The Venture Capitalist’s Writing Process

Foundry’s Brad Feld #Connect17 Interview (3/8)

Brad Feld writes nearly everyday, but why?

David Smooke: I do have thousands of half stories. There’s so many drafts, I don’t know how you go about-

Brad Feld: I don’t.

David Smooke: Managing all your drafts.

Brad Feld: I don’t draft.

David Smooke: You don’t draft?

Brad Feld: I just sit down and write, I have no drafts. I literally just sit down and write.

David Smooke: Then you publish.

Brad Feld: Then I hit publish, and if it’s shitty, the next day it’s not there anymore.

David Smooke: How do you block off time? Do you just write whatever you want to write? Or do say you say, “Nine to ten I’m writing, and at ten I hit publish.”

Brad Feld: For blogs, I generally write in part of my early morning routine. If I haven’t written a blog post by the time I leave my house in the morning, a blog post is not gonna get written that day. When I’m working on book, I tend to block out two to four hour chunks. Three to five days a week for a long period of time. They’re again, first thing in the morning. So, I’ll change my morning routine. Instead of getting up and checking email, and writing a blog post and whatever. I get up, and I don’t do any of that. I immediately just start working on my book.

David Smooke: Yeah.

Brad Feld: For whatever period of time I’ve decided I have blocked out for that. Now I find that I can be effective with an hour, and the max amount time I can write in one sitting is four hours.

David Smooke: Yeah, that’s tough. You think in another life, you coulda been a novelist?

Brad Feld: I do have fantasies every now an then about writing a novel. I’ve watched a few friends of mine become good novelists, like William Hertling. I’ve known them from their very first novel. It’s real work to get to be good at this.

David Smooke: Yeah it is.

Brad Feld: It’s not you write that first novel, and it’s awesome. It’s a lot of practice. Really, your fourth or fifth novel is probably really your first great novel. That’s not true for all writers. There are some amazing first novels.

David Smooke: Yeah.

Brad Feld: But, it’s a different skill than writing nonfiction, and I don’t think they … I think the discipline of writing maps, but I don’t think the skill maps.

David Smooke: Yeah, that’s a good answer.

Read The Rest of Foundry’s Brad Feld #Connect17 Interview

1. Writer / Publisher Relations on Medium
2. Who’s a Venture Capitalist’s Customer?
3. The Venture Capitalist’s Writing Process
4. The Venture Capitalist at His Investment’s First Conference
5. How Brad Feld Realized He Was a Venture Capitalist
6. What Venture Capitalists Can Bring to Product Development
7. The Nearly 30 Year Quest To Solve The Business Address Book Problem
8. How Venture Capitalists Market Their Stories