Graham Weaver: How to Achieve Your Goals, Manage Your Time, and Live Purposefully | E140

awareness. And there's a lot of things captured under that, probably humility and emotional intelligence and things like that are all kind of like sub bullets of of self awareness. You Randy,

Graham Weaver. Graham is the founder and CEO of alpine investors, one of the highest performing and fastest growing private equity firms in the world. Graham also teaches one of the most popular classes at Stanford Business School and won the 2024 distinguished teacher award there. Graham, thanks for being here. Welcome to In Search of Excellence. Thanks

Doesn't matter what he did that that night, his beeper go off, and he would get up and he'd, you know, drive to the office and, you know, fix a dog's leg or something. And then he'd, then he'd go, you know, come back. And then he'd go in the office sometimes and see clients. But he did that as long as I can remember, to and I talked to him later, and he said that he gave him for his 50th birthday present to himself was to stop taking emergency calls.

So he started his practice at like the age of 32 or something. So for 18 years, in the middle of night, he got up every time that the phone rang. And that was how he he built this practice, kind of brick by brick and and I watched that, and I think I absorbed more of that than I really realized that just the intensity that he threw into his his job, I mean, he, to this day, probably worked harder than anyone I've ever met, and his

drive was pretty insatiable. So definitely, definitely I absorb, I have definitely absorbed that through osmosis, I guess. And then what about your mom? So my mom, so my dad wasn't around much because he was building his company, you know. So he didn't go to my sporting events or parent teacher conferences. He actually a lot of times wasn't home for dinner. So my mom really kind of filled in. She stayed at home and was just like the perfect mom. I mean, she she her lifelong dream was to be a

mom. She was a great mom. She was the angel in my ears, you know, believing in me, taking my side on things, telling me that I could do anything, and, you know, giving me unconditional love. She was the person at every single sporting event and conference. And, you know, I clipped out all the things in the newspaper, and still has all those things. And so just just, you know, wonderful. I couldn't have, I couldn't have written a script for a better mom. I don't think so.

that. I kind of, I kind of just what you know was, was myself, you know, I had good friends and my siblings, and I got along well, and so I'd say I was pretty normal, like I maybe even average for that, for that time, and I wasn't upset about that or anything. It just, I never really, I. Know if I even had ambition to be different, but, but, yeah, pretty, pretty normal childhood, growing up in the in the Midwest, we talked

listening to? And how did that change your life?

a pretty monotonous job. I mean, you walk in line and turn around and walk back. It's hot, sticky. And, yeah, when the Sony Walkman came out, it was, it was, like, amazing. I mean, I couldn't believe that you could carry around something like that. And let's,

mechanical. And then they came out with one of the cassettes, so you could play, you know, you could play tapes, which, again, people probably even know what those are, but, and so first I started just listening to music and stuff. And I didn't, it was, it passed the time a little bit better. But then one time I went to the library and I was returning my music, maybe the Beatles or something. And there was this program that said, Think and Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill, which is a famous program.

And then there was another program probably that even influenced me more, by Brian Tracy, that was like the universal laws of success and achievement, or something like

that. I probably listen to that, I mean, and when I say that, it would be like six cassettes, double sided, and I probably listened to the whole program 10 times, and it was just like, it felt like someone was giving me, like the answer key to life, like it was things I'd never even thought of before, about, you know, deciding what you wanted in life, about setting goals, about writing them down, about working backwards, and all these stories of people that had, you know, brought things

into their lives they never imagined. I just thought, like, Oh my gosh. It like it was like, it was like an awakening of some kind. When I started listening to this stuff,

you were spending your time. And it never really just occurred to me just how much, how much you had this internal locus of control. That's, that's the geeky word for it. And I just, I just, I just found that unbelievably like freeing, and I thought it was just incredibly powerful.

it's actually destructive. You know, it's the kind of thing of like, if you haven't, you know, it's going to be, I'm not going to name any names, but imagine a guy standing in front of a Ferrari, you know, saying, if you don't have a Ferrari, you know, or you have a Ferrari,

that's what they're saying. And and then, of course, there's a link to buy their, you know, insert program, real estate, crypto trading, option trading, you know, whatever that they're selling. And you know, if you're 12 years old or 13 years old, you don't know the difference.

You don't know that that's not actually the path, and and so, anyway, so, so, yes, 100% I would encourage you know, the young generation to read Napoleon Hill, but understanding that their attention span and their and the content that they're consuming is so different from that now it's it's really kind of scary

Genie. I can't give you three wishes, but what I can give you is whatever you throw yourself into with your career and your life and the journey you go after go that you undertake. It's gonna go great. It's gonna be amazing. You know, what would you wish for? And I remember doing that as a kid thinking, oh, gosh, you know, I think I'd start a business. And, you know, this is what I'd want to do. And then, and then, and then he, the author, goes on to say, that's what you should do with your

life. That's your answer. Like, if you actually want to know what to do, that's it. And I remember thinking, it's not that easy, like that. That's not right, you know. And, and then, but, but he goes on to say, because that's your answer, absent fear of failure, that's what your heart really wants to do. And believe it or not, like my heart didn't pick I'm going to be in the NBA or something like that. Because, you know, there's a lot of factors that are exogenous that go into that.

