In Brief

It’s clear that proactively building an inclusive culture, supported and driven by leadership in both statements as well as actions, ultimately supports all employees and benefits a company in the long run.

VCs usually specialize by stage, sector and geography. They look for insights and data that minimize their investment risk. The more the entrepreneur can remove the risk, Epstein explains, the more investors will be interested – and the higher the valuation.

Amazon has product, channel, country, customer, and fulfillment “genes” – genes for every core aspect of its business. It is constantly mutating single genes, like at the start when the company started with books and then added music, video and other products – mutating the “product” gene.

But every so often, Amazon mutates many (but not all) genes, like the introduction of marketplaces and web services. They then go back to make lots of small single-gene changes. The strategy is very organic and very smart from an evolutionary biology lens: many small changes and occasionally big ones.