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Welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of The Land podcast. Today, we're doing something a bit different as I take on the role of guest on other podcasts to discuss recent developments in my journey and offer a glimpse of what lies ahead.
As some of you may know, I've recently embarked on a new professional path by joining the founding team of The O.H.I.O. Fund. In the near future, I'll be recording a dedicated episode to delve deeper into The O.H.I.O. Fund alongside some of my partners. In the meantime, join me in these conversations as I share my insights and experiences about transitioning to this exciting new venture, reflect on building Axuall, Lay of The Land, Cleveland, and much more!
In this particular conversation, I sit down with Ashtyn Morris from The Marketing Moves podcast, hosted by VividFront. We've previously featured VividFront on Lay of The Land's 124th episode with Andrew Spott—so be sure to check that out if you're interested in hearing more about VividFront and Andrew's journey.
With that, enjoy my conversation with Ashtyn Morris.
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Stay up to date by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.
Past guests include Justin Bibb (Mayor of Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Steve Potash (OverDrive), Umberto P. Fedeli (The Fedeli Group), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Stewart Kohl (The Riverside Company), Mitch Kroll (Findaway — Acquired by Spotify), and many more.
Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/
Follow Jeffrey Stern on X @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefe
Follow Lay of The Land on X @podlayoftheland
https://www.jeffreys.page/
Creators & Guests
What is Lay of The Land?
Telling the stories of entrepreneurship and builders in Cleveland and throughout Northeast Ohio. Every Thursday, Jeffrey Stern helps map the Cleveland/NEO business ecosystem by talking to founders, investors, and community builders to learn what makes Cleveland/NEO special.
Hello everyone, and welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of the Land
podcast. I am your host, Jeffrey Stern, and today we're going to do something a
little bit different as we flip the proverbial script, and I step into the role of
guests on other podcasts to share some recent developments in my own journey and
glimpse into what is coming next. As some of you may know, I recently started a
new professional chapter, joining the founding team of the Ohio Fund, and in the
near future I will record a dedicated episode to explore the Ohio Fund in depth
with some of my partners. Until then, please join me in these exciting conversations
as I share my own insights and stories about transitioning to this new chapter,
reflections on building actual, lay of the land, Cleveland, and a whole lot more. In
this specific conversation, I had the opportunity and privilege to sit down with
Ashton Morris of the Marketing Moves podcast, which is hosted by Vividfront. We've
actually featured Vividfront on Lay of the Land's 124th episode featuring Andrew Spot.
So please go check out that if you want to hear more about Vividfront and Andrew's
journey. With that, please enjoy my conversation with Ashton Morris.
Welcome to another episode of Marketing Moves. I'm your host, Ashton Morris, Senior
Account Executive at Vivid Front. I'm so excited for today's episode as I have the
chance to interview Jeffrey Stern. Jeffrey is a man of many talents and interests.
As co -founder of Actual, host and creator of the Lay of the Land podcast, and most
recently, the principal of the Ohio Fund. Jeffrey has made his mark on Cleveland,
which is why I'm so grateful to have the chance to sit down with him today to
learn more about his story and the work he and his team are doing through the Ohio
Fund, which recently raised $108 million for the first fund closing in early July.
Jeffrey, welcome to Marketing Moves. Thank you, Ashton. It is a pleasure to be here.
