Creating a Meaningful Life | Wally Hawley

 

About Wally Hawley

Wally Hawley is a co-founder of InterWest Partners (1979), one of the larger venture capital partnerships in the United States, formed to make equity investments in diversified U.S. growth companies. His prior experience includes seven years as President of SHV North America Holding Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of a Netherlands corporation, and seven years with McKinsey and Co. His current affiliations include Chairman Emeritus of the Advisory Board to the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research; guest lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business; former Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Young Life; Board Member of Stanford Alumni Association; Advisory Board Member of Rosewood Venture Capital; and Director of several educational companies including several online companies.

 

Interview Transcript:

Alan
Welcome back. I’m here today with Wally Hawley. Wally, welcome to the show.

Wally
Thank you. Glad to be here.

Alan
So while we’ve enjoyed a friendship for several years, but I like for the listeners, your early your early career was in one of the first venture capitalists here in the Valley. And you know, I could you spend a few few minutes going through your background of your lifetime line.

Wally
Yeah. When you got to talk about education at my age, I don’t know why. But I went to Stanford and Harvard Business School, joined McKinsey, worked with them and went over to Holland for four years to help build their operations there. And while there, I met a very wealthy Dutch family working for them as a consultant. And when I came back here, they hired me to be their US president at the ripe old age of 32. I worked with them and we started a venture firm for them, in addition to making acquisitions, and that’s how I really got involved in venture capital, was running a fund for them. And then in about 1979, or it was a little bit later, I realized that venture capital was going to really take off, I had no idea how much but I knew it was going to take off. So I said to my partner who was working with me, we should form our own fund, which we did. So we formed a fund. And at that time, there were very few funds, it was a club, we built it, and it was Interwest partners, still exists today going strong. After many years, I decided that I didn’t want to manage anything or be involved in running other people’s money. So I stepped out and began investing as an angel investor on my own. And parallel to that, as you know, I worked on charitable things, because I had an interest in wanting to help others, and not just helping myself. And so that’s kind of where we are today. I’m on nine boards, about half of nonprofit half for profit.

Alan
I like to spend a few few minutes here in that shift of what inspired you to shift out of that venture capitalist more into a call it the philanthropic philanthropic role.

Wally
Well, it was a couple of things. First of all, I began to think about, it really shouldn’t be about others, it shouldn’t be about me. And when it becomes being about others, well, you just don’t do it to make more money for yourself or whatever. But a parallel to that I read Bob Buford ‘s halftime book. And I read that and Bob had shifted from a businessman situation into a strong Christian organization. And I had become a Christian, I got to know Bob went on his board. And that book helped me to say, wait a minute, I think I need to make a transition in my life. So I began to do more in the nonprofit and charitable stuff, and ultimately, then just stepped out of my firm. And so I do a mix now.

Alan
So when, when you spend your time on the mix, I guess what, what’s your biggest driver satisfaction out of?

Wally
Well, there’s a common denominator in all of them. And that is that each one that I’m involved in, is run and managed by an outstanding person. So I have no problem, children, no difficulties. And really, you’re just They’re applauding these other people. And if you look at the things I’m doing, it’s not about me. It’s not about my name. It’s about the people. I’m helping and showing the success of what they’ve been able to do. And if I’ve enlarge that success by helping them, it makes me feel great.

Alan
You know, while as I listened to you reminds me of the interview I had with Ken Blanchard, and the author of The One Minute Manager, some I know cam. Okay, so So one of the things that he talks about as he’s gone through life, when he has a business card, he hands out, Chief Leader, servant. Yeah. And when you with organizations, you obviously could take a lot of the accolades from your academic background, I’m a Harvard MBA work with Stanford bubble. But what you’ve learned seems to be it’s not about who I am. That the role I play with others is that.

Wally
Very much other people, in fact, in my office now, and I’m having a lot of meetings, oftentimes, Alan, it’s with an individual who isn’t part of any of these particular organizations, but I’m just helping him with his or her life direction, and mentoring. And so a lot of that isn’t even part of an official board of directors or anything. And I just get great satisfaction of watching somebody succeed. They do extremely well. And you know what it’s about. It’s about others. And that’s when I became a Christian I changed from being about me.

Alan
I’m here today with Wally Hawley, he is successful venture capital early career then turned over to philanthropist midway through life. And while I need to take a quick break, and we’ll be right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back and visit me here today with Wally Hawley. And we’ve been talking about your timeline early venture capitalists here in Silicon Valley and midpoint your life. You jumped over to work with philanthropy, and serving on others and still active on some boards. But what what are you working on now? What are some of the projects in front of you?