So I'd say, you know, people, whenever I say that exercise, people are like, Oh, well, I'm gonna go win the World Series. And I'd say, Okay, well, yeah, but take out some really crazy exogenous, you know, factors like that, you know. And you know. So there's a little bit of realism, but not, not much. And, and that, that exercise that I did when I was 13 years old. I have pretty much almost throughout my entire life, done that exercise, answered that question, and then gone and done

that thing. And that's, that's a big thing of what I try to bring to my students at Stanford or Al, my, uh, people at Alpine, or, you know, the people on social media.

shit all happened. The last time I was there was he's driving an old beater car. Let's talk about when you were seventh grade. You got into wrestling and the second big event that summer, yeah, was you watching vision quest? Can you talk about that and how that changed your life.

He's in high school, but he realizes this isn't going to go on forever, and so he decides he's going to go on this vision quest, and he's going to do something that he just, he's just going to go for it. And so he drops down. He's a very good

wrestler. And he drops down two weight classes to from anyway, I think, to 168 and he, he wants to wrestle the best wrestler in the state, this guy, Brian, shoot, of course, you know, you know, the ending before it even starts, you know, last second he wins, you know, gets the girl, the whole thing and but, but as a wrestler, I was a media you know, I was, I was above average wrestler. But this was, like my

anthem, this movie. I mean, I can say every line of the whole movie, and I've watched it so many times. It was so inspirational to me. Music and

everything and so. So that that that influenced me a lot in wrestling, and I ended up going on my own little vision question, which you can talk more about, but that that was that kind of combination of the self help tapes about setting and goals and being really clear what you want on your goals, plus, then that was my goal now, was to drop down, make the varsity, and, you know, be part of this really, really good

wrestling team. I put those things together, and that ended up being probably the, probably the biggest turning point of my life.

be candid, I was 150 pounds. I was about six feet tall, and I and the really, the only real opening that I had to make the varsity, given like who was seniors and all those kinds of things, was at 125 so I had to drop 25 pounds and six feet, at six feet tall, rail thin, like I'm six one now, and I weigh 185 so this is 60 pounds less than I weigh now and and it was the hardest to this day, the hardest thing I've ever done. I mean, I was eating 900 calories a day. I was working out three times a

day. I was running in the morning, doing wrestling practice, and then getting on exercise bike at night. I was hungry all the time. On the day of weigh ins, I was also thirsty because you couldn't drink. And I just, I just like I found, I found that this limit that I thought was there wasn't there. And so I put myself through hell, and I realized I was still standing and I was able to do it, and I actually hit the goal. I hit the weight. And I wasn't.

I was the number one wrestler in the league, not in the state, and and I and then I'm fast forwarding a bit in the story. But my my my junior year, the biggest match in my life. I was number one. I was wrestling the number two wrestler in the league, and that we would have this big matte light that would come down. The whole gym was

packed. It was a sport our high school was the best at, and I lost, and it was just crushing, like it I also wasn't really completely rational, because I've been cutting so much weight, so it felt like a much bigger thing. And that's the last match ever I was a junior, so that, and that was the last match I ever wrestled like I ended up quitting, and that really haunted me. I I, it just haunted me. And the next, like, year and a half, I just sat with

that. And, you know, I It's interesting, because if you looked at my high school resume, and, you know, the grades I got. I was president of the class. I did really well in tennis and and I started plays, and I got into Princeton out of a small school in the middle of the Midwest. Like, you'd be like, Oh, that was great. But that's what I would say, was, like the

external scorecard. My internal scorecard was, I quit wrestling, like when I graduate, I was like, oh, you know that that's actually how I felt about myself. I was like, that's how, like, devastating that was for me. Like, I was like, Oh, I'm a and I just remember thinking, I'm that will never happen again in my life, and it hasn't. Why

of this guy. And she'd come home and, you know, 11 o'clock at night she'd be crying and she's miserable, and this was her thing. Had a great coach the year before, who left to go to another school. And here she is. I said, you know, Bianca, it's this is not healthy, that she went to a very tough school, academically, tons of pressure. So that was busy by itself. And then she had this, I said. She said, you know, Dad, I I'm thinking about quitting and and what do you think I should do?

And I said, Well, this isn't a straight line black and white. You make a tough call like this, and there's pluses and minuses, but it's not that easy, right? So ultimately, she was so worn down, so tired, she quit, yeah. And then she was more miserable than she thought, and she asked to get back on the team. She had to work her way back on the team. So what's your advice to people? As you know, you quit, you didn't go back. She quit, she went back. She was glad she

did. She still suffered at the hands of this coach, who was just the biggest jerk you could ever think of. What's your advice here? Well,

that feel like? And you know, how would you feel at the end of that? And you know your friends are playing still, and, you know, you're doing this other thing. And we kind of, like, really went there, almost, like, in a real deep kind of visualization, and then, then we did it the other way. Okay, you're going to stick it out. It's going to be tough, you know, you're going to have to get up in the morning and train you're going to have to do this.

