, letting people justkind of free flow, organically
create relationships.
We'll take about 30 minutes andI'll give updates on the state
of our portfolio, what's goingon with entrepreneurs, and then
we'll take about 30 minutes andI'll give updates on the state
of our portfolio, um, the what'sgoing on with entrepreneurs, um
, and then we'll also share atestimony or story.
So most of the time we'll havea member get up and just talk
(17:10):
about, like, here's my been, mywalk with Jesus, here's what
I've learned about faith-driveninvesting, um, all across the
spectrum of folks who are brandnew to folks who have been
investing for years now and whatit means to them and how it
plays out.
So we either do that or we'llbring in like an external
speaker to talk about aparticular subject or just kind
of educate the group.
So we'll do a little bit offellowship, a little bit of
(17:32):
admin, a little bit of testimony, and then the back half of the
meeting we'll have three pitches, so three entrepreneurs will
come virtually or in person.
We, we go, we try to it reallydoes.
So it does feel a little bitlike Shark Tank in the way that
we're moving through it 10minutes of pitch, 10 minutes of
Q&A, then the entrepreneursleave and it's 10 minutes of
investor discussion, we're on tothe next one.
I mean, it's fast and whatwe're really trying to do is get
(17:55):
investors to see if they'reinterested in the opportunities
opportunities before we spend alot of this founder's time.
So on one hand, it is a sharktank.
On the other hand, what we'vetried to build a culture of is
we're not going to tear anyonedown.
We're going to bless all theentrepreneurs we're going to
give, but we're going to givestrong and transparent feedback
at the same time.
It doesn't help an entrepreneurif they're up there, um, uh,
(18:15):
being vulnerable beingvulnerable pouring themselves
out and you're just tearing themdown.
But it also doesn't help them ifyou're just not telling them
why you're not interested.
So we try to strike thatbalance really well.
But it is in some ways aChristian shark tank just behind
closed doors with a closedcommunity of folks who can
actually put capital to work andcome along to these
entrepreneurs.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
So let's keep going here.
So we've heard, we've prayed,we've had fellowship, we're
building community, we'regaining trust among the families
that are involved.
And a pitch comes and there'sinterest.
There's interest.
Do all 20 families invest inevery company, or can six or
eight families pick one thatthey really like?
And what happens after?
Speaker 2 (18:54):
that Our investors make individual decisions on
which companies to invest in andwhich not to, and how much they
want to invest.
So think of me as more of agrand facilitator.
I'm finding the opportunities,I'm hosting the meetings, and
then we have a proprietarydiligence process that is highly
professional, that we help ourinvestors evaluate opportunities
, risks, risk and opportunitieswithin deals so they can
(19:14):
understand whether they want toinvest or not.
Because typically after aconversation or two you really
got to get underneath thesurface, underneath the hood of
the car, so to speak, to get toknow the founder better and the
business better, to understandwhether we're willing to accept
the risks for the upside of therelationship, the impact and
then obviously, the returns.
After there's interest from ameeting, we will go through a
(19:36):
proprietary diligence processwith the founder.
We'll create a report.
We'll share that with ourinvestors, we'll kind of bring
them along in the process andthen we'll decide whether to
invest or not.
We'll invest directly.
We only do equity deals.
So we're not, we're not doingdebt, we're not doing anything
like that.
We're we're, we're getting onthe cap table, becoming part
owners of the business.
We think that that aligns therelationship for in the
(19:58):
incentives in the long run forsuccess.
And then after that that'sreally where the key pieces
start to come into play.
So myself, or a number of ourinvestors, will likely get in
relationship with theentrepreneurs that we've made
investments in.
We build that relationshipthrough the process.
We kind of set some of thoseexpectations throughout the
(20:19):
process that we don't want tojust write a check and walk away
.
We want to be resources andthere'll be varied ways of
engaging or depths of how weengage with founders.
Some founders we're walkingwith monthly, consistently,
getting on the phone with themall the time, like really really
in lockstep.
Others, we're just availablewhen they need us.
We want to lean more and moretowards the former, where we're
(20:40):
really deeply in relationship,the proactive kind of version.
yeah, Totally.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And now, when you say we, I know you mean you, but I
think, right, some of thefamilies or men and women who
have been in business and thenare now investing in a business
who maybe have an expertise forthat business.
