Always pave it forward

This is Tanmaya Jain - he's the founder of inFeedo (backed by Tiger Global, YC, and yada yada yada). I've known Tanmaya for over 7 years, and I feel like he played a key part in teaching me that I always need to pave it forward.

I met Tanmaya for the first time in 2017 at a dinner party we were hosting at my house. My sister, Maansi Sagar , knew him - I think he was trying to recruit her to join his startup as an early hire. At that time, I was building my own startup, so Tanmaya and I got talking about the struggles of being a bootstrapped founder. Nothing much happened after, but we just clicked.

Two years passed, my startup was going nowhere. I didn't want to go back to sea (for context, I was previously in the merchant navy) and wanted to do something in the startup ecosystem. Just didn't know what.

One day, I decided to message Tanmaya and asked him if he was free to catch up. We scheduled some time to meet at WeWork, where he'd set up his office.

When we met, I basically ranted for about 30 minutes, talking about why my startup failed, how everything was going south, how I thought I didn't know anything, and why I felt I was probably at the lowest point in my life - probably even had my eyes heavy, I don't know, times were hard. Maybe talking about it was therapy?

He patiently heard me out and then reminded me that if I was at the lowest point in my life, the only way possible forward was upwards. For some strange reason, that felt... pretty good!

He then asked me what I wanted to do next. I responded, telling him that I didn't know. We spoke about things inFeedo was doing and if there was a path there, but given that I had no idea what I wanted to do, we didn't really open that box.

He asked me how he could help, and I simply told him that I wanted to get out of the house and just learn what other startups were doing.

He offered me a desk at his company.

For six months, I went to WeWork every day, and sat with the inFeedo team - they were all pretty confused about what I was doing there, joining their team lunches and whatnot, but I was just hanging out. Tanmaya and I wouldn't chat every day, but every time I met him, reminded me that I got this.

Over months, I spoke to many founders at WeWork, started understanding what problems they were facing, and helped them out in whatever way I could. Some paid me a token amount at times, but many didn't. Honestly, I didn't care, I was just having a good time.

I distinctly remember Shweta Seetharaman (my then-girlfriend, now wife) telling me, "If you enjoy working with startups for free, why don't you join a firm that does this all the time? They might just pay you." - this just put things in perspective for me ... and is probably what led me to choose Venture Capital.

After multiple rejections, cold emails, and conversations, I eventually ended up joining Rohan Malhotra and Arjun Malhotra at Good Capital . Not sure what led them to believe in me, but well, here we are today! Maybe I'll write about that too one day!

In hindsight, I realised that I need to always pave it forward - don't think about yourself all the time, don't think about what you'd gain from it, but just help out. If you can't help somebody yourself, connect them forward to someone in your network who could.

It's crazy how a small act can make a big difference. Tanmaya didn't have to offer me that desk or his time, but he did. That simple gesture? It changed my whole career path. Now I'm here, trying to do the same for other founders.

This core value is ingrained in Bharat Founders Fund as well. We always strive to pave it forward, even when we're not investing. Sometimes it's connecting a founder with a potential hire, sometimes it's just lending an ear to someone feeling lost. We've seen ideas spark and collaborations form from these simple acts.

It's not always about the big stuff; sometimes it's just about being there.

So, be Tanmaya, my friend. Be the person who paves the way for others, not expecting anything in return. Because in the end, that's how we all move forward, together.

PS: Life comes full circle at times, here is a podcast between Tanmaya and me in 2021 where we discussed how inFeedo made it through Covid-19

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“If you can’t pay it back, pay it forward.”

— Catherine Ryan Hyde