David Haber

You know, I'm just curious.

One of the things Bennett said, which resonated a lot, was he's like, I never felt like an employee.

Like, it never felt bureaucratic.

You know, and again, I think about that a lot here.

One of the things that surprised me about Andreessen, you know, it says Andreessen Horowitz on the door, is actually there's not a ton of top-down direction.

I think Mark and Ben have done a very thoughtful job of trying to make the firm feel like a platform for smart entrepreneurial people to build on top of.

And I think it was really wise if you want to attract and retain, you know, some of the folks here who've been very, very successful entrepreneurs in the past.

Like if they needed to be micro...

They would never work here if they were micromanaged.

One of the things that I think is rare to see is that my understanding is when you first had that conversation with Steve, you basically told him you were going to retire at 70.

Right.

That's not normal.

Most people try to sort of hang on, you know, especially at that level.

How did you think about that decision?

So, you know, it seems like you obviously did an amazing job.

I guess, you know, what did you see in John Gray early on?

Why was he the logical kind of successor?

hand the reins to someone who could take Blackstone on up.

Maybe we'll spend a minute just kind of looking ahead into kind of the alternatives ecosystem.

You know, we're sitting here amidst, I don't know, fear-mongering and private credit, the SaaSpocalypse.