Weekends as a Dad

I had an uneventful but nice weekend. We didn’t really do anything too exciting and I spent most of the time just taking care of my son. For better or worse, this is probably the new norm now as a father.

My weekend evenings are now spent mostly at home. We relax a bit in the late afternoon. Play with Colin and then put him to bed. Then perhaps have a couple glasses of wine with Sophia and order a nice delivery dinner.

The weekend afternoons are filled with parent errands and outdoor activities. We go to the stores to get groceries and things we need for the week. Then we try to get him outside as much as possible. We spent Saturday afternoon at Fort Funston on a gorgeous day and took Colin for a walk.

Lunches at restaurants are perhaps the only time Sophia and I get to eat out nowadays. I miss going out to dinner with all my friends though. We try to make up for it by having some nice lunches.

At this age, there’s just not that much to do with Colin besides take him around with us and play with him. Everyone keeps telling me to enjoy this point in time because they get a lot more difficult as they run around so I’m aiming to do just that.

My life is a lot more boring nowadays, but boring is good and I’m really enjoying my weekends as a Dad.

DEI

DEI has become the target of the new administration since taking office the last couple of weeks. Nearly every major tech company has eliminated their DEI programs. Of course there’s a lot of people for and against these initiatives.

My stance on the touchy subject is that DEI initiatives were implemented with the best of intentions but things just went too far over the last 5 years or so. At what I believe to be the core concept of DEI initiatives is that we should ensure that underprivileged individuals get a fair shot at jobs in order to address systematic racism.

The reality is that I’ve lived a privileged life. I was able to go to great university out of state in which my parents provided for. Maybe I didn’t have the resources as some of those that are very wealthy, but I consider myself lucky and privileged.

Unfortunately, that’s not the case for many Americans. Individuals may be born into more difficult situations and perhaps were not afforded the luxury of going to a great school. Some may have been able to attend some of the better schools through merit, but may have had to go to the junior college route and settled for a state school which gets overlooked. These individuals may be more than qualified for roles but just may not have been given the opportunity.

If that’s what DEI is addressing, I’m all for it. Give everyone an equal chance if they are qualified for the position and ensure that racism does not hinder individuals.

Unfortunately, I do believe that DEI initiatives went too far. The idea is to give everyone qualified an equal opportunity, not hire or promote individuals solely because they were of a certain race, orientation, etc. Quite frankly when things like that happen, you just stray into racism in a different form.

All that said, I believe this war on DEI once again has gone too far the other way. I’m in favor at eliminating some of these DEI initiatives, but the rhetoric from this administration going as far to blame a plane crash on DEI is just absurd. I hope we can get back to common sense approaches to address our issues in this country. For now though, we just have to buckle up.

Momentum

It’s still really early in the year, but momentum in the private markets seem to be picking up. Anecdotally, I’ve noticed a large uptick of buyers in the secondary markets. Presumably investors are looking to capitalize on the projected IPO window opening up in 2025.

It’s been a slow market the last 6 months of 2024 and volumes were trending downwards. January was slow as always every year as we everyone eases back into work from the holidays.

As we sit here in February, we’re finally seeing some positive momentum finally. It’s early and things can change quickly, but it gives me a lot of hope and optimism for the year ahead.

Otsukaresama

My meditation today was about the Japanese word Otsukaresama which loosely translates to “good job”. The Japanese use this phrase commonly in the workplace as a greeting or a goodbye to show appreciation for someone’s efforts. It’s a way to say, I see you working hard and I appreciate your hard work.

I loved hearing about this and I wish we had something similar in the U.S. Obviously, we can say the words, “good job” and “I appreciate your hard work” but we need something a bit more commonplace.

The workplace at Secfi can be really frustrating often. We work in a highly specialized field that is demanding. We’re also a small company that requires a lot out of our people. Like any workplace, we can great frustrated at our colleagues and what’s happening.

