Investor Stories 423. From Checklists to Leadership: Lessons from iFLY, DFJ Growth & Pismo Leaders (Shen, Schuler, Binatti)

This episode of TFR is brought to you by Ramp, the spend management platform we use here at TFR. They're offering listeners a $150 just to take a demo. We've never had an offer quite like this. Claim your $150 before this offer is gone at our partner link, ramp.com/partner/tfr. And this episode of TFR is brought to you by the American Arbitration Association, where smart startups and investors turn to for fast, efficient, and cost effective dispute resolution. Visit adr.org/tfr to learn more. Welcome to the podcast about venture capital, where investors and founders alike can learn how VCs make decisions and reach conviction. Your host is Nick Moran, and this is the full ratchet. Welcome back to TFR. On today's special segment, we ask guests to tell the most important lesson that they've learned in their career. Here's the segment called lessons learned. On today's special segment, we have Han Shen of iFLY. Han, can you tell us a story highlighting a critical lesson that has changed the way you invest? A lot of lessons for sure. But I will say, how about this? A fun lesson. So some people ask me, why did you name the fund I Fly? Do you fly? The answer is actually, no, I used to fly airplanes when I was in the Bay Area. I still have a valid FAA issued pilot, private pilot license. By aviation standard, I'm really rookie, right? So I'm not bragging about that. But then next question people ask is, Oh gosh, you know, you like flying, you're a venture capital investor, oh I see, you must love risk. I said, Actually no, not really. It's not that I love risk. I'm probably just more into how to assess and mitigate risk. And the commonality between flying and venture investing is understanding what are you getting into. What I mean by that is, you know, before I took off at the San Carlos Airport in the Bay Area back then, there's a long checklist starting from the day before. Weather forecast, airport situation, is there a temporary flight restriction when the president is in town? A lot of these details. Isn't that the same as we do due diligence checklists when we talk to founders, right? If there is a major ref, like for example, GFR or temporary flight restriction, president of Thailand, don't fly. If you ever take off, there will be some serious consequence, right? And the same thing, when you talk to a founder, you raise a reflag and it just stops right there. And more than three, four times, I was so close to push the throttle, start rolling for takeoff. And I saw something I couldn't understand on the instrument panel, right? And I pulled back and I told the tower of countries that said, you know, I don't want to fly anymore. I'm going to taxi back to my parking spot. And the choice of not investing, the choice of not …