They're part of the ongoingengagement, right?
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yes, yeah, and again, it depends on how the
relationships form during theevaluation process and what the
entrepreneur is looking for,what the investor is looking for
.
But yes, oftentimes it's notjust me walking alongside the
entrepreneurs.
I'm getting calls from myinvestors saying, hey, I talked
to Mike yesterday, I talked toVinit yesterday.
Here's what's going on.
Here's how I'm helping.
That's amazing.
(21:18):
We love that.
That's what we really.
That's really where we want ourvalue to be is not only just me
doing it, but also ourinvestors getting alongside as
well.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Yeah, just for the audience, look, we'll get.
We get to some stories, Ipromise, cause you know, you
know we've got to tell somestories, we're going to get
there.
But I really want everybody tograsp this concept because I
think this is a significant newmethod.
We always talk about we neednew methods.
We need new methods.
How are we going to do it?
People coming together infunding companies is not new,
(21:47):
but people coming togetherintentionally in relationship
and fellowship and prayer tobring the best of them and
various backgrounds and variousskill sets, and then pour that
into a founder and their companyand various skill sets, and
then pour that into a founderand their company.
The relationship that builds isjust incredible.
It's just different.
There's another layer to it,right.
(22:08):
It's a triple rated cord.
Maybe is a way to think of it,right?
Speaker 2 (22:17):
For a capital allocator or somebody who's
looking for their capital toreally have some purpose to it.
It's in the relationships wherea lot of that meaning is found,
and so we've been blessed thatnone of our portfolio companies
have gone under yet.
But you can see a scenariowhere an investor has been in a
relationship with anentrepreneur, pouring into them
aligned, praying for them and,let's say, the company goes
under.
The investor can still say, man, that was worth it because of
(22:39):
all the meaning that my dollarswent towards and all of the
relationship that was built herethey can feel good about.
And, trust me, we want to dogood deals, we want to make
strong returns.
We are not investing withoutexcellence.
No doubt we are pushing forexcellent businesses because
they're not going to have theimpact that they're going to
have unless they get sustainableand scale and grow.
(23:00):
But in the case that things gowrong, at least you can say, man
, my dollars were alignedtowards where God had obediently
called me in this relationshipwith this founder, and that's
incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
And they learned some lessons and they're probably
going to start another company,and I may be here to invest in
that one as well, or they mightjust do really well in another
space, and this is part of thesteps of their journey.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
Totally.
And Gary V, who's obviously asecular investor, famously said
I bet more on the jockey thanthe horse because it might not
work this time around.
But if I trust you and Ibelieve in you, then I'm going
to bet that the second, third orfourth time it's actually going
to work out.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
So, coming back to this concept of new methods,
this concept of how do we finishthe task remaining, how do we
get the gospel where it's not?
How do we plant healthychurches in the hardest to reach
places?
Right, how do we translatescripture into languages that
don't have it yet?
Into languages that don't evenhave a written language yet?
Right, all of this work that'sgoing in is to accomplish a task
(23:54):
which we mostly know as theGreat Commission, right, which
is to get to Revelation 7, tosee this reality of a future
event happen, possibly in ourlifetimes or maybe soon
thereafter, and I think you'replaying a pivotal role.
Now I want to go to the threadof the spiritual component and
the discipleship, because ifsomeone's hearing this and
(24:15):
they're like, hey, I want to bea part of this, right, I want to
allocate some resources to somecompanies.
I realize the risk, I realizethat this may not all make a
financial return, although somemight make a very large one, but
I know that this capital, it'salmost like a gift, tithes and
gifts, right, and actually canbe a gift.
(24:37):
We talk a little bit about howyou don't have to do this with
for-profit dollars, right, youdo have some investors that are
using their private foundationor their donor advised fund.
Talk about that strategy.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
In the concept of it's all God's.
And so the question becomesokay, lord, how do you want us
to align our capital?
There are wise strategies outthere.
We want to align with them, butoftentimes God is just calling
folks to say, hey, invest in theearly stage because we know
it's risky.
But the ones that hit are notonly going to do financially
very well but they're going tohave a huge impact.