Wally
Well, they come from a common denominator that goes back to I was a very close friend with Walt Gerber, who was a major pastor at Menlo church. And I said to Walt, I think I want to be doing something different. And I said, I hope God will open a door for me. And Walt said he won’t. And I thought, oh, and he said, your portfolio guy, he’ll open a bunch of doors. So it proceeded from there. Now what are the doors that are open right now, I’m involved in two major projects for Fuller Seminary, I’m on their family Youth Institute board. And the first project is called Sticky faith. And sticky faith involves kids who have been injured youth groups, and go off to college. And as you and I both know, many times the faith just as lost or disappeared. So the whole objective there is to make the faith sticky when they go to college. So they start groups on college, where they’ve got a whole series of universities where they’re having a sticky faith club. And in fact, the woman who runs it is just outstanding, a good example of what we talked about before. And, for example, recently, she just spoke to 13,000 people in Germany on sticky face. So this thing is just taking off like crazy. And I’m really enjoying that. And she’s doing a thing on a book, what’s going on on that. And it’s just, it’s very gratifying, very helpful. And then I’ve also working with another project on that same thing called growing young. And growing young is involved with the situation where church demographics, if you look at them, in general, are getting older and older. So the whole idea is how do you get younger members to be in the church and active to the church. So they are now coming out with a project and a book on growing young or what you should do as a church to try and capture more young people. So that’s the second fuller group that I’m working on. And very, then I’m working with a fellow named Reggie McNeal, who’s written a lot of books, strong Christian, very well known. And he is working on city projects where we will go into a city. And while it’s Christian based, nevertheless, we’re trying to find out what the city’s want and need, and they determine it. Oftentimes, it’s literacy. And then we help them work with that particular project to build it in their city. And Reggie has just done a great deal of work. He’s very successful. And I have to laugh, because in one of his latest books, he dedicated to me. And his whole idea was, here’s a guy who is mission oriented. So that’s another one. I’m working on young life. I was on the board and was Chairman of the Board of young life. I’m not on that. But I’m on a sub board that I helped create, which is a Hispanic initiative. If you look at the demographics in our country, you’ll see that the Hispanics are growing enormously. So based on that, we have a separate board because if you look at the different ethical groups at parmi, ethnic groups, you’ll see that you know, they aren’t the same in terms of their cultures. So we are capturing for Young Life, a whole Hispanic population, which is very large, so that’s another one I’m working on. And then I’m still on a couple Stanford boards and active with them. And so, you know, I get up in the morning, I got a lot of directions I could go.

Alan
You know, it’s you looking back to these younger generation, let’s be fulfilling to see that you’re making a difference in their life seems like today in society, the next generation, it’s on a trend to hold faith in their life is, is more difficult?

Wally
It is, it is. And this is why if we can do things like sticky faith or growing young, we can keep these people in the church active with their faith and not losing it because so many of the institutions are going to Allen are just out and out secular. And so you have to find a way to get around that and put them in touch with people, mostly adults like myself, who can help them to retain it. And that’s where we went or loses the next generation

Alan
I’m visiting here today with Wally Hawley and Wally, I need to take a quick break and we’ll be right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back in visiting here today with Wally Hawley, one of the early venture capitalists hurry here in Silicon Valley launched a firm in West in that that midlife in the 50s you decide to retire and and become do philanthropy more service oriented. Causes but while he is we we’ve talked in the last segment about all the causes a lot of focus back on the youth and you view yourself as being retired?

Wally
Absolutely not. Okay. I use the term redeployed. Okay, so you can retire from your firm, which I did. But that’s not the same as retiring or retiring for many people has an image of you’re playing golf and watching TV and just hanging out for me, you can be just as active. And you don’t have to be part of an organization or whatever. So I’m redeployed. That’s why the nine boards, you aren’t retired if you’re on nine boards. So what it is, is it’s really just a series of things that I’m working on rather than one thing within a corporation. So Alan, I have not retired, I have redeploy.

Alan
Was a difficult making the transition. I know some people looking at the word retirement thinking in terms of Will I have enough and you know, this thing about the golf and the, you know, the lifestyle, but when you look back at the decisions that you made now with a full 2020 vision, were you immediately where you want it to be or did this kind of evolve?

Wally
Well, it evolved because starting to do things other than just being ahead of my firm, involves some other things like getting involved in young life and some other things. So I would call it a more of a gradual transition than something where you give the keys back and don’t come in on Monday. So really, I was transitioning in part into nonprofit and charitable things, even while I was still at Inner West. And the more I did that, the more I realized that this had much greater satisfaction than just just doing another deal.

Alan
We went through a number of projects that you’re involved with, with young life and sticky faith and growing young. What moved you into the projects. Now there’s wages. I’m going to spend time in young life. I mean, there’s so many causes out there today. And you know, what helped you focus on getting involved in different causes?