All that said, I’m incredibly lucky to have a great team. This job just isn’t worth it if you don’t like the people you’re doing it with, and I’m fortunate to say that I love my colleagues. They’re rock stars and they always come through for me. Learning about Otsukaresama is a good reminder that I need to tell them I appreciate them more often.

Staying fit in 2025

With a new kid and much less time than I had previously, I’m now faced with the decision on what to change in my lifestyle. There’s a lot of hard things to give up, but that’s necessary when you have a kid. You just can’t have it all unless you have an amazing support system or a ton of money to pay for help. Unfortunately Sophia and I don’t have either of those luxuries.

The easiest thing to weed out is my social life. I knew that would suffer. I would golf less and see my friends less. Dinners out just don’t happen anymore. That’s fine.

One area that I’m for sure trying to maintain is my health. Obviously that’s probably the most important thing besides the kid. I used to be someone who loved spending 1.5-2 hours at the gym. I’m not a workout junkie, but it was a time for me to catch up on reading and get a good workout in. Or go on a long run.

In order to make this work, I’ve had to cut my time working out significantly. So last night I spent a couple hours researching the Minimum Effective Dose workouts which in short is the minimum amount of working out twice a week to maintain and build muscle.

I’m excited for it as it brings in new exercises and forces me to really focus on getting a good workout in. I’m hoping to condense my workouts down to 45 minutes tops with 15 minutes for stretching/showering.

Change is always a good thing and I haven’t been this excited to actually work out in awhile.

A new morning person

Last year, if you told me that waking up at 6am every morning including weekends would be my life, I would probably have said that’s my nightmare. I’ve never been a morning person and I have always struggled to go to bed early. Of course, I had to be up that early multiple times a week, but I’d at least catch-up on the weekends.

Enter Colin and my life is now 6am wake-ups when I am lucky and he decides to sleep through the night. Prior to Colin, the anxiety of waking up early on a Monday morning would probably drive me to toss and turn most of the night. Nowadays, waking up early isn’t so bad anymore.

While still tired, I know that I get to wake up and see my son who is always happy to see me in the mornings. There is no better feeling than seeing him recognize me and smile uncontrollably. It makes my day. Waking up early also lets me get a head start on my day so I can aim to be home earlier to see him before bed time.

On top of all this, I’ve realized that starting my day off with feeding and playing with my son changes my mindset. Put simply, instead of checking my phone and emails first thing and being stressed all morning, I need to be present to take care of my kid first and foremost. It’s obvious but easier said than done… but starting my day with Colin puts me in a better mindset throughout the day.

I wouldn’t go off and call myself a morning person still, but I’m getting there.

February - a month of rest

I spent the last 36 hours or so recovering from my trip from New York. The first two days of the trip and nights were hyper focused on rest and work. I wanted to be sure to get the rest I needed so I could maximize my time with the team in the 2 short days I had with them.

After a good couple of days with the team, I decided to reward myself and meet an old friend on Thursday before my flight out on Friday. Of course, we did what old friends do in New York and caught up for a bit too long and over too many drinks. I had a blast but my Friday trip home was that much harder.

The recovery lasted well into last night. Unfortunately nowadays in my mid-30s with a kid, you either get to choose rest or social life.

My January was about social life as Sophia and I explored traveling with Colin. We wanted to make up for a stressful December so we took trips to Monterey and Lake Tahoe. And I took a work trip to New York for the first time. It was a lot of fun but I’m feeling the exhaustion now.

February will be the month of chilling and rest. I’m looking forward to being home and focusing in on spending time with Colin and getting work to get a spot.

Secfi New York

We started kicking off our office search for a more permanent space here in New York a couple weeks ago. We had about 14 options on the table and narrowed it down to 5 to view in-person which we did yesterday.

It was a fun afternoon with some members of the team. Sometimes at a startup, you’re so deep in the work and grinding that you forget that there’s a lot of other fun things that come along with the startup. One of those things is building out an office.

A good office space in a convenient location is critical to having people actually come into the office. We’ve been in a coworking space for the last few years and everyone has struggled with space and places for calls. Not exactly an inviting reason to come into the office.

