Finding the Right Guide: How Early-Stage Founders Can Leverage Advisors & Mentors

Every founder knows that startup life is full of unknowns - but one thing’s certain: you can’t build a great company alone. The right advisors and mentors don’t just help you avoid costly mistakes, they accelerate your learning curve, open doors and challenge your thinking when it matters most.

At Startup Boston Week 2025, we brought together a powerhouse lineup of founders, investors, and operators to unpack what makes an effective advisory relationship, and how early-stage founders can make the most of them.

Featuring insights from:

• John Harthorne - Managing Director, Two Lanterns Venture Capital

• Yossi Hayut - Managing Director, Wix Ventures

• Shereen Shermak - COO, Dannce.ai

• Kat Lazell - Senior Program Manager, CIC

Together, they explored how to find the right mentors and advisors, structure those relationships thoughtfully, and keep them productive for the long haul. From deciding when to formalize an advisory board to navigating compensation, expectations and long-term alignment, this session offered a candid look at what it really takes to build a network that fuels - not drains - your startup’s growth.

Scroll down for key takeaways, and check out the full transcript at the bottom. 

5 Takeaways

1. Mentorship is About People, Not Titles

The best mentor relationships start organically - not with a formal ask or a LinkedIn message that says “Will you be my mentor?” John Harthorne emphasized approaching potential mentors as humans first: learn about their interests, goals and values before asking for advice. Mentorship thrives on authenticity, shared respect and mutual curiosity, not transactional networking

2. You Don’t Need Just One Mentor, You Need Many

No single person has all the answers. Founders should surround themselves with a diverse mix of advisors and mentors who each bring something different: moral grounding, technical knowledge, fundraising experience, or strategic perspective. As Harthorne put it, “I like to have dozens of mentors…some are good at HR, some at sales, some at ethics.” The more perspectives you gather, the clearer your path becomes.

3. Choose Advisors Who Add Real Value, Not Just Names

Shereen Shermak broke down three types of advisors: unpaid “office hours” mentors, paid experts (like lawyers), and those compensated in equity for strategic guidance and connections. The best ones aren’t chasing cash - they’re motivated by impact and love of the game. As Harthorne warned, “The people who ask for money early on are often the least valuable advisors.” Instead, look for advisors who bring at least two of the “three Ws”: wealth, wisdom or work.

4. Structure and Sustain the Relationship

Mentor relationships thrive on consistency, honesty, and brevity. Keep communication focused - short updates, clear asks and realistic cadences. Shereen advised founders to “popularize the 15-minute meeting” - short, specific and easier to schedule than an hour-long check-in. Regular but concise updates show respect for your mentor’s time and help maintain momentum.

5. Feedback (Even the Tough Kind) Is Gold

Great mentors won’t always tell you what you want to hear, and that’s the point. Disagreement signals engagement, not failure. Shermak reminded founders, “If they disagree with you, it means they care enough to tell you the truth.” Seek advisors who challenge you, not just cheer you on. And remember: mentorship is a dialogue, not a directive. You own your decisions and the outcomes.

Full Transcript Below

Want to revisit a particular quote or share with a teammate? We’ve got you covered. Read the transcript here:  

Kat Lazell

[ 00:02:03 ] Good morning, everybody. My name is Kat Lazell, not Jimmy. Sorry to disappoint.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:02:10 ] I am the senior program manager for the Cambridge Innovation Center's social impact program. So we help underrepresented founders in Massachusetts scale their businesses. And mentorship has been a really critical piece of our program, as I know it is for many who are building right now. And we're really lucky that we're in Boston. There's a lot of people who are willing to lend their support and their advice and their mentorship. So really excited to facilitate this discussion this morning. We want this to be really conversational. So I have some questions, but we also want to leave a lot of time for Q &A at the end. So if you have questions, there will be ample opportunity to ask them. And I want to start by having our panelists introduce themselves. So maybe you can quickly introduce yourself and then also to kind of ground our discussion. Say how mentorship factors into maybe your journey to the role that you're in now, or into the work that you do. Let's start with Shane.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:03:03 ] Hi, I'm  Shereen Shermak. I'm the CEO of Dance AI, a neuroscience biomarker startup, and I have also been an EIR at HBS and done other straight-up mentoring. But most of what I do is help founders spin out of universities. The last three companies that I've done one was a cryptography company spinning out of BU, and I met that team when I was just mentoring the two guys who were thinking about spinning out. They asked me to co-found with them. That happened again a couple years later, after that company was acquired, with a group coming out of MIT where they came into my office hours as an EIR and I ended up helping them co-found the quantum computing company. And then this most recent one, I offered my hours as a mentor at Duke and ended up as COO of Dance.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:04:01 ] Awesome.

John Harthorne

[ 00:04:01 ] I'm John Harthorne. I'm the founder and managing director of a venture fund called Two Lanterns Venture Capital. We're a seed stage investor in software AI startups in the US and Israel. We just finished fund one and are on fund two now. And it's going great. Prior to this, I was the founder and longtime CEO of MassChallenge, the startup accelerator. Ran that for about a decade. And before that, I was at Bain & Company for a couple years, before that at business school, and before that at a couple of different startups, small businesses. Mostly in the Boston area, and I would say I have always benefited greatly from mentors. I am like an extrovert, so I think by speaking, and I need to have people to bounce ideas off of, ideally really smart people, smarter than me. That can give me really good feedback and tell me when my ideas are stupid, which they often are, or when they're genius, which they occasionally are. And I will, as we develop this, my key point of advocacy for mentors is: I like to have dozens of mentors and not really in a super formal— you don't just need one hardcore; you're signed up as my permanent life mentor.

John Harthorne

[ 00:05:04 ] But I look to different people for different things. Some people are have an incredible moral compass and I look to them when I have an ethical challenge. Some people are great at HR knowledge. Some people are really good at sales or other stuff. So I basically categorize them into a whole bunch of things. And it's been like, I mean, I would say, oh, 90% of my career to the mentors and people that I've surrounded myself with. So super important.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:05:27 ] Great. Great to meet you all. I'm Yossi. I'm the managing director for Wix Ventures, which is the investment arm for Wix. com. I came here to study at MIT around three years ago and decided to stay because Boston is great, and it's great to be here with all the Boston ecosystem. I'm also serving as entrepreneur in residence for MIT Design X still, alongside investing in startups as part of my work at Wix. uh, working with students a lot this is what I love. I mentor them, but as John said, I also look for mentors all the time for different parts in my life, both personal and also you know for my work stuff. So yeah, it's great to be here, thank you, Amazing.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:06:12 ] So maybe, John, starting with you and thinking about how you evaluate different types of mentors for the work that you're doing, how do founders identify the right mentors or advisors for the specific needs that they have?