So excited. So you're not often in the interviewee seat, so this will be a great
opportunity for us to introduce you to our audience and learn a little bit more
about yourself. Can you tell us a little bit more about yourself, your story, and
how you ended up here in Cleveland? Sure, sure. It is not an accident that I tend
to find myself much more often in your seat than in this one. In sharing a bit
about myself, there's a fun poem that comes to mind. A wise old owl lived in an
oak. The more he saw, the less he spoke. The less he spoke, the more he heard,
"Why aren't we all like that wise old bird?" And I cannot tell you exactly why,
but I've always identified with the owl as an old soul and with a natural
proclivity, much more to listen than I speak. So the gravity in that chair is a
lot stronger, but it's fun to be somewhat uncomfortable and have to share more about
my own thoughts and experiences. And I'm grateful for the opportunity to do it. I
don't think I could ever recite a poem from Top of Mine, so that was very
impressive. Thank you. How did you end up in Cleveland? Sure. Well, I think really
by chance and luck at this point in reflection, no ties to Cleveland,
familial or otherwise, although I did learn after I moved here that my grandfather
was born in Akron and then proceeded to spend no time here and I didn't even know
about it, until after he had passed away, actually. But if there was a compass that
was kind of guiding me directionally through,
if Cleveland was the destination of that, you know, the true north of the compass,
I think it was probably a curiosity and desire for learning that ultimately brought
me here. Tactically, it was a program called Venture for America, which was a
fellowship program for recent college graduates to match them with startups in cities
across the country that tend to lack what I would call the young person gravity of
a New York or San Francisco, kind of inspired by the ethos and the model of Teach
for America, but with this entrepreneurial bend to it. And in optimizing for trying
to learn, I was very drawn to entrepreneurship as a mechanism for learning in
practice, what I thought is a more prudent way than in theory.
And so I feel lucky that it was Cleveland, but it could have been anywhere. Wow.
Yeah. So how long have you been here? About eight years now. Wow. What was one of
the biggest misconceptions you had about Cleveland Cleveland before coming here?
- Well, I'll keep rattling off quotes as they come to mind 'cause I don't have to
come to mind. - This is impressive. - So Mark Twain had a bit about travel being
fatal to prejudice and to narrow -mindedness and that if you are to cultivate kind
of a wholesome and charitable interpretation of people and of things,
you can't just vegetate in your corner of the world. And I don't know that I had
a misconception about Cleveland rather than I didn't have much of a perception at
all of what it was like, but I know that in retrospect, having come here, it's
just the most pleasantly surprising place. For whatever reason, I find Clevelanders
have a real simultaneous pride and self -deprecation, and maybe only the self
-deprecation ever made it externally outside of the city. And I've just been blown
away by the people, by the nature, by just so many of the realities of this place
that never seem to match the perception that people have of it. - I love that.
Well, before we're talking about your newest role as principal of the Ohio Fund, I
wanna take some time to talk about your other professional pursuits because you have
quite the resume. You co -founded Actual, a workforce intelligence company built on a
national real -time practitioner data network to transform how industry leaders analyze,
recruit, onboard, and engage clinicians. As a startup, you and your team raised an
impressive $41 million. Can you tell us a little bit more about this and your
journey to becoming a co -founder? Absolutely. And you got the pronunciation correct?
It is a word that-- It's a weird word. It is a Weird word, fanatically wrong, but
we got the URL. That was, you know, important. - The name of the game. - Internet
presence. So the founding of Actual came in the aftermath of my fellowship with
Venture for America, where I had the experience to have joined the founding team of
the time of a company called Vodum. And over the three years working there, we grew
from
Myself and one other fellow actually and the founder of the company to about 70
folks the Detour there is that you know, we were building election infrastructure
software for voting systems for secretaries a state to offer to their citizens
particularly for folks who What the government calls you a cove of voters, but
basically people who have accessibility considerations members of the military living
abroad The two astronauts stuck in space would would be bucketed under that umbrella
right now if they needed to vote. How did they do it? We were working with the
government to help afford that opportunity to citizens in the democratic process.
An incredible experience. We grew to work with a few dozen secretaries of state
but ultimately the business didn't really work out. That company kind of failed and
somewhat of a spectacular fashion in early 2019, but in the aftermath of it,
somewhat disheartened by the outcome, but not by the process.