We’re happy that’s changing here in the next couple of months when we have our own space. After going through this process in San Francisco, I’ve finally gotten pretty decent at finding offices.

First, we’re making sure we have enough room to make hires in the next year or two, but not big enough in our absolute bull hiring case. More space is not always better. If we somehow outgrow our space in the next 2-3 years, that’s fine and we can decide to move the team then. But having 10 people in a 30 person space makes everything feel very empty.

Rather, we’re looking at places that can sit 15 comfortably and then fit up to 20 with extra work. That should be more than enough space for the next year or two and also allow people to come visit from other cities.

We’re also prioritizing location. Paying $50 a square foot in Flat Iron vs $25 a square foot in FiDi is an okay expense for us. We want to create a culture where people want to come into the office, not because they need to. Location matters for people’s commutes as well as overall enjoyment of the space. I’d like the team to have the best lunch and happy hour options.

Lastly, also feng shui matters. Our last office in San Francisco had gorgeous views and was massive, but felt hollow. We had tried to decorate it and build it out the right way, but the pandemic delays and awful lease terms made it not worth it. This time around, we have two people from our team who love interior decorating and I’m happy to let them take the reins here. They understand the importance of building the office out the right way within a budget.

New York, New York

Admittedly, I’ve been really sad to leave San Francisco. My family is there. My best friends are there. And my golf game just started getting good.

But holy hell I love New York. I’ve been in town less than 12 hours and I can notice that my energy levels are on a different level. The sheet amount of quality food everywhere is just mind boggling, even for someone who previously lived here for 5 years.

I spent a lot of my plane ride figuring out where and what I wanted to eat while I was here. My fat ass even went to 2 restaurants last night, Fish Cheeks and Szechuan Mountain House. I just had to sneak in two of my favorite spots. Of course, that list has slowly just grown in the last 12 hours. Walking around and seeing new spots I want to eat at is my favorite thing to do in New York.

It’s also incredibly energizing being here with the team in-person. Unlike San Francisco, the office culture in New York is thriving. I’ll be checking out some places to move the team to this afternoon.

It’s going to be sad leaving San Francisco, but being here in New York has got me incredibly excited again. I can’t wait to be back.

Being present

Sophia and I drove up to Lake Tahoe with Colin on Thursday and spent a long weekend out there. It was our second road trip with Colin and like the first, he was great pretty much throughout.

Colin is getting to a really fun age right now. He’s smiling more and starting to communicate via coos. He’s not crying as much and he interacts with us a lot more nowadays. He’s also sleeping nearly 10 hours a night leaving Mom and Dad a lot more rested.

By far the most common parenting advice we get from friends and strangers is to enjoy everything now as they grow very fast. As I sit here on the eve of Colin’s 12th week birthday, I can attest that things are moving very quickly.

I can’t stop time or make things go slower, but what I can control is being present when I’m with him. It’s easy for me to do emails while playing with him or have the TV on in the background. Those are obviously horrible habits and I want to be conscious about being present whenever I’m fortunate to have time with Colin.

Productivity with a baby

I’ve been trying to find ways to be more productive in the last few weeks. With a new child, I want to be home by 6pm almost every day so I can feed him and put him to bed. After not being with him all day, this is a special time for me and I’ve made it a point to be there.

This timing has clashed with my previous preferred schedule. I’m someone who loves working into the evenings and stretching my afternoons. I’m on call most of the morning and early afternoon, and I don’t get a chance to be my most productive until the late afternoon and evenings.

With a more condensed and busier schedule now, I need to find more ways to be productive and that means I need to peel back in other areas of my day. Unfortunately, this means my personal time gets shorter. I no longer have the luxury of taking long lunch breaks and having leisurely workouts at the gym. Previously, I could make up for that lost time in the evenings but that’s no longer a possibility.

I also need to peel back the amount of calls I have and sticking to bigger blocks to focus on getting stuff done. This will also be hard given that I seem to live most of my day on calls. It’s going to be a big adjustment for me, but one that needs to be made to keep my sanity and work-life balance in check.

