Investing in Culture with Masha Drokova Founder and General Partner of Day One Ventures The Look Up! Podcast with Marc Weinstein

The Most Important ThingMasha simply asked me to relay to listeners to consider that you all are the creators of your own reality, not products of it. If you’re a start-up founder building transformational technology, reach out to Day One.
About Masha DrokovaMasha is the Founder and General Partner at Day One Ventures. Before launching Day One, she was an angel investor and founder of M&A PR Studio, a public relations company that worked with startups like Houzz, HotelTonight, Gett, and Toptal. Prior to cofounding M&A PR, Masha was VP of Communications at Acronis, a data protection company, where she managed PR activities across 18 countries. 
She is a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree and was named by Business Insider as a top 50 PR Pro in tech. Masha has a deep love for our earth and serves as an advisor to Oceanic, a non-profit using VR to bring attention to issues impacting our oceans. She also founded Satio, a non-profit project to connect scientists with philanthropists who want to fund cutting edge research.
About Day One VenturesDay One Ventures is a San Francisco-based early stage venture capital firm that invests in technology startups and spearheads their communications. Led by angel investor, entrepreneur and communications professional Masha Drokova, the firm is focused on investing in hard-to-imitate tech, impactful companies, and community-driven businesses that will fundamentally change industries and solve some of today’s biggest challenges – social, business, or otherwise. Portfolio companies include Superhuman, Atoms, Yumi, Truebill, Package Free, and more.
The Fund’s name was inspired by Jeff Bezos who explained that as soon as a business reaches Day Two, it’s all over. Day One believes in supporting founders that live every day and make every decision as if it’s the first day of the company.
An early-stage startup’s story, public recognition, and network can greatly impact the company’s success, yet few teams have the resources to fill these roles. That’s where Day One comes in. They are the first VC that takes an active role in portfolio companies’ communications. Day One leverages 12+ years of expertise in communications and marketing to help its portfolio companies grow revenue, attract new investors, hire the best talent, and create exit opportunities.
Episode Overview:In this episode, I sat down with my friend, Masha Drokova, to discuss her views on startup investing. Masha has incredible experience. She began her career in the public sector in Russia before moving to the US to lead communications for one of the leading data science companies in the world. She started a PR studio and now a venture fund and is an extremely supportive investor with a unique take on identifying winning teams.
She and I discuss the cultural differences between Russia and the US, being an immigrant in San Francisco, immigration policy, learning new languages, and her transition from politics to business. We also discuss intuition, how words manifest our reality, startup founder mental health, and the importance of self-love.

My Favorite Quotes:“When you’re a kid, you learn all of these words that are randomly put into your head, but you actually never chose them. But when you’re an adult, you can create your reality in your head and your reality is often created through your words.”
“When learning a new language, you get to choose which words you want to keep in your head and in that way get to decide the direction of your life”
“This fund is something that came as a result of my spiritual search.”
“It’s not possible to just evaluate based on fundamentals. Look at the entrepreneur – do I believe in this person? Is he or she doing what he or she truly wants to do?”
“Main criteria for a ‘Day One’ company is an obsession with customers. While other funds look at product, market, and team – we also look ta culture.”
“I like when management and governance is more or less a f