I always go into a meeting with a positive outlook on what the company could become.What type of future is this team creating? What type of future do I want to live in? What type of future do I want Sequoia to help create?

Ask yourself: “Why now?” What has changed in the market or ecosystem to uniquely enable this opportunity today? Why couldn't it have been created 3 years earlier, or 3 years later?

If you trace the success of many of the biggest technology giants today, they always took advantage of a key enabler: a technology advancement, a social or cultural shift in consumer behavior, oftentimes both.

most consumers are simultaneously neophilic—curious to discover new things—and deeply neophobic—afraid of anything that is too new. The best hit-makers are gifted at creating moments of meaning by marrying new and old, anxiety and understanding.In essence, they are architects of familiar surprises.