John Harthorne

[ 00:06:26 ] Yeah, so I think the key thing is that similar to sort of like raising money, it is like when you approach people, try not to treat them as a means to an end for yourself, but treat them as an end in and of themselves. And you have to kind of get to know them as a person and not all of them will be a good fit for you. So it's also in your own interest to kind of interview them and figure out who they are. So first, I think it's approaching people as humans and as other people, and ask them a lot of questions about themselves and what are they interested in. So, when we launched MassChallenge, as an example, this is I think is sort of grounded in reality. When we launched MassChallenge, we had this crazy idea that we're going to launch the largest ever startup competition, we're going to catalyze a startup renaissance, and grow our way out of the great financial crisis by creating lots and lots of companies at scale that would create jobs and growth and optimism and hope. And we really had no idea what we were doing. The only thing you know for certainty about an early stage business plan is that it is wrong. That is the definite truth that you know for sure.

John Harthorne

[ 00:07:27 ] And that's always the case. So that's OK. So what we did was we put down our best guess. And then we just started pitching as many people as would listen to us. Starting with people that weren't even necessarily appropriate, but just would give us a meeting— it's fine. Then we asked everybody, 'Can you name five other people we should meet with?' Can you? And just so we could play the field, and then you find some people that like there's they light up. There's a spark in their eyes, they get excited, they give you good feedback. And then you just stay with them. For me, honestly, I don't know that it's the most strategic or efficient model, but I just blast the field, talk to as many people as I can, and then I identify the five, 10 people that I like the most that I thought had good ideas, and you'll start to see that they're in different categories, like this person was a really good networker. So they mentioned 10 other people we should talk to. This person had really good strategic insight as to where our business plan was dumb and where it was smart and how we could modify it. Another person had good ideas for how to raise money, or change the pricing, or whatever. And so you just start to kind of categorize them. And I took really intimate, like intricate notes, and then just followed up with people and said, 'Hey, you gave me great advice on this, that, and the other thing.'

John Harthorne

[ 00:08:34 ] Now I've reached a new milestone and I need new advice. Would you mind taking five minutes or 10 minutes or 20 minutes to meet with me and give me more advice? And I think I just let it evolve organically. It's much harder to be like, 'Hey, I met you at this event. Will you be my mentor for life?' It's like, I don't even know who you are, right? So it is an interplay, and I would say just really get to know people. Just as you would want people to treat you, treat them, and ask them, like, what are your interests? We did another good tip that we did really early on was... In an early meeting with people that you think you want to work with, you should try to let them talk more than half the time. Ask a lot of questions. What are your interests in life? What made you successful to date? What are your goals for the next five years? What are your biggest fears? What are your hopes for the next five years? How will you know if you're successful in a year from now? What metrics are you striving for? What types of people are you trying to surround yourself with? Whatever. And take notes and then help them. It is— it's a kind of a shitty thing, but it's true when you're just starting out and you're sort of nobody and you haven't built anything yet.

John Harthorne

[ 00:09:34 ] You kind of got to help a lot of other people that are already more established than you for a while, but that endears you to them by doing favors, and it builds a network of support, and then they will help you back. um and then you can ask them for favors and people love actually to be asked for favors especially if they've already got a positive feel for you so just treat people like humans learn about them and then kind of slot them into categories and try to add value for them while they're while you're also deriving value I can just say that he walks the talk because when I graduated from MIT and started the VC, that was really new to me, especially in the Boston area.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:10:07 ] And one of the person that I reached out to was actually sitting next to me. and he was kind enough to sit with me and actually talk to me about his history, experience, how we built MassChallenge, and also open his network. to me, which I, you know, feel thankful for, because I feel like making more connections. You want people that are not just, you know, well experienced, but also great people. That will see eye to eye with you, not patronize you. I think this is also part of choosing the right mentors. It's not just about their LinkedIn profile, right? You also need like, it's kind of like a founder choosing a VC. And it's not just VC choosing the founders. I feel like if you're a founder and you're looking for a VC, you also need to talk not just to VCs, but also with other founders to make sure that they're aligned with you, aligned with your values. You can actually have a great connection. And I feel like this is, it's not just about the experience. It's not just about that. It's also very, you know, it's like, it's something that's truly between people and the network.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:11:13 ] Yeah, I guess I just compliment John's comments with the introvert's perspective on how to get this done. Um, so I don't like going out to lunches with people and trying to sell them on the thing that I'm doing and it's very hard for me to do to do the things that John does so well. What I like about Boston is that there are so many formal programs where you can actually talk to somebody.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:11:37 ] In the context of something they've already committed to. So I was an entrepreneur in residence at HBS. Yasi's at Sloan. I'm sure you have office hours for your fund. So there are a lot of ways to get in touch with people that they've already kind of put out there that you can just step into. And when I've committed to an hour with you on the EIR path, I'm going to spend that hour purely focused on you. And the goal of the meeting isn't necessarily for me to become a mentor, but for me to be a mentor for that moment about fundraising or something else that you have questions for me on. So I also think it's important to think about the type of mentorship or advisorship that you're looking for. I think, you know, for advisor stuff, there's sort of three flavors. There's the advisors that are just going to be like a mutual relationship that you chat with. They're an entrepreneur in residence or something like that, and it's kind of for free. And then, if you have a startup and you're looking at advisors as a way of adding value to the startup, there's the kind of advisors that you pay with money, and there's the kind of advisors that you pay with stock.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:12:43 ] and the kind of advisors you pay with money is usually like your lawyers or people who are experts in a particular narrow thing that you're not particularly good at maybe even operations or compliance the kind you compensate with stock are usually the ones who have broad experience who've been an operator before hopefully and who can help you with the growth path and aren't really in a specific function like that.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:13:11 ] Dovetails well into my next question, which is, okay, so you have maybe someone that you want to work with.

Kat Laz

[ 00:13:16 ] How would you go about successfully onboarding advisors or mentors into your startup? And does that differ, I guess, depending on how you're compensating them?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:13:26 ] I think it usually starts with an advisor starts with a social relationship and they're interested in your company and you have a couple conversations where you're just getting like maybe an hour or two of more or less free mentorship. and i think what john said and what yossi said is right you have to let them dominate the conversation for those first couple of hours and see how Much they bring to the table, and if you think they're bringing a lot to the table and there would be a big benefit for you all to work together, then you can start talking about okay well maybe for the next would you be interested in being our our advisor to this company, while we're. In precede so for the next two years and come up with some kind of structural agreement, you know, usually you're compensating people with options at that. At that kind of situation, and it's super helpful because you're getting the advice and the mentorship and their networks start to become attached to your network. Which, as a startup founder, that can be the most important part— not just the advice they give you, but are they willing to make phone calls for you?