Let's go through that. And, like, in each case, we got to the end of high school and we and we look back, and he was like, I gotta, I gotta stay, you know, like, I mean, I have to do this, I know. And he's realizing, like, he was scared, you know, it was hard, it was tough, it was but, but he, he realized, like, he, that's what he, that's why he was quitting.

Now, it could be the other, it could have been the opposite of that, where he had other things that were more exciting to him, and that visualization might have helped him otherwise, but I think, I think for me, I was kind of scared. I was like, it was hard. It was the hardest thing I've ever done. And I was, I was exhausted, you know, I had eaten for, at this point, three years, and it was consuming me. And I I was, I was just exhausted, and I was also, I was

also scared. You know, I had never thrown myself into something like that, not even close, and I felt like I was failing at it. And I think I was if I, if I had had that visualization, I would have realized like that that I wasn't quitting because I didn't want to wrestle. I was quitting because I was scared of of losing and I was scared of throwing my entire soul into something and failing.

Work is not perfect. And a lot of people say Work is work. And I think very few people who just bounce out of bed every day, you're really lucky. If you do, you're in the very small percentage say, like, this is the best thing that I've done. What's your advice? Yeah, to people, either that people in your company or people in your portfolio companies who are unhappy, is, should they quit if they're that, what's the threshold and is the grass always greener?

with a student. It's pretty much the same conversation every time they're saying, Okay, I could do X and I could do Y, and let's say, let's just take a student who's an alumni, so they're actually exactly the situation you're saying. They're in a job that they don't like. Let's use that as an example. So, you know, I talked to them for a little while, and they have, you know, a couple different paths. They could do three or four. At some point, I ask them enough questions I can tell, like, what

their heart wants to do. You know what their what their Genie goal is? You know what their real like soul, so to speak, not to be too woo, woo. But that what like, what's really tugging at them? If you ask enough questions and get them in a place where they can get out of their head, you can see what like, here's what they really want. And then my advice is kind of the same advice that Brian Tracy gave me when I was 13. Like, that's where you're going

to go. Okay? Like, let's be clear, you want to spend your life in pursuit of that, and then now all we're talking about is tactics. We're talking about the path to get there. So yes, you're in this job right now. Should you quit tomorrow? I can't answer that, like, on a blanket basis for everyone in the world, because everyone's situation is different. Maybe you need to accumulate some savings, maybe some skills,

whatever. But let's make no mistake, you're doing that in service of the path that you're going to go down and spend your life on. And let's make sure that we're back. We're working backwards from that path starting today where you are. So should you quit tomorrow? Again? Every everyone's situation is a little different, but irrespective of where you're starting, I want to map a path to get you on the path, because that's the path where you're going to feel like you're in

flow. You're going to stay with it for longer, and you know, you only get one life. So why not?

giving rah rah speeches. It was like, Hey, I'm going to be at the gym tomorrow at 5am you know, who wants to come? It was more, it was more like leading by leading by example. Exactly. It wasn't, I wasn't giving big speeches or anything. But when so so that was probably how I first started to become a leader. Was I was just, I was I was doing things that other people wanted to be a part of, and they wanted, they wanted to follow that path in terms of, can you teach leadership? I'd

like to think so. I try to do, you know, at Stanford and in our CEO and training program, I mean, I don't think it's one of these things that you're born or you're made a leader. I think, I think there's 100% you can teach leadership. And I also, if you look across our portfolio of leaders, I mean, we have leaders who are quiet and they they are introverts, and they're they never give these rauru speeches, and people will follow them to

the end of the earth. We have leaders who are military veterans, ballerinas, investment bankers, you know, everything in between. So I definitely don't think there's one profile. I don't think it's a gene. I think it's a I think, I think probably people, more than anything, are going to follow someone who's authentically in the path of the thing they should be doing as well.

years. Because Tony we were, we're very focused on attributes. It's been way more highly correlated. Number one attribute, by far, is the will to win. So and we you can, you can interview for that, and this is someone who is just going to put the company or the project or whatever on their shoulders and run through the burning building with it, and come out the other side one way or another, and and we can't teach that. So you said, Could you teach leadership? We can teach.