And I came to out of it with a deep appreciation and love and fulfillment for
company building and entrepreneurship, knowing that was really what I wanted to do,
but without an idea for what to build next. And so what I opted to do,
and this is also really the origins of the podcast for Lay the Land, was I set
out to meet as many local founders in Cleveland as I possibly could, to get a
sense for who they were as people, what motivated them, what inspired them to solve
the kinds of problems they were interested in solving, and some of the tactics of
company building. And
To my surprise I think again really the reason I'm still here in Cleveland was the
openness and receptiveness that people had to a total stranger reaching out to them
at that point in time to ask all those kinds of questions really just from a place
of Curiosity, I think everyone said yes, not a single person said no and so I got
to meet about 70 local founders in that period of time and
One of them turned out to be working through the ideation for what would become
actual at the time. And we kind of joined forces at a period with my former head
of engineering at the last company as he was kind of making his way through what
he called a gratitude tour as his last company was also a company here in Cleveland
called Exploris, which he had sold to IBM and it became the Watson Health Platform
and we were talking with all of the chief medical officers that he had worked with
about if they could kind of wave a magic wand, what other problem would they want
for us to solve? And enough of them had said credentialing and privileging, which we
didn't really know what that was, but we're like, great, and you'll pay for a
solution? Absolutely. So it really just came from asking who we wanted to be our
prospective customers, what problem they wanted us to help solve. - That's a crazy
story, but a cool story. How long did it take from that initial conversation to
getting the funds and really building it?
- Well, we spent a lot of time trying to get it right, going slow to go fast as
we like to think about it, where there's this kind of startup framework of move
fast and break things, And that maybe is like a fun approach, but with things of
great importance, such as healthcare and government infrastructure, that strategy has
its challenges. And so when we're working with health systems,
we really wanted to ensure that what we built worked, solve the problem that we set
out to solve, which is this credentialing and privileging problem and the time it
takes to onboard doctors within health systems. And so we spent a lot of time with
local health systems, Metro Health, University Hospitals, really ingrained in the
medical staff office. I spent maybe half a year trying to just map and understand
why it is that they do the things they do today and how it came to be that way,
and where is the opportunity for us to kind of rethink the whole way things are >>
So cool. As co -founder and director of Product Management, what were some of your
main responsibilities? >> Well, the way I always thought about Product Management was
at this intersection of shaping the product. Why are we building what we're building?
What is the vision and impetus and strategy behind it? Actually shaping the product
in the actual engineering and architecture and building of it, and then ultimately
syncing everyone in the company around both of those things,
setting the right expectations, ensuring that the product that we've set out to build
actually solves the problem for the customer and does the thing that we said it was
going to do. And so I kind of tried to ground everything that we were doing as an
organization in, are we helping? Are we actually solving a problem?
Not just, are we and cool technology, but just really tethering it to the reality
of, are we making things better and easier for the people who are spending their
entire professions, careers, focused on just doing this kind of work, and can we
make it easier for them? Awesome. What were some of your biggest takeaways from
Actual? Is there anything you wish you would have done differently?
There are a lot of We, I think one of the core themes,
at least from a product management standpoint, was when you find a problem where the
justification for the way that it's done today is just, that's the way we've always
done it, rather than from a place of necessity, that's probably a process worth
reconsidering. You know, why it is that it is that that way. I think that's often
where the greatest opportunity for building something in the form of a product or
company comes around. That to me was kind of galvanized by my whole experience doing
this. Things I would do differently, the whole startup process is one of constantly
just getting humbled by reality. I don't know that I would have changed the way we
did anything because I value the learnings that I got from the whole process very
much. But I would say from a culture standpoint and like a leadership standpoint,
I mean, to me the best of leadership is where you've articulated the vision both at
a high level but also to individuals so clearly that they are inspired by get,
see the potential and you help them to realize that both at an organizational and
individual level. And the culture around that being one where you've created the
space where people feel comfortable talking about all the things not going well,
because it is such a constantly humbling process of things never going well. The
whole startup is just never going well. And it's about how do you prioritize what
fires to put out. And so if you're in an environment where people do not feel
comfortable talking about the things that are not going well, then it kind of
creates this vicious downward cycle where people begin to optimize for maybe the
wrong things, for avoiding risks for just more from a place of fear than of
inspiration. And it's only kind of in reflection that I've thought about how to
articulate that, and I think where I had to do it again, I would be more explicit
about stewarding the kind of culture and creating that space for people to feel
comfortable being vulnerable that I think is important.
