Intro to Angel Investing | Class #1 | Understanding Your "Why" - Taught by Garry Johnson III
Learn the most important part about being an angel investor...
Dear Students,
Understanding your “why” is probably the most important part about being an angel investor.
Since this course is about shifting mindsets and thinking that you can in fact invest in the same quality deals as a venture capitalist, it’s important to understand “why” you want to build wealth in such a way.
Now, I can't come up with that reason for you, but I can explain the thought process behind why I invest in startups and why venture capitalists do too.
Watch Me Teach Lecture #1:
This course isn’t about glorifying venture capitalists in any way. In many ways, I believe they’ve contributed to wealth disparities and inequalities discussed in this course. The mindset, however, is one I believe can create a transformational shift and be applied to our everyday lives. Venture Capital is not perfect, and it is certainly not the end goal, but we can take lessons from it to build the future we desire.
My “why” is to build wealth, not just for myself as an individual, but to build wealth that my family, future generations, and my entire community can benefit from.
Even though I originally embarked on this journey alone, my “why” is not a selfish pursuit. It's about being a problem solver and an innovator, an agent for change and a superhero in my community able to put my talents to good use in making a difference.
Every one of our communities has problems, but entrepreneurs see those problems as opportunities. If we can change those problems, through developing solutions that benefit us all, then we all succeed.
“For it is obvious that if a man enters the starting line of a race 300 years after another man, the first would have to perform some incredible feat in order to catch up to his fellow runner. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Now, there are statistics that will tell you the racial wealth gap is widening — to say that the wealth attained and preserved in white communities is vastly greater than that of black and brown communities.
In my view, the only way that we can accelerate the rate of change that we wish to see and to create new wealth is to create new entrepreneurs, to create new businesses that deliver value at scale in our communities, and provide return on investment that can be reinvested in the development of our communities. The best way to do this is through investment.
It's important for me to teach this course because my “why” includes education.
Through my work, my goal is to educate 10,000 new angel investors — individuals who've never invested in a privately held business before, but they get their start after engaging with my content.
My “why” is about shifting the mindsets of those who’ve been taught to believe all they can ever be is a consumer.
My work is for those who previously believed they could never aspire to be an entrepreneur or a producer of valuable goods and services. It’s for those who never thought they could build a technology startup that goes on to serve millions of customers around the world. It's about tackling the narrative that just because you didn't go to an elite university, or have professional experience at a prestigious investment firm in the past, you can't aspire to be a venture capitalist, or simply angel invest in promising startup companies that you believe in.
My “why” is about educating a new generation of individuals of all ages, and of all backgrounds, to believe that they can do it too — to help them realize that many of the successful people you may look up to, the people that you study or whose art or music you love, they too are entrepreneurs and investors. Knowing that, there’s no reason why you have to fit into any one particular box. You don't have to fit in with any existing narrative or stereotype — you can create your own future and build the next best thing on your own terms.
Our country is becoming increasingly diverse, which I believe to be a very good thing, and unfortunately, some others believe this to be a very bad thing. The reality is that times are changing, the power structures that dominated the past are slowly being reformed, and diverse leaders from underrepresented backgrounds are shaping industries that impact us all.
My “why” is to create a guide that makes it a little bit easier for anyone interested in learning about startups and investing in private companies — to make it easy for them to understand how to get started, to inspire them to take that leap, and to galvanize them to take action in creating the change they want to see in the world.
It’s about shifting people's perspectives from thinking that they can't do it or they don't have the resources to do it — to realize that you can do this too, and you can get started today.
Even if you don't see yourself represented, this is a space that you belong in, and you can represent yourself in this space. When you represent yourself, you’ll be representing others who look to you for inspiration — and when they see you, they’ll know that they can do it too.
For me, this is how we multiply the number of wealth creation opportunities in our communities. It’s by educating and inspiring one person at a time, and then that person will go on to educate and inspire, and then that person will go on to do the same. If we continue to lean in and accelerate that cycle, we will have communities bursting with owners and entrepreneurs — creating the change, scaling to new heights, and lifting as they climb.