We cannot. We cannot teach the will to win. So we have to hire people that already have that, and they and, like I said, you could have that as a ballerina or a military veteran or any, anything. That's number one by far. Number two would be probably grit persistence, because you're gonna in, at least in almost anything you're gonna get kicked in the teeth a

number of times. And then three would probably be just like self awareness, and there's a lot of things captured under that, probably humility and emotional intelligence and things like that are all kind of like sub bullets of of self awareness. So those would be the three you

find land. And those are somehow, some way, I was going to survive and find land. So I don't call it the will to win, but now I am going to call it the will to call it survival instinct. And the word it

gave me three. And sales is probably something that has, you have a little bit more of an opportunity that can be learned versus the things I mentioned, I feel like are a lot harder to teach. So if you gave me five sales, would have actually been in the top five, but, but, but, but it is a little bit more, a tiny bit more teachable than will to win or grit, which, which are, are just I can't do with some anything with someone doesn't have those things. So,

all this free time. You know, what do I want to do? And and I set three goals. I actually wrote them down. My Genie goals. I was going to be valedictorian, I was going to be the best rower in the country, and I was going to start a business that was going to pay for school. Those are my three goals. And those are pretty much the three activities I did at college. There wasn't a lot in the four

years. I mean, I made toward the end, when things loosened up, and I kind of had the academics down, and my rowing was coming along. Then I started to introduce social in the first few years. I just, I just went hard at at those three things. So when

I was in college. And something happens where I think when you write it down, I don't know if you have to say it exactly the way I said it, but when you write down something like that every day, I think a part of you assumes the identity of someone who's already achieved the goal. So I'm the number one row in the

United States. My alarm goes off at 445, and I have a choice about turning it off and going back to sleep, or getting dressed, going down to the boathouse and rowing on the rowing machine, the ERG, for an hour before class, when it's dark, there's no one there. No one's gonna know if I did it or not. But hey, part of me is the number already behaving like the number one rower, even when I'm 135 pound novice from Toledo that didn't even know the boats go backwards. You know, like you

never rode before. I never rode before. I never been in a boat before. So

and I did really well rowing. I was captain of a team that ended up winning the national championship, but so I but I was definitely not the best. I was probably the one of the worst rowers in the boat, and I I was the strongest rower on the rowing machine, but I was technically probably the worst rower in the team, so I didn't hit any of the goals, but I going back to what I was saying about your internal and your external scorecard, like my internal scorecard, I I was

good. I had done everything I wanted to do. I left it on the field, and I, I felt really, really good about how I how I spent those years. So it really wasn't as much about the goals as about like, how. Thing, having three things I was excited about enough to throw my entire soul into them. And then I realized just how gratifying that was. And I've and I've tried to basically do that, you know, since then too.

only going to charge you. I don't remember what it was, nine cents per paper per day. That's it. That's, I mean, that's not much. And they're like, Yeah, that sounds great. But you multiply that by 2000 papers, times seven days a week, times the whole year it was. It was unbelievably profitable. So the hard part about that business was I had to get 15 college kids up seven days a week. One of them had to get up at 4am to drive the van to drop off all

the papers of the sites. The other ones had to all get up at 530 or 6am the amount of stuff that went wrong in that was almost infinite. There was, you know, you could imagine what that was like. So that was tough, but, but it was, it was a great experience. It was really, it was really great experience. So

unbelievable. I mean, when I say I would go down to the boathouse by myself, which I did at five, six in the morning. I mean that usually I would be the only one there, but Mike, Mike tadey, probably half the time was was there training right next to he had no idea who I was for the first, you know, maybe month, and then after a while, after he, I think his curiosity just got the better him, because there's this 135 pound kid with a mullet who's coming down to

the boathouse. I had a mullet, yeah, because I was from Ohio, you know. I mean, you probably had one in Michigan.

forms terrible. And, like, and he started helping me a little bit with my form and also just telling me what workouts to do. And really, really simple thing, which was, and I want to geek out too much on this, but

duration over intensity. So, like, you could train, I could train seven days a week, if I keep my heart rate at basically 85% if I start doing what everyone else does, come down and do these hard pieces and, you know, 10, you know, one minute on, one minute off, and go as hard as they can, you're going to build up lactic acid the next day. You're not gonna

be able to train as hard. So Mike was like, hey, you know, row at 85% just slightly harder than conversational pace, and just do as much volume as you can. And that was like life changing. I mean, that I could train an infinite number of, literally infinite number of hours and not, you know, have any any soreness or anything. So he gave me that that and also just kind of like being in the boathouse with with Mike and John. It was just, it was, it

was awesome. I mean, it was, it was just Mike tatey went on, by the way, to be the US Olympic coach won a gold medal, is just an absolute legend, and that I. I mean, to be able to have had that experience with him at that age, was just it was really cool.

being leading by example. In my professional world, some of my coaching is first in last out. Philo is what I call it, and I teach that. I preach it. How important is it in the private equity business to outwork everybody. And one of the things that I teach my mentees is you really don't understand what it's like to outwork everybody else you have. I have that means getting I get to the Law Library at three o'clock every day. I'd leave at 11 o'clock when there

was no one there. There were like, three of us in the whole law law library. So how important is it in your success and in your business, do people in the private equity business who work the most to get there before no one else does do the best?