But, I mean, yeah, there's a lot of, it's all learnings. - No, that's amazing. I
think a lot of people, even if they're not in the startup space, can take a lot
away from what you just said in terms of, if you're operating from a mindset of
being fearful of what's going to happen, then you're not really giving yourself the
best shot in whatever you're doing, and that perspective I think is key. Absolutely.
I would be remiss to not talk about your podcast, Lay of the Land. I am a huge
fan of it. I love listening to your weekly episodes. You share stories of start -ups
in Builders and Cleveland and throughout Northeast Ohio, and you have nearly 200
episodes, which is crazy to think about, making you one of the most well -known
podcasts here in Cleveland. What made you start Lay of the Land?
That might be a loaded question. Yeah, I know you kind of touched on a little bit
before. So if one of the consequences of those, you know,
many dozen or so conversations in 2019 was finding my co -founder and the starting
of actual. The other was a set of observations that came from those conversations,
which to me were surprising. One was the degree to which none of the founders and
CEOs that I talked to knew who each other were. Just no one seemed to know who
the other builders and entrepreneurs in our proximate area were. That was surprising
to me. It was surprising to me the degree to which Clevelanders didn't know who
these these folks were. Many of whom, you know, all of whom in my mind were
inspiring people of, you know, a formidable capability that have built impressive
organizations both from the seed stage all the way through to public company CEOs,
multi -billion dollar organizations. So Clevelanders didn't know who they were, and the
third was the complete dearth of media coverage of any of them, who I had been
convinced had almost any of these folks been in New York or San Francisco would
have garnered the whole media mechanism to amplify the stories of these entrepreneurs,
the success that they've achieved and even the struggle and trials and tribulations
of the journey along the way. And so when I kind of pieced these things together,
there were a few motivations I had for the podcast. One was that I just wanted to
introduce these people to each other. The whole process of building a company is
really hard, it's really difficult, can be very lonely. And oftentimes the folks that
are best to see counsel from are those who can empathize but who are outside your
company, which is other founders. And so I thought there was a real opportunity as
I was starting my own founder journey to build the group of peer support that I
wish existed in the community. And so part of it was a selfish bit on that front.
Nothing wrong with that. You know, from all these folks that I genuinely had been
inspired by. The other was kind of with the venture for America hat on. If you are
a young, entrepreneurially inclined kid in Cleveland and you aspire to do something
in that realm and you do not know who the people are in your community who have
achieved the kind of success that you hope to achieve someday, then you're gonna
just be even further inclined to go to a place where you know that those kinds of
people exist, like in San Francisco or New York. And so I thought there was a real
opportunity to amplify these stories, so that other people in the community could
know about what I felt to be very inspirational stories. And,
you know, as I came in my time here in Cleveland to appreciate the midwestern
kindness and warmth of people, the humility that's kind of embedded in that whole
sentiment I love but if there was a downside to it I felt it was kind of in this
you know bragging is not the right word even but like a lack of recognition and
celebration of success and excellence and you know things worthy of aspiration and
you know I'm a New Yorker I'm not from Cleveland I you know feel like I'm
masquerading as one one, I resonate a lot with that whole Midwestern energy,
but I have no problem trying to amplify these stories of all the people that I've
met who have inspired me truly to try and build cohesion amongst the community here
and amplify their stories so that people know that really cool stuff is happening in
Cleveland. Did you ever expect it to take off in the way that it has? You know,
it's it's I've never and you know in the spirit of marketing Haven't really ever
marketed it. It's it's really been a community building exercise one person at a