And so that's where a lot ofour investors come to the table,
(25:10):
as they say how do I do this?
Well, obviously a lot ofinvesting, especially in the
early stage, comes from personalfunds towards for-profit
companies.
That's pretty standard.
When you're thinking aboutinvestments, you put an
investing cap on and you say isthe returns worth the risk?
And you kind of walk throughthat.
But one of the vehicles thatwe've used a lot is a vehicle
from a group called the ImpactFoundation that allows donor
(25:33):
advised fund capital, charitablecapital, to be invested in for
profit businesses and then, ifreturns are created, they go
back into the donor advised fundand can either be reinvested or
given away to a nonprofit.
And so the donor advised fundfor those who aren't familiar
with it is basically a vehiclewhere you have a liquidity event
(25:56):
on December 30th and you wantto take a tax write-off and you
don't know, man, how are wegoing to give all this money
away on December 31st?
You can put it in a donoradvised fund and it's going to
stay as charitable capital.
You take the write-off in thecurrent year but then you can
give that capital out years andyears in the future.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Yeah, oftentimes it makes a lot of sense when you
talk about a liquidity event toreduce the taxable event in that
year.
So you could almost front loadyour giving for a number of
years, right, while kind ofredirecting Uncle Sam's dollars
to the causes you care mostabout?
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Totally, yeah, and I should have let you explain that
because we're giving you abackground.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
You're doing a great job.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
You're going to be able to do it better than I can,
but yeah, so the donor advisedfund just a great vehicle just
in terms of a wealth strategy,part of a wealth strategy of a
high net worth individual Shouldbe a part of everyone's,
everybody yeah, absolutely.
And so if you capital towardsfor-profit businesses, well then
now we can create a multiple Onyour giving capital, on giving
(26:56):
capital, but also we can get forsome folks this is where
talking about the Unreachedpodcast, this is where a lot of
folks are leaning is saying, hey, we're investing in a business
in a really hard to reach placesomewhere around the world
that's going to be spreading thegospel.
That's probably not going toprovide the type of return
profile that we would look forin our personal portfolio, but
if it's successful, man, is itgoing to have a huge impact, so
(27:19):
you're able to take thatcharitable capital that you'd
otherwise give away and put ittowards a mission that could
likely be sustainable, and someof these may not be huge
investments.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
I think it's helpful for the audience to hear this.
I mean, if you just look at themath, with 20 families and
three and a half million, andwhat 18 companies 17 deals, 14
companies.
Yeah, yeah.
So you see that the hit rate orthe capital per is not huge.
So you're not talking aboutmulti-million dollar investments
here.
No, you're talking about 10sand 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s.
(27:48):
A lot of times, right Sure.
Sure To close the loop on thisdonor advice fund concept.
I've said this before but Iwant everybody to hear it again
Cash is the least tax-efficientgift you can make, and so if
you're in a situation right nowwhere you're doing your tithes
and your offerings and you'regiving to causes you care about
via a check or a wire or acredit card, swipe at an event,
you really need to talk tosomebody about setting things up
(28:10):
differently.
If you have an investmentportfolio or you have a company
or you have real estate orsomething with long-term capital
gains in it, it makes way morefinancial sense to use a DAF, a
donor-advised fund, to gift andnot pay taxes on those long-term
capital gains but right offthat full amount.
So that's my little plug forthe day.
(28:30):
So let's go to stories, BecauseI know there's some sensitivity
in some of the companies thatyou've invested in and we can't
say all the names and all theplaces, but there is some.
Like your portfolio is reallycool.
It's very diverse acrossdifferent sectors of the economy
, almost like a small-cap fund,and it's got, I would say,
(28:52):
global.
It's not international and it'snot all American right, so it's
kind of a small cap global fundin the angel pre-venture super
early stage phase right.
Speaker 2 (29:02):
So tell us a couple of stories yeah, that's a good
way to characterize it, and Ithink I mean just some high
level stats and then we'll getinto some stories.
Our portfolio is probably 80,85% US-based companies and
target markets in terms of whothey're selling their product to
and, as we've talked about,we're looking for strong
founders with intentional impactand market rate or above
(29:22):
returns.
We want to be excellent in thetype of deals that we're doing.