worked everyone. I would like to think, as I started to get up the curve and learn more and and become, you know, skilled, I actually started to try to figure out a model where I didn't have to do that, you know, because I wanted to have a family, right? I know you and I shared, like trying to be home with them. And I actually wanted people to be able to come to Alpine and not have to pull all nighters and not have to make a decision between whether they could have a career or have a

family. Because when I came out of school and did an analyst grind on Wall Street, and I looked at the associates and the senior associates and the vice presidents and the principals and the partners, none of them had lives, you know, and I didn't, I didn't want to be

them. And so I think it's, it's interesting because, because the people who are young at Alpine, it doesn't matter what we tell them about the hours they're going to just, they're going to, they're going to work 16 hours a day, because that's who they are. And they're, they're learning who they are, and they're, they don't have a family at that time, and they're, you know, that's the kind of people we hire. And no matter what we tell them, that's

just what they do. But I think I want to provide a path where as people do have families that we've built a model that has intellectual property, that allows us to be really successful with, without the, you know, without the like, 16 hour days.

customer too. You're really the only one you're trying to impress. If you think about the external scorecard, why do you want an external scorecard, ultimately, so you feel better, but like you could just start with what's your real scorecard? So, yeah, I sorry. I lost track. The Did I answer your question?

what the benchmarks are. And we, and we derive a lot of our mission off of, you know, being selfish standard deviations better than those benchmarks. And that is inspiring to the team. So it would be, it wouldn't be fair to say, like, Hey, we're playing. A competitive game, and we're not even going to know what the score is, so I wouldn't, I wouldn't say that, but I'm in terms of, when you go home and are you sleeping well at night?

You know a lot of that's going to come down more to like, Are you winning on your own scorecard?

Stanley in a minute. But so many students that I mentor, it's like, oh, I want to go into investment banking. I want to work at Goldman Sachs. And we have lots of conversation a group of 32 so you know what? Half of you who think you want to do it are not qualified to do it, frankly. And two, you couldn't handle what happens there. It's wrong for you, but Oh, my God, I can do it. Everyone else is doing if

they're making so much money. So talk about the advice and FOMO, and not only how it applies to students, but investors as well. And we could talk about the crypto, the.com all that stuff.

going to be very fun. I hope you could find another alternative path, but maybe that is the best option. So I think it's like making the short term decisions is, to me, in service of the that longer term career, career trajectory that that your, your soul is, wants to go on.

historical cash flows, right? I mean, you can look at these businesses, see the growth rates and margins and all kinds of things, but you're also around this world, yeah, absolutely everyone wants to get rich. Everyone jumping on the bandwagon.

future. That's the only value that it has, not that it's sending you dividends, not that it's a house you're going to live in or a car you're going to you know, but it's the only value it has is that the greater fool is going to think it's worth more in the future. That's a painting. That's crypto, you know, that's nfts They all fall into. It's even gold, you know, they all fall into that bucket. A lot of people don't agree with that. Lot of people talk about all kinds of different reasons

why that doesn't apply. But if you really break it down, the only value they have is you think someone is going to pay you more. That's just a very, very dangerous game to play, because you're, as you would imagine, you're relying on some external factors that you have no control over, and you're and you're and you're you're you're relying on someone being a greater fool. And I think if you had the algorithm of avoid 100% of those games, you would be way

better off. It you wouldn't get lucky to buy, you know, Bitcoin at whatever price you bought it, you know. So you're gonna have to give up on that. But I think on the whole the whole world would be way better off if they avoided all those games.

the magic formula. I can promise you, if someone's selling it to you on Tiktok for, you know, 1999 a month, they don't have the formula, or they wouldn't be sharing it. So hot tips, you know, option trading, program, real estate flipping, if someone knew how to do that, really. They wouldn't be selling it. So So run. So, right, yeah, okay,

right? Investment bankers, despite all the bullshit that we're softer right now. I mean, you read in the newspaper about young junior bankers dying because, you know, they work so much, yeah, but in the investment banks, despite what they say, I mean, I have a lot of former students and friends work there, it's still pretty much the same. So you're at Morgan Stanley Capital Markets. You're sent to this pig firm.

You're excited a billion dollar investment there, and then your mom, at some point, comes to visit you. She plans all these things, skating at Rock Center, and then tell us about the phone call that you got about your friend Monty one day and how that changed your life. Yeah.

really stupid. What's the

for that simple reason. So Morgan Stanley was gonna, you know, Greenfield this, and take it straight from from a farm all the way through the processing plant and put it on your shelf. You know, that was the kind of thesis. The problem was that they built their model on historical pig prices of $47 100 weight, which was, it turns out, the last 100 years average, and it was the next 100 years average, but, but, you know, it's the kind of common thing.