time facilitating I think many hundreds of introductions at this point, but I think
the the bottom up grassroots effort of it has has kind of grounded roots at this
point that has allowed it just slowly but surely to grow in time as we are able
to bring more people on the podcast to amplify their stories much in the way that
you're doing. I love that. Do you have any tips or advice for people who want to
start their own podcast? Do you need a full setup? Can you do it? Well,
logistically, I think even today, it's much easier to do a podcast than I had
realized it was four years ago. The tools we were talking about, the AI capability
as a companion for audio transcription, for the sound engineering on the back end,
it's pretty doable. And for me, it's been, it has brought me great joy and
fulfillment to do it. And I certainly wouldn't have anticipated that it had, it
would have evolved in this kind of way when I started But but came from a place
really just again of curiosity mostly and so I would say if if you know if you
would want to start a podcast You should you should give it a shot. Yeah, I see
no reason why not very accessible very doable Very accessible very doable and
memorializes stories in a I think a really cool way the the number of times I've
now heard from people mostly guests who've been on the podcast that You know their
kid really appreciated hearing these stories that they never heard about their parent
before. Yeah You know those are those are evergreen the internet will you know
forever hold them and That that is that's been pretty fun. I feel very similarly in
terms of sometimes we record all these episodes It's always fun in the moment. I
look forward to it as well, but it gives me Worst my heart a little but in terms
of I had some fun episodes with a lot of different people, some of my friends, and
knowing that we've had this captured and one day when we're 67 years old, I feel
like, "Oh, do you remember when we did that?" And we could listen to it. So it's
really cool from that perspective, especially when you take a wide view at it.
- Captures a moment. - Yeah, definitely. This question might be akin to asking a
parent if they have a favorite child, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Do you have
a favorite interview on your podcast or a must listen episode. I know this one.
- It is an impossible question. I will pay respect and homage to the place we are
in right now and I have to call out Andrew Spot who is a close friend and I
think did an excellent job. I mean, it's really difficult. There are so many
different times in different situations where different conversations come to and based
on different wisdom that people have had. And I mean, if anything, it's kind of
just reinforced this idea that there truly is something to learn from everyone, but
I'll call out one 'cause it inspired more than most have in terms of my personal
response and reaction to it, which was a conversation with Lila Mills, who is the
CEO and founding editor -in -chief of Signal Cleveland, which is a nonprofit local
news organization here in Cleveland. I was inspired enough by her story and the work
that she's doing to actually get involved on the advisory board of the organization.
That one hit a chord in a way that many of them do, but don't often have afforded
the opportunity for me directly involved. Yeah, I love I have to listen to it. I
the first episode I listened to was one with Andrew obviously, but it was great and
it really just I was hooked. Well now that we've spent some time talking about your
different endeavors I want to transition to talking about the Ohio Fund which is
your newest adventure. Recently you and other venture capitalists raised $108 million
for the first fund closing in early July which goes without saying, is an incredible
feat. I would like to preface that this is a little outside of my realm, so before
getting too deep into the conversation, I want to first do a quick little vocabulary
lesson for our listeners who may not be as familiar with venture capital. So, in
simple terms, can you break down what the Ohio Fund is and how you operate? I can
do my best. Well, it's better than what I can do. We'll Let's see how simple it
is. The Ohio Fund is a fund, meaning that we've collected investments from people
who believe in what we're doing as an impact fund to ultimately deploy into
opportunities that we think will drive the financial and economic kind of impact that
we've set out to achieve under the umbrella of the thesis of the Ohio fund.
