Is this new world we just woke up to all that different?

Whether you voted for John McCain, Barack Obama, or some obscure write-in candidate yesterday, you no doubt feel different today.  While I certainly think our world has changed with the election of a President with a distinctly different agenda from the current one, I’m not sure if we should expect that a new world will appear before our eyes when President-elect Obama takes the oath.  Logic would dictate that regardless of Obama’s agenda for his Presidency, he will still manage the world as it is even as he strives to make it different and new (just like every President tries to do).  And it also seems logical to believe that with the other party retaining its right to filibuster, both sides will have to compromise to a great extent to get anything done.  That’s probably a good thing for everyone. 

We in the venture world, like most other investors, have a simple list of wants/needs – we want market stability and some level of assurance that government won’t fiddle too much with the natural workings of the market.  We also need a level playing field for our portfolio companies and we want to make certain that the entrepreneurs running those companies have the proper incentives to work hard at growing those concerns.  Nothing on that short list of wants and needs is new or different from any list I would have constructed this time yesterday and you can be assured that it won’t be any different a year from now or 10 years from now. 

So, President-elect Obama… congratulations.  We in the venture/start-up community are looking forward to working with you and the new administration.  We appreciate your mandate to change, be different, bring something new to Washington.  Just know that we in the high growth business community haven’t changed our agenda – we just want to build enduring companies that provide substantial return to our limited partners and contribute to the overall prosperity of America and the World.  

Tagged as: McCain, Obama