Reset days

I blocked off my entire calendar today to give myself a “reset day”. I had done my best to get caught up on everything on Monday despite the holiday and was hoping to get caught up on my to-do list on Tuesday.

Unfortunately, I spent most of the day in calls and meetings. My checklist only grew bigger and I wasn’t even able to get to the most important thing I wanted to do. The writing was on the wall that I needed a day to catch-up on things.

These reset days are great for me as it gives me most of the day to solely focus on getting work done. I’ve moved or canceled nearly all my meetings except that pesky one hour of calls that I need to do.

I feel good and excited to get through everything. Note to self to schedule more of these reset days in the future when things get too crazy.

America 2025

The Trump Presidency has officially arrived and if there’s one thing I’m certain of is that this will be a much more interesting political climate than the last four years.

My stance going into the Trump Presidency is to remain positive and hope that he proves me wrong. Like it or not, he’s our President and there’s going to be changes that take place. I hope these big changes promised actually turn out to be the right thing for this country.

On the positive end, it does seem that Trump is aligning himself with much more positive advisors. Controversial as they may be, I’d rather see Trump advised by Elon rather than Steve Bannon. There is hope that he’s learned a lot from his last Presidency and he’s much more effective this time around to enact positive change.

On the scary side, Trump’s divisive rhetoric is worrisome. I don’t know what Elon’s intention was with his salute, but it was not great for the optics one way or another. I fear that we are once again giving people a platform for racism and xenophobia.

I’m an optimist so I’m going to remain hopeful for our country.

Living life with Colin

I’m feeling a lot better after taking a few days off through the long weekend. On Wednesday, Sophia and I decided to go to Carmel a bit early and roll the dice on two nights away with Colin. We really needed to get away for a bit and break out of our normal routine.

We had worried about Colin not adjusting well, but he adapted like a champion. He slept his normal hours and didn’t miss a beat. It was a test case to see what traveling with Colin would be like and the results were overwhelmingly positive.

We spent most of the trip doing casual walks around town and also visiting the aquarium one day. We spent more time in our hotel room than we’re typically used to on vacations because of Colin, but just getting out of our apartment and living a bit was really nice.

For the first time since Colin was born, things felt a bit like our old life but with the added benefit of showing Colin the world. While I’m sure he wasn’t too cognizant of what was happening the entire time, he’s been a lot more responsive and communicative lately. Bringing him with us on our adventures has been a treat.

Sophia and I are already talking about where to take Colin next. We’re going to be sure to take advantage of the baby years and travel as much as possible.

Tough decisions and conversations

Whether it’s deciding to let someone go or pulling the plug on a project, one of the biggest lessons I’ve learned from my 6+ years working at a startup is that tough decisions need to be made quickly and decisively.

The natural inclination for people is to delay or procrastinate that decision. It’s natural as it’s often easier to push things back and hope things fix itself out in the long run. It never does unfortunately.

For those reasons, it’s best to just make the decision and get it done. The conversations are never fun. There’s a human aspect to all this and often times these tough decisions impact individuals directly. But for the best of the company and that individual, it should be done quickly rather than a death by 100 paper cuts.

Time for a recharge

I’ve been running on fumes since December. I kept telling myself that I’ll take some time off when things slow down in January, but I’m sitting here mid-January and so far it’s been another busy 2 weeks of work.

Sometimes you need to hit rock bottom to realize things and unfortunately that’s what happened to me yesterday. I woke up exhausted and just generally negative about everything. I struggled through the day with some tough anxiety.

Simple tasks were just much more difficult and it was hard to focus for long periods of time. My run that serves as a stress killer and quick fix ended up being the most I’ve struggled in a run in months. Rock bottom indeed.

The toll of a newborn along with a stressful job doesn’t make things easy. Being a first time father adds fuel to the fire. Going forward, I know I need to do a better job managing my time and schedule. It’s just not sustainable to do what I used to pre-kid anymore.