- That was great. - You know? - Yeah, that was simple, straight to the point. When
you announced your new chapter with the Ohio fund, you did share some information
with your network about the technological trends of today. As I reviewed them, I
knew I wanted to take some time to discuss them with you today, as you have some
pretty dynamic points that I'd love for you to expand upon. I'm going to read them
off and to preface is a little bit of a monologue, so bear with me. Well, I
apologize, I think, because it's probably my monologue. No, it was great, but I want
you to expand upon it because I could not do it justice. So you noted that the
desire for domestic, secure, and robust supply changed, the infusion of software and
automation into hardware, the rising demand for energy storage and usage tied to AI
growth, and the exponential decline in the cost of computing, the falling costs of
electricity production, the increasingly competitive positioning of renewables, and the
visibility of nuclear within the Overton window, the rise of electric vehicles, and
the economic incentives of the IRA and CHIP's Act to reshore and develop these
manufacturing competencies locally, make Ohio app to ride this industrial wave once
again, and to be a leading force in reindustrialization.
So, Jeffrey, can you elaborate on these points and explain how they are making Ohio
so appealing for venture capital? I certainly have a way with words.
No, it was great. It was very powerful. But I was like, you know what, I want
Jeffrey to talk about it. There's another quote that comes to mind, which, you which
I'll do my best to rattle off here, but there was an Ohio politician in the 1830s,
Caleb Atwater, who suggested that Ohio is peculiarly felicitous - - It's a mouthful.
- As to soil, productions, and climate that would,
it would be their own fault if they We're not the happiest people in the union. To
me, the way to think about these trends, and we can talk about them, but in the
context of the Ohio fund, if you believe that Ohio is well -positioned,
if you jump forward into the future 20, 30 years, and you look back at what would
have had to happen for Ohio to be in the place that it is,
having taken advantage of those trends, it's not it's not a given that it just
happens. The Ohio Fund is meant to be a catalyst for finding the opportunities that
are on those structural trends that we can invest in and ensure that Ohio is able
to actually achieve that kind of success that we think it should and can have.
So the reindustrialization idea is kind of a fun one because it harkens to the the
history of Ohio and our, our, our know -how and competency and history of,
of building things. You know, at one point in the not too distant past, Ohio was
accounted for half of the world's rubber production, a vast majority of the,
the the movement and production of steel and and really just the building of a lot
of things and in the hollowing out of that I think and not just Cleveland but you
know a lot of the the Rust Belt has has kind of suffered as a consequence of of
what of what that has meant as we have moved manufacturing elsewhere And I think
what's really fun about the whole opportunity of the Ohio Fund today is that there
is this resurgence in desire and recognition of the strategic importance of us being
able to build things again and the kind of both financial and economic impact that
investing in those kinds of opportunities could have locally. Well, that's so cool to
think about. I mean, I'm from the Youngstown area. My grandpa used to work in
Lordstown, the GM plant. And not so much what I saw because by the time I was
born, things obviously had changed. But just in terms of hearing what my parents
talk about, when really some of that industry moved away, it really did change.
And I think it's really cool what you guys are doing in terms of really tapping
into our roots and seeing how we're positioned to really capitalize on what we have
and just our deep history. So it's amazing. We're trying to play to our strengths
that we have as a place. So New York is obviously well -known. New York City in
particular is well -known for being the financial capital of the world. And Silicon
Valley, for the last, I would say, 30 years or so, has been recognized as one of
the hubs for technological innovation and startups. With the Ohio Fund, how are you
looking to help set apart our region in the VC world. - Yeah, well, I'll expand
upon it 'cause it's not just venture capital actually. So the fund itself was
inspired by this organization called TAMASIC, which was started about 50 years ago to
this year in Singapore and laid out a thesis that we have been inspired by with
the Ohio fund and which truly we're trying to emulate in in our playbook and roll
out of of what the fund is going to do and and to invest in and help to realize
but it was it was broader than than a venture fund. It was opportunistic in that
it would it was able to invest in anything really at its at its onset in
Singapore. Tomasic was investing in a steel mill, in a bird park, in an airline
that became Singapore Airlines, and really a whole variety of mechanisms both in
terms of assets, so direct company investments, but also new company creation, debt
instruments. So it's really kind of a broad mandate, but tethered to a place and a
belief in the opportunity that that place had. And so the Ohio fund
is inspired by TAMASIC and what it did there, and hasn't really been attempted
before in America. We haven't had kind of a place -based fund that has that level
of flexibility in it prior. So kind of an experiment in and of itself,
but I think gives us the flexibility to be opportunistic to capitalize on a lot of
those structural trends that we talked about. And again, if you believe that there
is that opportunity, and again, you think what has to happen for Ohio to capitalize
on those trends, the Ohio fund, we want to be the activation energy, the catalyst
to bring together Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Toledo, Dayton,
Youngstown, the whole state really to invest and rally around the kinds of things
that need to happen for Ohio to realize those opportunities. How did you get
involved with the fund? I can't believe I didn't ask that first.