John Harthorne

[ 00:14:33 ] Yeah, I think likewise. And I would say for people just getting started out, often the most daunting element is like, what do I do first? Like, it's sort of like starting a— if you're starting a book or writing something— and you have a blank page. Is the scariest part, right? What's the first step? So we started with people that we knew. So we went to, I was, when we started Mass Challenge, I'm thinking, so. My co-founder was an HBS grad, I was a Sloan grad, so we just went back to our professors, to the people that ran the entrepreneurship center, people we had already worked with that knew us, had a reasonable level of respect for us, and then we pitched them on the idea and asked for advice. Just like, what do you think? Is this dumb? Is it smart? Who else should we talk to? And then they sort of catalyzed additional introductions, and then it just kind of snowballs. And pretty soon, you're like, I have too many meetings to keep up with. There's not enough hours in the day. And we had to split up. But just start— I think key thing is just get started with somebody that you know and trust and you like, that you think has a reasonable respect level for you, and then ask them for their quick advice on what are your next steps and other introductions as it were.

John Harthorne

[ 00:15:34 ] And I would say certainly there are, at some point, it is reasonable to compensate people for their advice, especially in a more formal, bigger capacity. But it's also reasonable for a while to just ask for free advice for a long time. I don't think you have to jump right to compensation. And even some of my best advisors, like Desh Deshpande, who is a super successful entrepreneur and avid advisor, he used to always tell me: 'The people that ask you for money early on are the least valuable advisors, and you should steer clear of them.' And I think there's some truth in that. Of course, again, it is reasonable to compensate people at times. So I wouldn't say never do it. But if people in the first meeting are saying, 'This is how much I'm going to charge and how much equity I want,' then— probably they're not that good. The people that you want are the ones that are so successful, they don't really care about the money, and they're doing it because they love the game, and they want to help you, and they love the enthusiasm and excitement for it. And so I learned a lot. I mean, Desh was one of my best ever advisors.

John Harthorne

[ 00:16:35 ] And that was a good piece of advice from him. So look for people that really are passionate and love it and get excited the way that you do. And again, it's easier. It's a different game. You can play it many different ways. But as an extrovert, I played a numbers game and talked to literally 1 ,000 people to find 10. that I really adored, which is a lot of work and it isn't for everybody. But I would say at least like play the field a little bit and then pick, you know, pick a few that you really resonate with from there.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:17:03 ] I'll just add, you know, if you're doing it through LinkedIn, be specific, right? Be specific on what you want. Don't just write, 'Will you mentor me?' or 'Let's grab coffee,' okay? It's not enough. Just say, you know, expectations. Why did you reach out? What do you want? How I can be helpful to you? I always ask people when I meet with them. How will it be a good meeting for you? How will you define it as a good meeting? What will be the outcome in the end? And I think this is where you try to help, not just meeting people out for coffee, because then you won't have enough. You know time of the day to do that. So be very specific on why you reached out, and what do you want to get out of it. And I feel people value that. You know, be honest, be direct, and be exactly— what you want out of the mentor. Um, yeah. And also later on, like you said, you don't just want them for free. You want them to be invested. Right? You probably want people to see them on the cap table, because then you're sure that, maybe not from day one, but they are committed to, you know, to the startups, to the program, and not just, you know, another title on a, you know, one of the founder presentation.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:18:08 ] Here's my advisory board, okay.

John Harthorne

[ 00:18:10 ] And as a key point, like Desh used to say, there are three things that you can get out of advisors: wealth, wisdom, and work. Right. And so, ideally, you get at least two of those three things from each member on your board of advisers or those that you're willing to compensate and build a long term relationship with. But, so, they could either invest or donate, if it's a nonprofit, or they could provide you with really good insight. Or, they're willing to do work and actually draft documents for you, make introductions, sit with you and work out strategy and stuff like that. It's just a simple, easy framework to think about of what you're looking for out of that person.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:18:42 ] I'll just add to exactly what you said, and don't commit early. It's harder to get people out of your cap table than getting them in. And I see it all the time, even for founders coming to me and say, 'Hey. We want you on the advisory board. We're going to give you a percentage.' I'm like, 'Wait, I haven't even brought you any value. Why do you want to do that? It's your cap table. Wait with it.' So, you know, that's a note that I totally agree with you guys.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:19:05 ] I agree. Um, you know, usually by the time you get to a couple years in, you've got advisors who you may not have spoken to since a year and a half ago. It happens to everyone. It happens, you know, the best of us. You know, that's why there's vesting. Um, but you know, I think I think that's very true. Probably in the first three months or so, you're not even really talking about money. But if it's valuable to have people on the cap table, you really should. And if they're, you know, at a level that you think will improve recognition for your company or their, just very good in the space that you're in. I mean, it's definitely worth considering. Yes, I think there's a big difference too between cash and options compensation. So, there are a lot of folks who are looking for a job, frankly. and are going to ask for cash compensation. And there's nothing wrong with that if they're doing the work and you want to pay them in cash. If that's what you have, but when you're an early-stage startup, what you have more of usually at the beginning is equity and finding people who are motivated by equity, I think, is so much more valuable to a startup than people who are motivated by cash.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:20:12 ] And that will probably be true even for employees and people all the way down the line. Like people should genuinely, when they're negotiating with you as employees, if they don't show interest in the equity portion of the equation, they're probably not there for the right reason. Um, same thing for mentors. They should really be looking for equity. Um, not necessarily cash— it's Mike.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:20:33 ] I would love to build on that a little bit. Um, so what, for the mentors? Um, before they hit the point of being compensated, what is in it for them? What is the value add?

Kat Lazell

[ 00:20:46 ] Let me start with you. Love of the game. I think love of the game.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:20:49 ] You're getting, you know, a front seat of building something, you know, without being there for the full time. I think bringing and also paying back. You know, most of the time, for, you know, I was a founder before, you know, and people helped me. building my company. People around me really help me with the ecosystem, open doors. And I feel like this is something that people also love to be part of— something that helps founders when they're doing their first steps. I think this is something that people just love.

John Harthorne

[ 00:21:19 ] build. Yeah, I agree. It's like launching a startup is exhilarating. It's also terrifying, right? I mean, it is. It's like the most terrifying and horrible thing you'll ever do, but it's also the best way you can express yourself in the world of business.