How does a as a five foot man drown in a six or, how does a six foot man drown in a an average of river that's an average is five feet deep, you know, because it gets deeper at certain points of the river and and so hog prices promptly dropped to $18 and the business made zero EBITDA and had, I don't know, half a billion of debt. So the banks took the

business. Two years later, hog prices went up to 80 and the business went from making zero of EBITDA to 250 million of EBITDA with zero changes except hog prices. So Morgan Stanley just really didn't think through the implications of leveraging a highly commoditized product, but for me as a young analyst, I mean, it was a blast. I mean, it was crazy. I was in the I lived in the CFOs basement, and we built models, and we were, I mean, we were trying to get this

thing refinanced. I was watching, it was like watching a car crash in slow motion, because I was building the financial model just saying, there's 100% chance we're gonna run out of money, and I was trying to communicate that to the C I communicated it the CFO. He communicated it to the person on the deal. The guy who was on the deal didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to, you know, deal with it, because it was his deal, and it was going

to make him look bad. So we were like, all right, I guess we're just going to watch this thing crash, which we did. And it was a wild experience. It was, it was, it was totally wild. But then the story about my mom was, you know, I was in, I was in, you know, in Manhattan, my mom had lived there for a little bit

in her life. She's single, you know, she, she worked an hourly job, didn't, you know, didn't have a ton of money, and saved up her money and was gonna, she drove from Ohio out to New York, she made tickets to see two shows and we're gonna go skating in Rockefeller Center. She had this whole agenda all planned out for the two of us, and my mom and I were really close, and she comes and like the associate, who's 18 months older than me, is wants to stay in the office all day, and I gotta

stay. And it was Friday, and so I didn't see her. That happened Saturday. We were working on something stupid, by the way. I was there for two years, worked 100 hour weeks left, you know, had zero weekends off and closed zero deals. So nothing I worked on mattered. But it was just like this associate wanted to look a tiny bit better for the Vice President. And so he stayed in the office all weekend, which meant I had to stay in the office all weekend. I think I saw my mom for a total of, like,

three or four hours. That whole time she was really bummed, obviously. But the worst part about it was, I remember thinking, Mom, I don't understand why you don't understand why I can't come see you like, I can't, like, it's my body. Well, just tell your boss your mom's in town. I remember thinking, yeah, that's not really how it works. But in a very short period of time, I had almost become that culture, you know, where I was, like, I didn't even think it was that crazy that I didn't get to see

her. I mean, I was, I was disappointed, don't get me wrong, but I didn't think it was that crazy until a number of years later, where I look back and I was just embarrassed and but I think it's a real big lesson, which is like you do become the people you spend time with. You become the environment you're in. Morgan Stanley wasn't going to become more like Graham. Graham was going to become Morgan Stanley, which I did in a short period of time.

So I only realized that until once I got out of that environment. And

me. And just, just one of these amazing people, lights up the room when he's in the room, makes everyone feel like the most important person, like, when he's talking to you, and so, yeah, like, right around the time I'm, I don't remember exactly what year it was, but I'm sitting down. I was at, I was in Washington, DC, living for the summer, and my phone rings, and my buddy says, Hey, Grammy, you know, you might want to sit down. He says, you know,

hey, Monty's gone, you know. And I was like, What do you mean, Monty's gone? He said, Well, he, he died in a plane crash, you know, two nights ago. And, I mean, I think I was 20 he was like, 2322 or 23 at the time. And I just remember thinking, like, that's not, like, that's just not even possible, you know. Like, how's that? You know, he had his whole life in front of him, and he was going on a fishing trip or something, and took a small plane and crashed. And that really didn't

sink in. I don't, I don't know that I really processed it until a number of years later. I now gone through business school, and I, I'm jumping a little ahead, but I'd, I'd taken a corporate job that I was supposed to take, and I was probably in a relationship that wasn't that great, and I was kind of doing all the things I advised my students not to do

back then. And then I went to New York with a number of friends, and we started talking about, we, all of us were kind of process talking about Monty and telling stories and stuff. And I, I got on the plane ride home and just started bawling and just thinking to myself, like, Monty would be so disappointed in me, like he he had, he called me Dreamweaver, and he had, like, this incredible thing, way he thought of me. And I remember thinking

like, you know, he died. He didn't have a chance to live his life, but like, if he saw what I was doing with mine, he'd be so disappointed. And I literally landed I ended a relationship. A few days later, I quit my job and, you know, started my own company. So I that that was really impactful for me, right?

person I know has plans. I can't tell you how many phone calls I've had, even from my own kids and said, Hey, I just got tickets to this game, or my parents are coming in town. Yeah. Do you tell your boss and say, Hey, I've got plans. What's the right what's the right way to handle these issues without your boss saying, Gosh, you know, you're weak. I mean, or the firm's not important,

recently passed away. He took you. Know, literally months where he was spending a lot of time down there. And like, of course, that's way more important. And so I have tried to design a firm where, you know, you're a real a real person, and like, for a short period of time people can cover for you. And like, people are thrilled to do that when they realize you're doing something that's important for you. And the kinds of people we hire, they're not taking advantage of

the system. They're not, you know, they're not trying to pull one over on you or anything. I mean, they're they want to do really great at work. And you give them that benefit the doubt that they're going to, they're going to cover for that other friend when that, you know, when that friend has something. So it's hard for me to give that advice, you know, because I, I really, I just really tried to almost go the other direction as as we were building, you know, building our company. So I, I do