So through a lot of ways, it's fun in retrospect to try and connect the dots
because it feels a lot easier than to try and presently have predicted what they
were because You know really hard to have predicted, but the founding team of the
Ohio fund the The idea came from Ray Leach here in Cleveland and Mark Kwame in
Columbus Ray is the founding CEO of Jumpstart here in Cleveland and had actually
Invested in and joined the board of actual in its in its earlier days And so
through a combination of Ray leading our board, through which he was essentially my
boss, and the work that I had done with Lay of the Land, when I had stepped away
from actual Ray kind of incepted into my mind the idea for what the Ohio Fund
would become. It felt too sufficiently compelling for me to want to pursue anything
else. It just felt like the right culmination of the set of experiences I had
through trying to build a company here in Ohio, through getting to meet hundreds of
founders within Ohio, and a real belief and recognition that I had kind of developed
on my own about the opportunity that we have here in Ohio to tap into this kind
of latent excellence and capacity that we have for building things and really
innovation writ large. And so I feel very lucky and privileged to be part of the
team, but it It came from really the relationship that I had developed with Ray
through my time here in Cleveland and a desire to want to work with them to help
make this thing happen. Isn't it crazy to think about you never know the
relationships you have and who you're going to meet and what it could lead to? I
mean, you probably never would have anticipated this. No, I mean, if you told my
New York City boy self that I would be here in Cleveland investing in the future
of Ohio, where I have no ties. I mean, that I would be like, what are you talking
about? Well, we're happy to have you. Ohio is a great place. I think it's the
Midwest charm. It is. It's very disarming. We're all very friendly. Yes. Yes. No,
and I'm happy to be here. So this is an election year and I have no intention of
making this podcast political, trust me, but elections can impact investment decisions,
especially at the level you guys or the conversations you're having, and I know that
states compete strongly against one another to attract more venture capital money. I
know the Ohio fund isn't all about VC, but in your opinion, what does Ohio need to
do from a marketing perspective to better attract more VC money to the state? Well,
I think telling a story that resonates and demonstrating the kinds of things that
we're able to do that Couldn't be done elsewhere. I mean,
it really is the mission of the Ohio fund I think in a lot of ways to demonstrate
that capability when you think about the kinds of things that Will be able to do
and the things that we're investing in These are not things that could really happen
in New York City or in San Francisco there there is a place -based component that
uniquely positions Ohio to be able to, I think, demonstrate the advantage structurally
that we have compared to some other places in the country. At the same time,
I think we could, you know, there's some other low -hanging fruit. You know, we
could probably do less cringy marketing that I've seen in New York about trying to,
you know, pitch Ohio. - I've heard, I've never seen it, but in terms of never seen
it in person, but I've seen some of those campaigns and I go, oh. - It's like, I
don't know, it's tough. It's tough as someone who's trying to advocate and truly
actually likes this place now. And as a New Yorker, I'm like, why did they do
that? But no, I think, so anecdotally, in the last few years, specifically after the
pandemic, I've seen a real resurgence of people boomeranging back, people who grew up
here, who have gone elsewhere to New York, to San Francisco, to DC, to Boston have
really kind of flexed their professional muscles and have achieved a lot of really
amazing things. People love Ohio. Like the people who are from Ohio love it,
like to a degree that's like strange and weird and awesome at the same time.