John Harthorne

[ 00:21:33 ] And you miss it as you get older, you no longer have, and sort of more established, you no longer really have the capacity to go and launch something new in the same way. Or just becomes too challenging, too difficult, and so you really want to relive that through somebody else, vicariously, and that means that which is important because it means, as the entrepreneur, you got to bring that passion to the equation, you got to like re-spark that excitement and that creative enthusiasm is a super important part of it. So they're getting a lot of excitement, enthusiasm. They have a lot that they can add, but they can't really live it in their own life in the same way. So I think that is super important. And then again, I think this comes down to asking them each individually what's in it— sort of for you. And what do you value in life? What gets you excited? And it will be a little bit different for each of them. But some of them just like to flex their strategic muscles. They're really, really, really smart, and they love to apply their intelligence to difficult problems. Some of them just have this great network and community that they wanna share with the world with other great, smart people.

John Harthorne

[ 00:22:39 ] So it will vary a little bit, but a lot of it is just living vicariously through the entrepreneur.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:22:45 ] You can't do every idea you think of. And I think a lot of people who do multiple startups, like we all have, are addicts to the game. And they really enjoy seeing the business ideas. They really enjoy learning new things. I mean, my last couple startups— cryptography, quantum computing, neuroscience— subjects I knew nothing about the day I met the entrepreneur or knew very little about. So I get to learn all of the subject matter while passing on knowledge about how to get from day zero to two years in.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:23:17 ] I think you know. For most mentors, they just enjoy it a lot. Many of the more seasoned mentors are generally at a stage of their career where they don't want to overly commit. So they may only meet with you you know unpaid whatever for several months, because they don't really want the hanging over their head— the you know, I have to do this. It's a job now, they like to do it and they enjoy it. To some degree, the money takes the enjoyment out of it.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:23:44 ] So I just want to add that you also get out of it as well because you're exposed to new innovation.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:23:50 ] You're exposed to new innovation and new talent, right? Think about, like, you know. I remember Neil Young playing with Pearl Jam, right? That's the case. Like, you know, you said old people, but it's like you don't have the time, you don't have the capacity to start a startup. But you can also experiment with AI by that. And you can also work with great new founders and great new talent and build something with them. And I feel like it's not just giving back, but you're also getting a lot of it from it.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:24:23 ] So we've talked about some pitfalls that that founders might run into when bringing on mentors. Offering compensation a little too early can be a common pitfall. What are other common pitfalls that you've observed? And how would you recommend that folks avoid those? Well, John, I'll start with you for that one.

John Harthorne

[ 00:24:42 ] Sure, so I think that one of the things is if people approach you with a lot of greed and are immediately demanding huge equity or compensation, that's sort of an obvious red flag. But I would be careful. It's not that common, so I wouldn't worry too dramatically about it, but there are sort of bad people out there that will try to abuse you and take advantage. Not a lot, but so that's one obvious red flag. I think the other element that you'll see, again, where I found it very valuable to talk to lots of different advisors and not just one or two, is that... Not everybody looks at this. It's hard to do to launch a startup successfully. It's incredibly high risk and low odds of success. And so nobody really has all the answers. If you're getting all of your feedback and input and advice from one person, they're probably wrong half the time. So if you but if you have 10 people, you can sort of take a poll and average it out. And if all 10 of them say that you should definitely do step A, then they're probably right. If you get five different answers with two people in each group, then you have to decide either which of those people are the smartest on this topic and the best, or it's dealer's choice— you get to decide.

John Harthorne

[ 00:25:48 ] But I think I found it to be very important because you will find not only different pieces of advice but often opposite pieces of advice from people that you trust and believe in. That is also, I think, a risk: people will take you down a rabbit hole that suits their interests and needs but doesn't necessarily suit yours. So I find it very valuable, again, to get a balance of different opinions. And at the end of the day, recognize you own your company. You are the one that loses the most if it doesn't go well. Everybody on the sidelines is just giving advice. So definitely listen. And if they're smart and it resonates with you, then take their advice. But you have to be the decision maker at the end. Don't allow them to sort of overwhelm you and coerce you into actions that are not in your interest. I think that's probably the key thing in my mind.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:26:35 ] You can definitely get advice whiplash talking to different people and having them give you 180-degree opposite opinions just based on what they know.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:26:47 ] It is important to synthesize and think about why they say what they say, based on what their background is. And that may be more informative than actually the piece of advice they gave you. And I would add a giant green flag to me for mentorship— is operators, somebody who has started a company before. because it's a difficult thing to start a company and the weight that's on the head of a ceo is something that if you haven't experienced it for yourself if you haven't had to fundraise before if you haven't had to almost run out of money before if you haven't had to you know hire people you barely know and it's when you have no time all of that stuff matters and it enriches the advice that somebody's going to give you so i find it much more meaningful in a lot of ways for mentors to have walked the same path and have fought through the same struggles as an entrepreneur themselves.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:27:43 ] And I would also add from observing some of the folks coming through our programs, sort of ties back to knowing what you need. I think also being explicit with your mentor about what it is you're looking for. I've seen some startups come back and say, 'Well, they didn't do X, Y, Z thing for me.' And I say, 'Did you ask them to do X, Y, Z thing?' So I think being—not expecting them to be mind readers as well.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:28:04 ] So I want to kind of turn to thinking about folks coming out of colleges and universities. And Shereen, maybe I'll start with you for this one. What special opportunities do people who are currently enrolled in college have to reach out cold to people in hopes of building and advising our mentorship relationship?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:28:20 ] Yeah, I mean, I get a lot of notes. I went to Sloan as well, and I get a lot of notes from Sloanies of the last decade who were starting their first company. And honestly, you know, when I get those or people who are reaching out for some other reason that we have something in common. I really enjoy getting those. But the schools themselves have a lot of resources set aside for entrepreneurs because they're very interested in having their entrepreneurs succeed. So they set up entrepreneur in residence programs. They set up, you know, funds that go alongside the university. So I think. Almost every university in Boston has an entrepreneurship center, and that entrepreneurship center generally has at least a dozen senior mentors signed up for various programs that they offer. That you should check out. And these are all things that you can get for free.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:29:11 ] Universities also often have legal office hours, which can be the most expensive thing to spend your money on and the biggest savings when you can get. An hour of a lawyer's time for free just to tell you you're not screwing something up or that you don't need a lawyer for X, Y, or Z.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:29:28 ] There's just, you know, BU, Tufts.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:29:31 ] Northeastern especially, MIT, HBS, like all of the schools around here have really well-funded, dedicated programs to help success.