recognize the harshness of it. I do recognize that. But I, I probably wouldn't advise someone to go be part of a culture that that they where they don't admire the values of that place, because they will become that place over time. But

as much as until then. But from this time to this time, I'd really like to try to have that time off, and I'm willing to put in the time before the time after. By the way, you know, my my colleague, Haley's gonna cover for me during that time if you need me right at that time. But like, you know, I think you, I would hope you could have that conversation. Be a good communicator. Yeah, be proactive. Be a good communicator. Put yourself in your boss's situation. What do

they want? Do they want you to not to see your mom? No, they want the work to get done. They want to know that there's someone they could call if it's urgent during that time. So that's where your friend covers for you. So you can be proactive about that. I would say, if you're getting pushback on that consistently, you're at the wrong place and that now all we're talking about is how long you're going to stay there until you are in the path of the job that you want. When I

and basically, what happens? And today, I don't know how it works, but back then, you'd go to the printer, and at the printer, there's a firm called bound, and you're there looking at documents the whole night. I mean, you're pulling all nighters, you're sleeping there, you're not going home. And I remember thinking, Uh oh. And I left bound, and I didn't tell people where I went, and I drove all the way back to Beverly

Hills. I was bitching the whole way to myself, telling me how miserable I am, and I knew I wasn't going to be. I hated law school as a means to an end. And I remember driving to Beverly Hills took almost two hours. And then I remember eating dinner, how unpleasant it was for me, because I had to drive all the way back to Costa Mesa again and then not sleep all days. And you know what? I didn't I didn't say anything to my boss, because it would have been very difficult.

It was unforgiving environment. I mean, I was already going to leave, but I remember thinking, Gosh, it's the most miserable I've ever been in my career, except when I lost my job. Yeah, no, that's,

closing dinner in Napa. Tell us about this woman who. Was talking about the Hamptons 13 or 14 times during during your dinner and fish. And then I found it very interesting about you hiding out in the bathroom and going out on this run, and then tell us more of the details about the drive to Steamboat Springs in your 1986 Volvo and what you were doing on that trip, because it's you just said, Oh, I started my own firm, but it was really more than that, yeah,

investors. And in 1995 I think it was they, they were they'd been in private equity for like, 10 years, which almost no one had back then, so they knew what they were doing, but they had spun off and done their own thing, and they didn't really have a they didn't have a raise committed capital. So they'd go find a deal, and then they would, they'd sign the deal up, and then they'd go raise debt, and then they'd go raise equity with the deal. But they'd have to, like, do a bunch of tap

dancing to make that happen. So the first six deals, I think, that we did were all in that model. And I learned a ton. And because, I mean, there's only, there were only there were only three of us. And so it was great. David horing and I would sit in the office, and we'd go through a conversation with a seller, and we'd hang up the phone, and then he would say, Okay, do you know why I said that? And do you know why I said

that? And then we would, and then, you know, we'd be negotiating a legal document, and he would, you know, he we'd get done, and he'd walk me through what networking, capital adjustments, you know, meant, and how that was working. And it was just, it was great, great mentorship. It was like just drinking from a fire hose. I feel like I got 20 years of

experience in like two years. I left there to go to business school, and and then while I was in business school, I remember this, sitting in very first quarter, I'm sitting in this strategy class at Stanford Business School, and this this perfect professor. He's a TA he's probably 25 years old, and he's teaching this class out of a textbook. He's never worked a day in his life. And I'm thinking, Oh my God, what did I do? How did what did I do? I didn't even I can't believe I

left this job to be here. So I said, I'm gonna start buying companies. And just like American securities, I had no money, no fun, whatever is real. I'd seen this playbook that they had where they could, you know, put together a deal first and then go raise money. So I started doing that, and I bought three companies while I was 25

years old. When I bought my first label printing company in business school I was taking, I would take a flight to I would take a red eye flight out on Tuesday night because we didn't have school on Wednesday. My companies were in the Midwest and the East Coast. And then I would do my bank meetings and whatever all day. And then I take a flight home and be a

class the next day. I did that for two years, and it was absolutely the most fun thing I ever did, and it was exhausting and it was terrifying, and everything else, and they didn't go well, you know, the you think the end of the story is like, Oh, it was amazing, and made every single mistake you could imagine,

is debt. You know, the whole structures debt, but the sub debt lender needed there to be a little bit of equity, like a couple $100,000 which also, of course, didn't have. So at the time Capital One was launching, and there was, like, this kind of credit card, like, intense competition between the credit card companies. And they would, they would, you would, I would get this thing in my in my mail that would say, you know, write yourself a check for $50,000 and

pay no interest for a year. And then you would get one that would say, roll over your balance and pay no interest for a year. So I had this spreadsheet of, like the credit cards, and when they were gonna actually gonna say I was gonna have to start paying interest. It was the dumbest thing ever. I did not never. This is like recommending you what not to do, but this was my only source of funds that I had at the time, because I was in debt from business school, and, you know,