Come on now. Can't say that. No. But I'm kidding. But I think we haven't done a
great job trying to, you know, we have this love of this place.
The people who are from here, who are elsewhere right now, I think would love the
opportunity if they were aware of what is happening here to participate.
And I say, I think it's the importance of storytelling and amplifying the awesomeness
of the things that are happening here. So it's much in the spirit of the podcast
and again what you're doing and just trying to make more people aware of the the
greatness of this place. I think it's interesting with people like podcasts like you
and how we have a podcast here at the front, obviously marking moves, whatever one's
listening to, that there just needs to be more positive stories about Cleveland
because to your point, as Clevelanders we can make fun of Cleveland but at the same
time it's important that we're also sharing why we love it so much and why we can
kind of make those jokes lightheartedly, but it's a great place. I mean, I tell all
my friends, I'm never leaving Ohio. Live here my whole life and I have no ambition
or no inclination to want to leave here. - Yeah, this is a great place. - It is.
Don't have crazy natural disasters, great healthcare, it's affordable to live, all the
things that you care about. - Yes, but I think to the agree that you can make
other people aware of that, specifically those who know what it is like here and
who are elsewhere, and also people who are not from here, I think that that would
go a long way. - Absolutely. It was hard for me to narrow down and determine my
final question for you, Jeffrey, as we could really go a lot of different ways with
your story and just what you're doing is super fascinating. With that said, my final
question is, what advice do you have for anyone looking to break into the venture
capital space? How does someone get their start? So with my founder hat on,
having been on the flip side of, I mean, hundreds of conversations with investors
trying to raise money and having been rejected, you know, about as many times, and
having worked with a lot of investors who I greatly appreciate and admire, I think
the strongest investors are those who are able to empathize with the founder journey.
And so to the degree that as an investor you can empathize with the entrepreneurial
journey, it lends credence to the advice that you're offering,
to the set of experiences that you've encountered and how that relates to the day
-to -day work that the founder is going through. And so my advice would be, if
someone wants to get into investing, it would be to first try and understand what
it is to, 'cause I think it's a bit difficult to be
of service and of value to if you if you don't know what it is that they're going
through it's great advice well before we end today's episode i'm going to rattle off
a few rapid fire questions are you ready let's do it okay favorite podcast this one
you know what i had a feeling you were going to say that and i was like this
great thank you what's your favorite thing about cleveland the people the nature The
most everything about it. What's your favorite Cleveland restaurant? Oh?
I have to go Doug cats his whole family of restaurants are the best Zog is up
there for me so good so good last question favorite Cleveland coffee shop
Well as I spoke and I'd take nothing away from Doug I do have to reinsert
Mitchell's into my answer. - Oh my gosh, I meant Mitchell's far too often.
It's way too close. - That place is my true weakness. - Oh yeah, it's so cool that
you can see everything being made too. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I think it's the best ice
cream in the world. That's my hot take. - That's a hot take. That is, we have that
on record. - Good, I want it on the internet forever. - So, do you like ice cream
more than coffee? Do you not have a favorite coffee coffee shop? Yes. I appreciate
coffee for other people's appreciation of coffee. You know,
it's a drink for me. Caffeine doesn't really do it. I like coffee places. I go to
Edda all the time. I love let go, but it, you know, coffee is,
it's just not my thing. That's fair. Are you a tea drinker? I'm a hydra homie.
I like water, you know. Nothing Nothing wrong with that Well, Jeffrey, thank you so
much for joining us today. I learned so much and I know our listeners did too
Where can our listeners find you if they want to connect? Sure. Well, first off.
Thank you for having me a true Pleasure and privilege to be here. I Would I would
point them to to the podcast to label and you could find it on any podcast player
or just reach out to me linked it easy enough well thank you so much thank you
ashen
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