John Harthorne

[ 00:29:43 ] Yep, I would second that. I think that's the right thing to do is start with the entrepreneurship center. Find also often like specific professors that you really bond with that are in a right subject. They will have. Advice for you on who else to talk to or they'll be good advisors and support structures themselves. Then there's, you know, not just your own university, but all of the other universities. As Shireen mentioned, almost all of those events are open to the broad public. You can just walk in. So just scour the web look for who's running events in your area. It's even easier with Chat GPT or other You can just ask them, 'Where are their startup events in my area in the next month?' and it's pretty detailed. And just go to events. MassChallenge runs events that are largely open to the public. Almost all of the events are free or $10 or something like that to go to. And then just start going to them. You'll find some events you like, some you don't, you meet lots of people, you don't meet people, and then just keep going to the ones that you like. It really is just getting started and then using that initial. You know, beachhead to just snowball into five other people that you meet, five other and pretty soon it is— I think that Nate Boston is not that big of an ecosystem.

John Harthorne

[ 00:30:49 ] So there's like maybe a little bit of an eggshell to break through at the very beginning. But once you get in and know a few people, it seems like you know hundreds of people. Very, very quickly, and especially as a university student. The other thing that I would say is, that I think Shireen sort of highlighted briefly is, cold outreach in general doesn't work. Like if I just get random outreach from people on LinkedIn or otherwise, I just get, I'm overwhelmed. I get so many of those that it's really hard to distinguish. But if it's somebody who has at a minimum an affinity, like I went to Sloan or I went to, I went to Bowdoin undergrad. If they went, if they have something in common, that helps a little bit even better. It's if it's a if Shireen makes the intro to me and says, 'Oh, this is somebody I know that I think you would really like meeting then that warm intro is something I take almost every time. And it's not that hard to find somebody that we know in common. So try to make the effort. This also shows that you cared enough to research each of the people you're reaching out to and you're not just blasting 1000 people in the hopes that some of them will respond. So I think warm outreach is super important.

John Harthorne

[ 00:31:52 ] Find somebody you know in common or something you have in common, or I saw your video and I really liked what you said about XYZ. At least demonstrate you put some effort in, and that is a really key step to getting that sort of initial introduction.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:32:05 ] Also there's the formal stuff that you talked about with the mentors how to build the startups and so on, but there's also the informal side, like office hours with professors— even if they're not your professors, like I went to an office hour of a Nobel Prize-winning education economist because I had a question. That was where he wasn't my professor. He wasn't offered in any entrepreneurship program, but I wanted to validate the problem, not the solution, the problem. And I feel like this is also something that you as a student can actually look if you have problems, you have issues, if you have, you know, stuff that you want to validate. Look at the professors out there and their office hours and write to them that you're, you know, studying and there's faculty and so on and you want to come to their office hours.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:32:49 ] You know, usually they will say, 'Yeah, come over and, you know, have a chat with us.' And I use that a lot because this is part of the research and everything that you have that you know MIT and Harvard can offer you. Which is which is great and it's more than they're just formal like how to build a startup.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:33:09 ] I think it's going back to the validation of the problems all the time. And some of them even were like innovators and they created startups of their own and so on. So use that as well.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:33:20 ] There are two more kinds of aspects that I want to touch on before we open it up to Q &A. And the first one is sort of maintaining these relationships once you've established a relationship with an advisor or a mentor. What practices do you think contribute to sustaining kind of a beneficial, productive relationship, particularly as your company evolves? And Yossi, maybe I'll start with you.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:33:41 ] First of all, be honest. You know, if you're going and speak to a person, be honest with your issues, with your problems. We're not here to just, you know, hear, oh, everything is awesome. Even when we invest in a company, you don't want to like, you know, for them to say everything is great, everything is awesome. If people want your help and people want to chat with you, we expect them to be honest. And I think it's vice versa. You're going to be honest with them as well on the hard problems, on what you see in their path, and so on.

John Harthorne

[ 00:34:13 ] Yeah, I agree. And I think it's really important also to demonstrate you are listening and hearing their feedback. Even if you don't agree with it 100%, that's okay. You can be honest and straightforward with them. But demonstrating that you have... That you are following through on your commitments and your promises each meeting, you should come back each subsequent meeting, you should come back with something new, done right. I always want to hear and, ideally, something positive, but it's also okay if you're like, 'Well, I attempted to do XYZ and I and it didn't work out because of ABC. That's okay, but just have like a good update that demonstrates I am working, I am trying. Because among the worst things is just like, I don't have the time to meet once a month to just talk about ideas and nothing actually happens. Like, I'm only interested if we're actually doing something that there's actually outcomes that are happening. And so, again, I think understanding each of the advisor's interests and helping to, demonstrating to them that you are executing towards their goals is very, very valuable. Helping.

John Harthorne

[ 00:35:13 ] Often I find, you know, helping their other mentees, their children, potentially, their other colleagues and friends, like just demonstrating goodwill and that there's positive momentum and that there's something in it for them to stay engaged with you instead of just like your rambling incoherently about ideas every month that you'll lose them very quickly. So just sort of demonstrating forward progress, commitment, and goodwill is always like a good step. final thing is I would say— even just quick touch points— maybe you don't need their help. But just like occasional updates, nice and brief, not like a 17-page document. Here's everything I did in the month. But just like, hey, just wanted to let you know we're progressing. Things are going great. I closed this customer. I'm struggling to make this higher. Don't need to chat just yet. But I'll be back in touch in a month. Just so you stay top of mind and you don't disappear for nine months at a time. It's also actually very valuable. I struggle with that sometimes. But that's actually a very valuable trick that I learned from some of the people on my team: to just stay top of mind so you don't disappear completely.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:36:15 ] Yeah, I think underneath what you were saying was also setting up a regular cadence of talking to them or setting expectations about how often you'll touch base. Some people are once a month. Some people are once a quarter, depending on how much time they have and the kind of thing you're talking about. So, if it's, you know, they're helping you out to think about your fundraising and helping you with your pitch deck, you might meet with them like three times in a month. For other people, you might only reach out to them once a quarter, give them a short update, and ask for a specific answer to a specific type of question. And the other thing underneath what you were saying— or that I'd like to draw your attention to— is just the emails and the communications with your mentors and advisors need to be brief. And that's one thing I always work with founders on because you really want to tell your whole story in the way that you want to tell it, but that's not the way that people want to receive it necessarily. And trying to keep things to two short paragraphs. Four or five sentences total.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:37:16 ] Nobody reads more than that in an email. Think about how much of an email you would be willing to receive and read through and cut that in half for your audience. And that's pretty much as much as you can write them in an email. If you have more than a few sentences to say to them, schedule 15 minutes. And the other thing is don't be embarrassed to schedule 15 minutes instead of a half hour or an hour. People who are very busy often dread hour-long meetings or can't take them. But 15 minutes is something almost everybody has in between stuff. And so I want to popularize the 15-minute meeting because it can be.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:37:52 ] Much more helpful to get 15 minutes than to be told. No, I don't have an hour till next month.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:37:59 ] The piece that I want to end with is, before you open to Q &A, is just hearing from you on any advice that you received from a mentor or quote or kind of a takeaway that you got that still kind of rattles around in your head.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:38:15 ] Mistakes are your greatest mentors— is the thing that a mentor once told me, and I'm like, as a serial entrepreneur, I 100% believe that.