However, every once in a while,we'll see an international
opportunity where the impact isso strong and we're seeing the
value of that founder that we'llget behind that and it's not
concessionary returns.
We're investing in excellentbusinesses that we think are
going to be successful, but theyjust might not have the return
profile that we would expect,the asymmetric return profile
(29:44):
that you'd expect when you'reinvesting in an early stage
company in the US target towardsa US target market.
A couple of stories I'll picktwo one from kind of our typical
blend and one from that sort ofinternational, more impact
heavy blend, or one or two fromthe second category.
In 2021, a guy named AndrewAsher was building a company
called Lucid Drone Technologiesin Charlotte, north Carolina,
(30:05):
and Andrew's vision was how dowe take drones and put them in
dangerous and dirty jobs andautomate what humans are doing
right now?
So if you've been walking downthe street in a downtown area
and you see guys with thesqueegees up 10 stories against
a building washing the windows,andrew just felt like that was a
dangerous thing that technologyshould be able to automate.
(30:27):
He built a really high techdrone to be able to handle that
sort of workload and we investedin with him very, very early on
and then subsequently investedwith him in 2022 in his next
round and then recently, earlierthis year, invested with him
again in his Series A and keptbringing more investors into the
(30:47):
fold.
But what's most cool about thatexperience is not only the
impact that they're having, thekind of lives that they're
saving legitimately and the sortof opportunities that they're
providing to the blue collarworkforce to really automate
their work and scale theirbusinesses the process alongside
a few of our other investors,and just to watch his openness,
his growth, his ability to learnwhat God is trying to tell him
(31:21):
right now to help grow himpersonally, and watching how
that personal growth translatesto business growth almost every
time.
So just to see the longevity ofAndrew's journey over the last
three plus years has been just ajoy and, by the way, the
investment's looking pretty good, so we're excited about that.
Another story, just kind of onthe international front.
We invested in a business in athird world country.
(31:42):
They're doing a pretty cool.
They're in a commoditiesbusiness and the founder of that
business had been plantingchurches in this kind of hard to
reach area of this country fora long time, oh yeah yeah, here
we go.
Here we go.
Here we go Unreached podcast.
So he had been a pastor to themfor a decade almost and had
been able to plant among thisunreached people group and is
(32:02):
now planning a business there tohelp uplift this tribal
community out of some of theirpoverty and try to give them
jobs and opportunities.
But as he's doing that, he waspreaching recently on missions
and after the service a lot ofthese folks from his church
community came up and said, well, you were on mission, like we
want to go.
And he was like blown away,right, because we're talking
(32:27):
really impoverished people whohave never left their 10 square
mile radius of where they'vegrown up and been a you know,
been a part of this church.
And they're saying that we wantto go to the nations and so, um
, the founder exactly Jerusalem,judea, samaria, the ends of the
earth right.
The spirit is just totallyrested on these people and said
(32:48):
let's go, um, which I thinkshould be a challenge for us.
You know, sitting here in thisroom and here listening to the
podcast on, like, these arefolks that are getting called,
like, are we open to the voiceof Jesus telling us where to go
and how to get there and askingus to take risks?
I mean it should be inspiring tous.
And what's really cool is thefounder now has this business
(33:09):
where he's thinking aboutreplicating to another hard to
reach place and he can.
After the people in his churchare trained on the job, he can
now send them to that place witha job and an intent purpose so
they can go share the gospel.
So it's like it's a mechanismfor these folks to be actually
be able to go on mission.
Where they're not good, they'renot going to be able to raise
(33:31):
support from their friends andfamily.
So they're able, but they'reable to now be missionaries in a
place where they would neverhave a shot of doing that
previously.
So it's just a beautiful storyof how that business has
potential to really reach evenmore of the nations and kind of
bring other folks into the fold.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Love it, love it.
I want to talk about measuringreturns.
Okay, so to invest withexcellence, to speak to
investors, credited investors,qualified purchasers, folks that
really have the capital andexperience in the space, they
want to measure returns.
Historically, you're talkingabout market rate returns are
better.
We're thinking IRR, we'rethinking MOIC.
(34:08):
We're thinking these differentconcepts of just how is my money
doing?
When is it going to come backto me?
Can I borrow against it?
