Last week, an entrepreneur reminded me that one of the greatest gifts you can give someone is to believe in them. I’ve been working with this entrepreneur for a long time, and they recently launched their new business. As part of the launch, he sent me a note expressing his gratitude that I believed in him. This reminded me of one of my earliest entrepreneurial endeavors.
I was a junior in college, eager to become a full-time entrepreneur but needing help to start. I approached one of my professors, Frank Borchardt, whom I had met during my freshman year. We had hit it off and built a great relationship. He knew how passionate I was about starting my own venture, and at one point, he told me, “Whenever you’re ready to go out on your own, come see me, and I’ll be your angel investor.” At the time, I didn’t think much of it, but I tucked the idea away and continued with my studies.
Now, I was ready to make the leap. Professor Borchardt was a full professor in the German department, and I had no connection to or studies in German languages. The intersection was that Professor Borchardt was world-renowned for using technology in foreign language learning, and he loved studying the history of technology. The class I had taken with him was all about technology through the centuries and how it impacted society and culture.
When I walked into Professor Borchardt’s office, he greeted me with his big smile and boisterous laugh. He was the stereotypical eccentric college professor. In all the years I had known him, he had exclusively worn black and only shorts, never cut his hair or beard, and always filled the room with his big personality. I pitched him my idea: a product to make it easy to update and maintain websites. As a blissfully ignorant 20-year-old, I called this new product “SuperUpdate.”
Without hesitation, Professor Borchardt said yes. He told me he would love to write a check for $20,000 and that it would be much more interesting to invest in me than to see his shares in Duke Power grow. His investment paid off in many ways, but the most important was the belief he had in me. Believing in someone is one of the most powerful gifts you can give. On that day, more than 20 years ago, Professor Borchardt believed in me and helped me get my first startup off the ground. Today, my goal is to continue paying it forward by sharing that gift of belief with others.
Entrepreneur
via https://www.aiupnow.com
David Cummings, Khareem Sudlow