John Harthorne

[ 00:38:27 ] I'll give two brief ones. A lot of them are not necessarily monumental, huge, grand pieces of universal wisdom, but they're just problems that you're stuck on that somebody solves so crisply and cleanly. so i remember early on at mass challenge we were innovating all sorts of things and like basically it was this is like pre-crypto era but basically inventing how do we create a token to reward mentors for engaging with other startups and all these other things and one of my mentors was just like maybe you don't have to innovate on every aspect of the business like Maybe some of it can be regular, and you can just have a few innovations. And that was like a huge game-changing way for us to look at it. And then another one that is really simple, and I felt stupid for it, but it's a good clarification of just how easily people can solve your problems for you sometimes. I had worked, when we were running our... award ceremony at Mass. We're getting too big for the room that we were using at the convention center. So we had about 2 ,000 people we could fit in there, and we had interest from 2 ,500, 3 ,000 people to attend. We're like, we're going to run out of tickets.

John Harthorne

[ 00:39:27 ] We need a bigger room. And Josh Boger, who was on my board, was like, 'No, no, no,' John. Didn't you go to business school? You just have to raise prices. It's a supply and demand problem. And I was like, 'Holy shit.' I didn't even— why did I not think of that? That is like so obvious. But sometimes they just have like clarity.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:39:43 ] I think sometimes you want people that believe in you— sometimes even more than you believe in yourself. I think this is truly important, especially in a startup where it's a roller coaster. People that will lift you up and say, 'It's okay, you can do it.' This is what I see in you, and here's, you know— you'll figure this out. And sometimes that's enough. And I had this one mentor that is also a friend that I feel brings it in, you know, to the table a lot of the time.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:40:12 ] Love that. So we want to open it up for questions. And maybe just to get a sense of who's in the room asking some of these questions, how many of you are mentors by show of hands?

Kat Lazell

[ 00:40:23 ] Awesome and how many of you are potentially looking for mentorship? Use this to seed some of the so some of the seeds of networking later. Okay, perfect. So um, who would like to ask a question? Maybe you would start with this in the front row and I think do we have a microphone for her?

SPEAKER_9

[ 00:40:45 ] Hi, everyone. Hello, my name is Anshul. I am a Sloan MBA recently and just launched our company on Delta V demo day two days ago on maternal care. Question: very basic. What is the basic difference between an advisor and a mentor? And how can we bring value to the mentor or advisors? As founders?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:41:07 ] I can start.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:41:09 ] Mentors are usually for a different set of issues, maybe like strategic or personal.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:41:16 ] I always think of advisor, like when you get to advisor, I always think of it as being more formal. Like, that's when you start thinking about, okay, is this going to be a relationship with the company as opposed to me personally?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:41:28 ] So I think, I don't know, there's probably a lot of ways to cut it.

John Harthorne

[ 00:41:32 ] I'm not sure that there is a formal, officially accepted definitional difference between them, per se, but I have a similar kind of perspective as Shireen, so maybe that's the conventional, accepted wisdom is that a mentor to me is almost not. Not necessarily sort of spiritual but it's kind of a personal, like a guide for you as a human being and how do I think through my life and that can apply to your business as well. Um, but in my mind, that is a longer term, more personal relationship. And then an advisor could be just on a specific, specialized topic, like I need an advisor for pricing, or I need an advisor for a specific topic. But I also agree that, in the business sense, that you typically call your board of advisors. And there is often a formal structure of, like, this is business advice. To me, in my head, it's more of a topical value that they're providing, whereas a mentor is somebody who cares about you as a person and a human in a slightly different layer. I'm not sure that's exactly correct, but that's how I think of it.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:42:30 ] I totally agree with you. I feel like mentor is something that has more personal stuff into it rather than advisors. It's not about advisors. It's how about you do your startup where mentor is why did you choose to be a founder in the first place, right? This path and talking to you about that.

SPEAKER_2

[ 00:42:57 ] Hi, Lewis Brilliant. Thank you all for coming out and speaking.

SPEAKER_2

[ 00:43:02 ] I learned a lot from listening to all of you. I'm a mentor. I'm one of the guys who raised their hands on the mentor thing, but I'm also a coach, a very high-end coach.

SPEAKER_2

[ 00:43:11 ] And I want to disagree with what John said first out about going in and asking to be paid up front. I will not do anything where I'm not paid up front.

SPEAKER_2

[ 00:43:22 ] Sometimes it's by money, but often it's by learning from the people I'm mentoring. I tend to only mentor people who I think are smarter than me, more dedicated than me, and people who I wish I was when I was 20 years old.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:43:36 ] Great.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:43:39 ] Maybe we'll take some folks in the back corner here.

SPEAKER_4

[ 00:43:44 ] Hi, I'm Chris. My question is about how you guys think about mentoring diverse individuals. I think anecdotally, I went to Harvard Law School when I graduated. There were 30 kids in a class of 600 that were black. Most of them went on to big law where there weren't black partners there. And they suffer tremendously in terms of mentorship because that enables them to climb the corporate ladder. I ended up being a public defender, so that didn't really matter. But in terms of like the VC world and startups, there are very few black people like in the room and just in networking events here in Boston in general. So I wonder, do you guys have diverse mentees and do you think about that actively?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:44:20 ] I think about that a lot. I am usually mentoring women, although I've mentored a lot of men. But I came up at a time when there were really no women in banking. When I started in financial services, no women to really mentor me in banking. And I actually met my first woman mentor in banking probably 15 years ago, not that long ago in a relative sense.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:44:44 ] I really couldn't focus on having women as mentors or focus on a particular race and ethnicity at that time.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:44:55 ] I just found eliminating that criteria and maybe finding mentors that don't look like you. I don't think mentors necessarily have to. I think some mix of your mentors should, and that's a difficult thing. I think the good news is there are starting to be—um— venture capital firms that are centered on black entrepreneurs. I would seek them out. I've sought out to improve my deal flow and diversify it as an angel. I've sought out VCs who focus on minority communities and they are 100% always willing to have a conversation. So I think that's a good place to start. They often have office hours and they make great sponsors and they're very good about networking— the ones I've spoken with. I don't know if you have more.