Can I have liquidity if I needit?
A lot of these concepts, butthere's a lot of folks right now
talking about how do we build amechanism for measuring the
impact?
Right, and it's happening inthe secular and the sacred space
(34:31):
right now.
What are your thoughts on thatconversation?
Sure, yeah, I mean, I thinkit's definitely in the secular
and the sacred space right now.
What are your?
Speaker 2 (34:34):
thoughts on that conversation.
Sure, yeah, I mean I think it'sdefinitely an evolving space.
I'm not sure I've found aframework that has totally
figured it out.
So, before I even answer thequestion, I'm not sure there's
like a go-to, like this is theway that we do this.
A lot of organizations aretaking stabs at it.
So Praxis is an acceleratorprogram out of New York.
They're great partners of ours.
(34:56):
We've invested in a few of theirportfolio companies and they
have these ORIs Opportunitiesfor Redemptive.
I think it's Opportunities forRedemptive Impact where they've
kind of classified the type ofimpacts that they want to see
and then are trying to measureagainst like how are we moving
against these kind oftheoretical goals?
And then are trying to measureagainst like how are we moving
against these kind oftheoretical goals?
Problem is it's hard to connectthose with actual metrics of
(35:17):
like how much have we improvedpoverty in this place?
Or how many folks have wereached with the gospel, or
whatever that metric is forimpact, whether it's spiritual,
social or environmental.
The hard part is getting from atheory of change to a KPI where
we're saying we're seeing this.
Oftentimes, when we're doingdiligence on companies, really
we look at like a few core areasand, again, we haven't
(35:39):
perfected this, but some of itis.
Yeah.
What is that theory of change?
What are the KPIs?
What are we actually measuringto show that we will have had
the impact that we're trying tohave?
Key performance indicatorsCorrect, yeah, sorry, metrics
metrics, you could call them, um, or just measuring the impact
in some way, shape or form?
Have you even started to thinkabout what those key performance
indicators are and like how youwould measure them and where
(36:02):
you would integrate those?
So those are some of thequestions we're asking asking,
but we're also asking thingslike founders.
Founder impact alignment issomething we think about a lot,
which is like what part of thefounder's story has led them to
this particular problem and whyare they passionate about it?
Because it's one thing to say Iwant to have impact.
It's another thing to bepassionate about that impact and
then really resonate with thatperson.
(36:23):
And you know they're going to goto bed thinking about it and
they're going to wake upthinking about it A hundred
percent Not that that'snecessary for having impact or
even having a successfulbusiness, but it's a good
indicator for like whether ornot the founder is really going
to engage well in that space.
You know.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
The reality is what I think you're doing.
That is beautiful is itsconnection and its fellowship
and its intentionality, and it'sgetting to know the founders
and the founders getting to knowthe investors.
And, man, I just commend you.
It's great to see someonetaking a leadership position in
this space.
Effectively, man, you're amissionary, you are working in a
(36:58):
space leading people to Christthrough redemptive investing,
and it's beautiful.
And I'm so glad that I've gotto know you.
And so the next question I have, because I think everybody's
wondering you're here in Austin.
You've been here for 10 months,10 months, 10 months.
Okay, you said you came here toreplicate to see can this be
done again?
Where are we at?
Well, you know when.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
I got here in late August of last year.
I kind of came in open-handedjust saying I have this
experience, I think I havesomething unique in DC, but I
don't want to be prescriptivefor what God is doing in Austin,
so let me just build somerelationships and kind of see
where it's going with theintention of I'd love to
replicate what we've done in DCand have that same impact here.
We've been buildingrelationships for about 10
(37:38):
months.
We have enough commitments toget a network launched here in
Austin in September Praise God,man, that's great.
So we're moving towards that.
We'll start with seven to 10investors and we'll be bringing
now 30 plus families to thetable.
When we're thinking aboutopportunities and be building a
community here in Austin, andwhat we're hearing, experiencing
, hearing from our customers,hearing in prayer is this is
(38:01):
really double down on community.
How are we providing a spacefor folks to really get equipped
and activated to go deploytheir capital for the kingdom,
whether it's early stage orbeyond?
How are we creating those sortof experiences and fellowship
among high net worth individualsand family offices that are
faith aligned so that they canreally feel equipped to go do
(38:21):
this work?