Wally
Well, I think God was at work here, because if you see many of these things, it is a continuum from one to another with another door opening. And so for example, I started with young life when someone put me in touch with them and got involved and saw what was going on when on a regional board and it just went from there, ultimately to becoming the chairman of the whole thing. But through that I then was introduced down at Fuller Seminary, who told me about Reggie McNeal. So I didn’t have an objective to go out find a Reggie McNeal. But Reggie McNeal was there and I saw him got to know him and began to work and work with him closely. Reggie was part of fuller. So here comes the filler sticky faith and other things. So this has been a series of just meeting people who know that I’m available. And I’m not saying alright, I have to find another thing, or this is a specific things. And I come back to my point earlier that its people and great leaders. And so I’m looking for someone who is a great leader. Sometimes it’s Christian oriented, sometimes it is. And I’m wanting to work with that person. So I could almost track back on each one of these, that it was a continuum of something that I had started earlier.

Alan
When when you move into the organizations, and it’d be very easy for you with all your accolades credential of Harvard MBA, Stanford, educated and, you know, started a number of successful companies to say, well, you know, I met I’m in charge now. But you don’t. And when you look at the leadership, and how you influence people, what are some of the most important attributes that you find that people will respond to giving you that respecter? Yeah.

Wally
Well, first, let me correct you, when you’re 78 years old, if you have to go back and tell people where you went to school, you have a problem with it. So let’s just leave the schools have been so long ago, I’m not even sure I can find them. Okay. Actually, what’s happening here is you are being available to serve other people, and I’m not in charge. I’m a helper. I’m an advisor. So really, the incharge part of it is the head of the group that I’m working with. And that’s very clear, I am not telling these people what to do. I am working with them to find out where they can use me. And I will be helpful in that regard. But there is not such a thing as Wally being in charge. There is not such a thing as Wally me his name on a building, I have helped finance professors. But it’s them. It’s not me.

Alan
How important is honesty, in business and dealing with others?

Wally
Well, if you don’t have it, basically, I don’t think you have anything. It’s a matter of trust. And if you’re working with someone, and as long as you have the trust, and they have the trust in you, it’s all important. And in fact, if you begin to lose it, and over my career, I obviously have gotten involved in situations where I’ve seen leaders who start to do things that I’m not very happy with. And at that point, I’m out of there. There’s no reason to tolerate anything other than someone who you feel you can trust what they say their word or what they’re going to do. So it’s all important now.

Alan
What role does respect play a business?

Wally
Which is partially in between with the earlier question you do have respect if you have someone you can trust, and has the integrity. The other part of respect is that you honor and are awed in some cases by what these people can do, and their capabilities and their missions. And so a lot of respect comes from what is your mission? And what is their mission? And as long as they’re in tune, or you can agree with the mission or they can agree with your mission. That’s when respect happens.

Alan
So while a final question, what advice do you have for the younger generation today?

Wally
Well, it sure helps if you are involved in faith, doesn’t matter what denomination I didn’t become a Christian till I was 40. I wish I had become earlier but better late than never. So I would hope that they would have faith to start with. Beyond that. The advice is take advantage in a good way of the talents and capabilities that other people have that you can work together. collegially. So I think you have to make sure it’s not about yourself. I come back to it’s about others. And so you work in a team environment. It can be different teams as I do. But, you know, I just get great joy in watching other people succeed.

Alan
I want to spend a few moments on leadership attributes. And when you hear the word integrity, what do you think of?

Wally
Well, integrity and honesty are sort of the same thing. But if a person is described as a man of integrity, it means you can trust what he says what he does. And so you’ll find people that when they say he’s a man of integrity, people say I know that I can use anything He says, in a good way. And so they’re really trying to help you. And I think part of that integrity is caring about others.

Alan
How do leaders gain respect of their employees?

Wally
Well, they demonstrate whether they really care about the person or not. And many of the leaders spend time mentoring people. And the good leaders will take the time with younger people and newer people to help them. Whereas some of the other kinds of leaders that are more about themselves are just interested in getting publicity or getting other kudos, and not caring about, well, what’s happening to my organization. People in the organization know whether you really care about them or not. And those are the popular leaders. And it comes across when people talk about a leader, they talk about how good he is, how they like him, how they respect him. And that’s what really good leadership is, in my opinion.

Alan
Why is service important in today’s world?

Wally
Lord knows we got enough problems in the world today. So making it about yourself, doesn’t really cut it. And I think the problem is that you have dividing maybe two types of people, if you want to take the extremes, those that are about themselves, they are acquiring assets, they’re acquiring wealth, and those who really want to see that our society is better. And I think there’s plenty of places that we can help make society better. And there’s so many ways you can serve. Whether it be in a religious setting, or whether an educational setting, or a business setting. And as I’ve said before, the satisfaction of serving rather than acquiring is very satisfying.

Alan
What is the most important aspect of leadership to.

Wally
Setting the example for other people? When people look at you, and they say, All right, I see what he does or what he says, and I respect that and I like them. That’s what leadership is really all about.

Alan
While I appreciate that today, so

Wally
you. Nice to be here.

 

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This transcript was generated by software and may not accurately reflect exactly what was said.

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