From the inner sanctum of Silicon Valley and short-term capitalism comes the story of a VC who lived it, then left it and found a better way to build great companies.
Dave Whorton was John Doerr’s associate partner at high-flying Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers during Silicon Valley’s big shift, when he witnessed the VC industry pivot from a proven forty-year playbook of managing risk to something much more aggressive: “get-big-fast.” Don’t worry about profitability. Cash out and find another venture.
For a while, Whorton took part in this whirlwind as he pursued his dream of becoming the next Hewlett or Packard, starting two companies himself. But soon it all got to be too much. Whorton recognized that if get-big-fast was the formula for building a great technology company in the twenty-first century, that just wasn’t for him.
That could have been the end of the story, but instead it turned out to be the beginning of another, deeply inspiring one. Whorton went on a journey to find a better way to build companies, a way focused on long-term stability and steady growth, funded through profitability; a way in which leaders were committed to a purpose beyond personal wealth generation, to putting their people first, and to setting up their companies to endure. He calls these companies “Evergreen.” Another Way combines Whorton’s inspiring story with his Evergreen 7Ps framework, designed to guide more entrepreneurs and business leaders to follow his path.
Full of revelations, practical advice, and real-world examples of companies going Evergreen, Another Way is as instructive as it is inspiring at showing capitalism at its best.