For now, I’m going to take the rest of the week off after tomorrow morning. And possibly some time next week as well. There may not be a better time given things are slow and I need to take advantage versus creating more work for myself to stay busy.

It’s time for a recharge. I’ll be a better Dad, husband, and colleague once I do.

A sense of normalcy

Sophia and I had a fun weekend that we’re unfortunately paying for now. After over 2 months of new parenthood, we decided we needed a break.

Sophia had a girls dinner on Friday night and I had the guys over for drinks. It was a nice escape for Sophia and it sounded like a fun night. For myself, I had Colin still but it was also nice just having the guys over for drinks and watching football like we normally do.

On Saturday, Sophia and I hosted our “annual” crab feast for everyone. We had 8 friends over to our place for an afternoon and evening of crab and drinks. Colin was the star of the show and it was great to have all the friends over hanging out with him.

Having a kid there still makes things different but perhaps for the first time since Colin was born, it felt like things were “normal” as in the way things were before Colin was here. Of course, part of our journey now is understanding that there’s a new normal and getting used to that life style.

And yes, we’re paying for it today. Even with early bed times, the lack of sleep adds up. Spending the entire weekend socializing makes the next couple of days that much harder. For that reason alone, we may not be having many of these weekends anymore.

For one weekend though, it was a nice break.

Triaging the right partners

When you work at a startup, time is the most valuable resource. There’s just simply too many things to do at once and you need to prioritize accordingly. It’s always going with the highest value projects and deals.

We’re always trying to make sure we triaging the best deals. There’s always a trade off between amount of work and deal impact for us and finding that balance can be hard. Doing a sizable deal into a target company is always ideal, but if there’s complications that’s going to require a lot of work, we need to weigh that. Same goes for any projects we take on as a company.

One area that I need to really get better with is making sure we triage the right partners. Put simply, there’s some partners we work with that are great and worth the effort of building a relationship. They see the mutually beneficial aspect of working together and we help each other.

There’s others that are purely transactional and only come to you when you need help. Like in life, you don’t want to be friends with that person that only comes to you when you need something.

We’ve historically cast a big net here at Secfi in terms of our partners, but we’re at the point where it’s time to pick and choose better “friends”.

Losing your independence

So far one of the hardest things about being a parent is coming to terms that I simply can’t do much else besides parent anymore. There’s no going out to dinner anymore or grabbing a drink with friends after work. Well at least not often.

In my 34 years on this planet, I’ve lived mostly independent doing what I want. Things changed a bit once I moved in with Sophia, but still if I wanted to grab a drink with friends, it would just need to be a simple text message.

That all goes out the window once you have a kid. As much as I’d love to try this new restaurant, Colin needs to be in bed by 7:30pm to ensure he has a good night sleep. We could try to do an early dinner at 5pm and bring the kid, but it’s not the most pleasurable experience brining a 2 month year-old to a restaurant in the fussiest part of the day.

Sophia and I are trying to decide if we want to take a quick weekend road trip to Monterey in a couple weeks as well. Normally, this would be a dream weekend for me to get away and do something different. But of course, we’re thinking twice about doing it given that we now have a kid.

It’s a tough transition for sure and I’m still getting used to it. Seeing my son smile at me though makes it all the better. At least I have that to look forward to.

U.S. Digitalization in 2025

I spent over an hour at the Post Office today applying for a passport for my son. I suppose in the grand scheme of things it wasn’t the worst experience or the biggest time suck, but I showed up on time for my appointment only to wait 45 minutes before being helped.

As anyone would guess, the application process was filled out on paper and we had to print everything to bring to the post office. Once there, the post office worker had to hand print more things to finish the application. When I left, I could tell her was preparing the application to be mailed to the Government.

This is the year 2025 in San Francisco nonetheless and we still have yet to find a way to digitalize passport applications. Of course, this isn’t the only example of where our Federal, State, and Local governments are severely behind in tech.

I have no interest in helping fix the government’s issues, but I imagine that with proper incentives in place, there would be many entrepreneurs who would step up to fix these antiquated systems and processes.