hadn't saved up a month. You paid for your own business I paid for my own business school. Yeah. So so that, that was how I financed some of these early deals. And it. Was, I was tight, you know, doing walking on a tight rope,

great private equity firm. It was a good firm, a good job, but it wasn't what I wanted to do. I want to do my own thing. And so that was when I had that plane flight that I mentioned you before. So I fly home, I land on that plane flight. I'm in this job. I don't I don't want to be in and that's when I quit my job, you know, ended things with my then girlfriend, and then packed up this 1986 Volvo and drove across the country to Steamboat, where my high school girlfriend was living at the

time. I was thinking about her this whole time, pretty much, yeah, I pretty much was, I mean, more or less. And so, yeah, I had, going back to the tapes. I had, like a boom box, which people don't know, it's like a portable cassette player. I had a whole, you know, slew of D batteries, and I had all of Tony Robbins. I think it was personal power, unlimited power, one of those two, maybe both. And I listened to, like, 18 hours of Tony Robbins on the drive out

there. And I was just like, putting together my life plan. And by the time I arrived in Steamboat, I was like, I'm going to start my own private equity fund. That's what I'm going to do. So that, yeah, that that was, that was how that started.

fund. Yeah. Took a long time to raise the fund, and then you got, I wouldn't call it lucky, but you had people who believed in you, yeah, talk to us about those two people, yeah, and how did you do that?

were trying to sell to us. And our, our, our team thought it was the coolest thing in the world. I spent three days, and I was like, This is the worst thing in the world. Stevens knew that, and so I kind of like said, Hey, very politely, like, we're we're not interested. And I showed them all the analysis. They were really they were angry, but they were also super impressed, because I'd seen through, like, their their ruse,

so to speak. So anyway, we go through this, this thing, and we end up, we end up partnering with the Stevens family. They were fantastic to work with. You know, we maybe gave them less money for for the combination. It's a complicated story. But anyway, we ended up exiting this thing. Everyone made money so, so when I started raising my my funds, I was talking to the lead guy, this guy, Doug Martin, who's an incredible guy, and he was, he was kind of trying to

hire me to work at Stevens. And I said, Well, you know, I'm, I'm interested in starting my own thing. And so he agreed to potentially invest, and he wanted me to talk to his business school classmate, this guy, Tom Steyer, who was a hedge fund, a guy who ran far along, ran for president a number of years ago, also an incredible guy. I probably did seven or

eight meetings. Well, my the actual story about Tom is I called, I would call Tom's assistant and try to get on his calendar, and she would blow me off. And I called him, I think, 11 times. And finally his assistant said, Tom, we'll see you on April 30, at this time for 15 minutes, you know, stop calling and, uh. And I think it was the 11th time I called him, and she didn't say, are you in town that day? Could you do you have time that day? She just

gave me that. And so anyway, I had the meeting, and Tom and I spent more and more time together, and then Tom and Doug together were basically the bulk of our first fund. As my business school classmates, my parents, you know, everybody I knew I was calling on all my favors, and then lost money on that fund. So I, I like, Oh, I'd spent this entire, you know, energy, doing all this work to try to finally get this thing off the ground, and then, like, we made every mistake, we lost

money. And it was, it was absolutely devastating.

listening to me right now. I mean, she hounded me on LinkedIn for a gazillion I don't know, 14 times, 15 times, and want to come in for a meeting. And finally, I just got stopped. Same thing, 20 minutes, and the 20 minutes turned into one hour, because someone's doing a good job. I mean, you know, you're going to give them the time. So looking at the camera on this one, I mean, everybody, I 99.99 my own kids, and we've talked about our kids, you know, not

listening to you. What's the advice should people how many times should people call when they don't call you back? And what's the point where you're being an annoyance versus not an annoyance? And I

called him 35 times, you know? I mean, it was just, it wasn't, it wasn't like, you know, I wasn't taking it personally. I was like, Well, Tom hasn't heard my story yet. I mean, he's not saying no yet. He doesn't even know what I'm pitching. So it was, it was just, I felt like I I had the conviction, and I wanted to just convey that conviction to him. So my answer is, yeah, as many times as it takes, when

Well, then he became CEO of Marriott, yeah, and I call them his assistant's name was areza, and it was I called every week for something like 20 weeks in a row at the same time Randy, yes, I'll put a message, thank you, goodbye. And finally, she called me one day, and they were on the East Coast, I think, at some point, and I was in my office, it was 630 in the morning, and said, you're in the office. Yes, okay, don't go anywhere. Mr. Bullenbach is going to call you

back right now. And it was a, by the way, of like a four minute phone call, but at least it taught me the lesson of keep going. Yeah, you're listening to part one of my amazing interview with Graham Weaver, the founder and CEO of alpine investors, one of the fastest growing and most successful private equity firms in the world. Be sure to tune in next week to part two of my incredible episode with Graham. You.