John Harthorne

[ 00:45:46 ] It's a great question, and it is a real challenge. So yes, there's three of us in our fund, and the other partner and our senior associate are both female. And so we do make a specific effort. We have 25% of our investments are in female founders. And it is a real struggle. I see it in just our meetings with my partner, who is smarter, better looking, and more interesting than me, and will be in charge of certain aspects. And yet, when we are speaking with...

John Harthorne

[ 00:46:18 ] outsiders, they very often look to me for the answer, and I'm like, that's not my job. She's better, she's the appropriate person to answer that question. So there is like a very real bias in the system, and a lot of, and so I think it is a challenge.

John Harthorne

[ 00:46:33 ] For non-diverse individuals to mentor diverse individuals who have a different set of struggles. So I do make a conscious effort to try to help.

John Harthorne

[ 00:46:46 ] Nevertheless, I do agree that it's challenging. At MassChallenge, we did explicitly identify this as a problem, and one of the challenges is that, as you noted, that you are faced with this sort of historically biased system, which means there aren't as many people of diverse backgrounds that are in positions of leadership and success and authority and so you have fewer mentors to draw from to support a very large pool of incoming talented young entrepreneurs that deserve that mentorship. So I think Shireen is right that you will have to look to mentors that are not necessarily of the same background and don't look exactly the same and will be lacking in some skills and knowledge and capabilities that will be necessary. This is an added burden and challenge in what is already a difficult field. But I do think there are more and more people that are willing and interested and excited to help. And there are funds that are specifically devoted for it and many individuals. And increasingly, society, hopefully, is trending more towards a better mix, maybe not.

John Harthorne

[ 00:47:49 ] All the time and it's very you know up and down, but um, I i do uh, I do hope that improves over time and I do think yeah, people are increasingly committed to try to solve that problem, but it remains a challenge.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:47:59 ] Take some folks in this corner— we do.

SPEAKER_9

[ 00:48:09 ] Hi, I'm Rohit. Are there certain qualities in founders that you look for before agreeing to come on board as advisor or mentor?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:48:19 ] So hard to pin down and I'm sure for the VCs it'll be an interesting an interesting response, but it's very hard to to pin down those attributes. However, it's usually underlain by an energy to solve a problem. So they're excited by the problem. They're willing to throw themselves at it. They are 100% enthusiastic about just solving a particular problem. Um and they know what that problem is and can say it in a sentence, so that's generally what I'm looking for when I'm trying to work with the founder. I'm trying to figure out how I can be helpful. So usually, the second thing I'm looking for is: Let me know, like, I'm not saying it's to be nice—I'm just saying, let me know how I can be helpful. Because I want to target the conversation to the topics that are most useful to you. So I think coming in like showing your energy and passion for a problem and also having a specific ask that's appropriate for the mentor is a really great way to get started.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:49:23 ] It's definitely something I look for.

John Harthorne

[ 00:49:25 ] Yeah, I think I have a similar answer. I think it will vary for each mentor, so it's not exactly the same across the board. But in general, for me also, it is passion, commitment, grit. Like, I really like to see that they are unreasonably attached to their idea and the outcomes that they're targeting, and that they are committed and will take action. There's nothing worse than having a meeting where you discuss things, you come back and have another meeting, it's the same discussion, and you're like, 'Did nothing happen?' Like, I thought you were committed to actually making a change in the world. I'm not as interested in just whiteboard sessions. I'm really interested in seeing somebody that is almost addicted to just execution and getting stuff done all the time. And then I feel like, 'OK, I can help here and there, but you're going to be an independent actor that's going to go and get stuff done on your own.' That, I think, is a really attractive characteristic in The Founder from my perspective.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:50:12 ] I'm also looking for people that I can learn from, that I feel like they're doing something because they're passionate about it, but they know about it, and I'm not necessarily know everything about it, and I can learn from them as well. And I feel like this is what I look like. People that are looking for a mentor, but you want to build it as a partnership. And they're willing to take you as a partner into their journey.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:50:35 ] Not working your path, but actually creating their path based on your perspectives. This is what I would look for.

Kat Lazell

[ 00:50:45 ] We do. This gentleman in the white shirt. I think white shirt. I can't totally see. Yeah.

SPEAKER_6

[ 00:50:53 ] Thank you. Hopefully a quick question. So it's around getting mentors or advisors within the field of the market that you're sort of building in. And if I could give a little background. So I've sort of built a tool around helping board meetings for nonprofits sort of run better. And I've reached out to a lot of board facilitators to help sort of build this out. A few of them have shown a lot of interest in sort of being involved. One in particular, I want to have them involved in terms of more outreach. But they have some real thoughts about the product. In terms of building that out, we're clashing a little bit on that. I'm curious about sort of your thoughts on just working with people in your market versus people who are business-savvy in general, and how to deal with those sort of disagreements.

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:51:38 ] Clashing or brainstorming, that was the main question. You were brainstorming with him or you were clashing about the product?

Yossi Hayut

[ 00:51:51 ] But I feel like this is the thing: will you listen to him, and he also needs to listen to you? Right— not just making sure that you're following his steps and advices. I feel like this is the thing, and this is what I think you need to frame for yourself: is it the right man? He is— he the right mentor for you?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:52:11 ] Because of that, I think that the arguments show that this person actually cares about what you're doing and isn't just there to validate you and make you feel good. And you never, you know, if you've made your, what I always agree with founders, if you've made your best argument, if I've made my best argument, give me 15 minutes, listen to what I have to say. If we don't agree, we have to disagree and move on. And that's always a good thing as a founder to have as a key principle. You're going to have lots of different opinions coming to you, but often you'll have to disagree and keep moving. But for the people who disagree with you, keep in mind that they care, they've thought about the problem, and they care enough to tell you. The truth is, they see it and they know you're not going to like it. And that costs them more. So, I guess for me, if I was looking for a mentor, I would definitely look for somebody who doesn't tell me what I want to hear all the time. And that's an important trait.