We're working on continuing tobuild the strategy.
I'm kind of an entrepreneur ofentrepreneurs, right Like I'm
investing, but I'm also buildingthis network in this community
and thinking through where Godis leading, and so just very,
very excited to be a part of thecommunity here in Austin, Very,
very excited to start investingwith folks here in town and
excited to see where God bringsthis vision in the next few
(38:43):
years and where else the visionends up going.
I think God has called me here,so I'm not sure how it
replicates across cities beyondthat, but that's part of the
equation that we're going tostart trying to think about is
like, really, where does this gooutside of Austin and DC?
Cause it?
You know there should be acommunity like this in every
major city in the world.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Well, look, I do not hesitate to share with the
listeners that we're going to bepart of this.
My family's excited to be apart of this.
My family's excited to toengage in this, learn with you
in this, share what we'relearning so that the network and
others can learn as well.
And you know, if it ends upbeing God's plan, that this is
something that should replicateto other places, like we want to
(39:21):
be there to help that in anyway we can.
So, man, just in closing, today, you know what we do here is we
always ask the guests to prayfor the listeners.
So I want to ask you to prayfor everybody.
But I just want to say again,man, I just I'm grateful for you
.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
Looking forward to these next chapters together.
And thanks for the kind wordsand I'm excited about your
partnership in particular, justthe level of influence you have,
the vision that you see, it'snot often that you meet somebody
who kind of you just kind ofget it Like.
You see, you're seeing what I'mseeing and you're seeing the
potential for where this isgoing to go, and it's just so
encouraging when you got peoplecoming alongside you that are
(39:54):
like no, no, no, I see you, Igot you, and I really appreciate
the kind words.
Speaker 1 (39:58):
Same thing you're doing for these founders, right,
same thing you're doing forthem, you know, it's the same
thing we hopefully we're doingfor all the relationships that
God brings into our life is justtaking time to sit down and
listen and say I hear you, I seeyou, I'm with you, let's go,
let's go take this, let's gotake this next step together
100%.
Speaker 2 (40:14):
I'm excited that you're going to be one of those
people for me.
Speaker 1 (40:17):
Right for us.
Speaker 2 (40:17):
That's amazing.
So, yeah, let me play for us.
Wow, jesus, thank you for theamazing ways that you're
establishing your church andthat you're allowing us.
We get the unique privilege ofparticipating in your redemptive
story for the world at largethrough our capital, through our
(40:39):
vocation, through ourrelationships.
Lord, that you're the one who'sbuilding and we just get to be
a part of that.
And who are we to be able toparticipate with the sovereign
Lord and his purposes and hisways, man, it's just such a
privilege and such a benefit ofthe gospel and benefit of
knowing you.
Lord, I thank you for all of thebusinesses here in the United
States that are blessing theiremployees, living missionally,
(41:00):
hoping to accomplish things, andall the struggles and
challenges that come with that.
Pray that you'd be with theirleaders and their employees as
they move throughout the world.
And then also, lord, especiallyfor those businesses throughout
the world that areintentionally going to hard to
reach places so that peoplemight know the real you and
might be able to experience lifeand peace and salvation.
(41:22):
Lord, we just pray that thosebusinesses would be established.
We pray for new models.
We pray for new strategies.
We pray right now, in your name, for more folks to be called to
that space.
So right now we just pray foranybody listening to the podcast
that's feeling led that youwould just that, jesus, that you
would call them to these spacesand places so we can have more
(41:44):
workers working towards bringingabout God's redemptive story.
So, lord, thank you for Dustin,thank you for the Unreached
podcast and thank you for whatyou're doing here.
We pray you'd establish yourwork and we pray all these
things in Jesus' name.
Amen and amen.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Thank you for listening to Unreached.
Our sincere desire is that whatyou've heard today will cause
you to see the mission of Goddifferently and your role in it
more clearly.
If this adds value for you andwe hope it does would you please
rate and review the podcastwherever you listen.
Also, share with your family,your friends, your church, your
life group, small group, d group, wherever you do life, and if
(42:21):
you want to connect with us,find us on Instagram at
unreachedpodcast, or email us atunreachedpodcast at gmailcom.
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