John Harthorne

[ 00:53:11 ] Yeah, I agree. And I think it's not necessarily a deal breaker, but it can be. But I prefer to have lots of different types of personalities as well as different skill sets and mentors around me. So, probably the best mentors I've ever had don't tell me what to do, but just ask a lot of questions. And they help me to realize what I already know that I haven't. Fully externalized or sort of properly identified. Like Desh was like that, he was incredible. He'd only ever ask questions and it was frustrating because at times I'd be like, 'Can you just tell me what to do? Just say the answer and I'll do it.' But he was like, 'He refused to.' But then I had some mentors like Josh Boger, who was very opinionated and would tell me all the time what to do, and it was super frustrating and difficult, but he was also almost always right. Not always, but almost always right. So, and I think the key is, are they, so I think to Shreen's point, the fact that they have an opinion is probably a good sign. But there is a line at which you're like, 'All right, now you're being stubborn and obstinate and not actually working together in a collaborative way.' And that's kind of the key question I think you've got to get to, is to what point are they trying to sort of take over your dream and your goal?'

John Harthorne

[ 00:54:15 ] And at the end of the day, you're the entrepreneur. You need to make the decisions and own those decisions and be comfortable with them. You should listen to them, especially if they're smart and you respect them. So probably you both need to ask each other more questions about, like, 'Why do you believe that?' What is the goal that you're trying to accomplish with that? What is the benefit that we're not otherwise getting through that? And I would just say— really deeply understand that perspective— then you have to decide if you think it's right for you or not. But isn't necessarily a deal-breaker; it could be if they're just unwilling to listen and be collaborative, but also good to have difficult people around you sometimes.

SPEAKER_8

[ 00:54:58 ] I'm Kevin. Thank you for your time. I was just— the thought crossed my mind about like AI— and can like, if you don't have a great mentor, can AI kind of substitute? What type of questions would you recommend? You know, like I'm not even one of those, it's just tip of the tongue nowadays. So what I'm saying is, if you had like some questions that your mentees ask you, could you share some of those maybe? And then also, I'm sure like we could use AI to find like a list of like potential mentors as well. But like, what type of questions, if we're going about it by ourselves, would you?

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:55:31 ] I think that was a South Park episode last week. Yeah.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:55:37 ] Yes, you need it. You need to catch that one because it makes the point very very well. It's very comforting to be able to have Chat GPT or something else like right at your fingertips to ask questions and there are a lot of good answers out there. But it's chat GPT, isn't a human who's had those experiences that aren't recorded. It can only give you answers based on what it's seen and knows, and the kind of seasoning and ability to pivot and all of that that a real mentor brings to the table is always going to have value. I think there's a lot of like. There are a lot of times you don't need an expert in the room. You just need to know what have other people done to approach this problem. And I think figuring out what other people have done to approach the problem and having chat GPT run around to find that information for you is great. But you don't want something that's just going to validate you back and that sort of thing. And definitely watch the South Park episode.

John Harthorne

[ 00:56:34 ] So I think it's a great question, actually. And I do think over time, it will get better and better. And you'll get digital twins of specific people, so you could get like at least insight into what type of advice they might give you. I don't think yet right now that it's a full substitute. But it definitely can make you much more efficient in your engagement and interactions. And a lot of questions around, just like market sizing and market segmentation, and which types of customers might be interested in. What other competitors exist in pricing and other sorts of things like that that are sort of more factual and based on information that's available on the web? It can radically reduce the amount of time you have to spend to go research that. And instead put it at your fingertips. And that will make you better suited to go and approach a mentor. So you could use it as kind of a pre-session to help sort of build your ideas and make yourself a little bit smarter so that you're not overlooking the obvious insights that are out there. But I agree that I don't think it is as valuable as a human who's got deeper experience and has done this for a long time. Because a lot, I mean, honestly, the biggest challenges of running a business are almost all about human interactions.

John Harthorne

[ 00:57:37 ] And it is much better suited for actual factual information, even though it hallucinates. But it is better suited for gathering that type of data than it is about understanding the personal dynamics and things. So definitely a good tool, and I would integrate and use it, but I don't think it's a replacement just yet, at least for human mentors.

Shereen Shermak

[ 00:57:57 ] Yes, if only because founders and entrepreneurs tend to have such unique personalities and are always surrounded by people with these unique and sort of offbeat personalities, things aren't going to resonate exactly the same way as it is for the average of the population, which is what ChatGPT is really tuned towards.

SPEAKER_3

[ 00:58:19 ] Sorry, I have to end our session now. But on that note, so I want to give a huge thank you to our speakers. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_3

[ 00:58:39 ] What personally resonated for me was the love of the game. That's why I'm here all week and living vicariously now that I'm not sure that I want to work 80 hours a week on a passion project. I get to live vicariously through some of the younger folks coming up with these great ideas. So with that, we have a lot in store for the rest of the day and the rest of the week. As I mentioned earlier, we have a welcome party right in this room, presented by HPE and NVIDIA, and that will be at 6:30.

SPEAKER_3

[ 00:59:17 ] We have lunch, so I know you want to mingle in the room, but as much as you can move out, so we can reset for the one o'clock session after lunch. It's not as critical, given that we have a little bit of extra time. Uh, let's see if you're on the with us virtually. You don't need to go anywhere; just choose your next session, and we'll be back with you shortly. I did want to mention that Kevin Ty from Three Circle Studios is our official photographer.

SPEAKER_3

[ 00:59:47 ] So, if you grab him for a photo, you'll actually get a personalized album. I keep getting texts saying, 'You've been seen again,' 'You've been seen again.' It's really kind of fun. So, if you want to join that, find Kevin.

SPEAKER_3

[ 01:00:02 ] And I think that's it. We'll see you at the next session at one o'clock. Again, I know our panelists will get bombarded up here with questions as much as you can. Kind of move those out, and we'll see you at one for the next session. Thank you.

John Harthorne

[ 01:00:19 ] Well done, guys. Nice. It was fun.

Shereen Shermak

[ 01:00:20 ] Thank you. Your voice is, like, really soothing. Oh, that's right. So what a nice thing to say. Thank you.

John Harthorne

[ 01:00:26 ] Thank you, Kat. Great job. Thank you.

Shereen Shermak

[ 01:00:29 ] Yeah, of course. Happy to. It's so great listening to you talk about these things. I haven't talked to you in such a long time about all this. It's been a while.

John Harthorne

[ 01:00:35 ] We should get together sometime for coffee or something.

Shereen Shermak

[ 01:00:36 ] Yeah. Yeah. I'm very interested in what you're doing.