Rob Ryan: Founder of GrowthHax, in Los Angeles
I love what I do. It’s my life’s work/purpose. Our team loves working with the people we help. I get to wake up and talk to, learn from and help some of the smartest, most aspirational entrepreneurial people throughout the world. It’s easy to stay motivated to help good people pursue their dreams.
Twitter: @IAmRobRyan
This interview is part #EVOLve Series with one of our @posi2ive community members. Interviewees have been active in our weekly *VC Impact* community roundtables on Twitter Spaces [each Friday 3:30pm PT] and community. In each self-paced and self-authored interview, we ask impact Founders / Investors what they are doing to change the world, and why they’re motivated to focus on their area of impact. Hope you all enjoy!
The Interview
Top Sustainable Development Goals (SDG):
4: Quality Education, 5: Gender Equality, 8: Decent Work / Economic Growth
Impact verticals your venture focuses on:
Any and all!
Please share what you’re building, your professional background, and what inspired this venture.
My firm, GrowthHax, is a 6 year old consultancy that primarily helps early stage companies, their founders, investors and entrepreneurial economy stakeholder organizations to expand their relationship network. We also co-produce content and events to directly support entrepreneurs. We build bridges between and within Latin America and USA. We help our clients in 3 ways: Relationship Building. Strategy Advice. Content & Consulting.
Much like you’d hire a law firm to help you navigate the legal aspects of your business, or an accounting firm to navigate the tax realities of your business, our clients hire us to help them better tell their story, to build the new relationships they need, in new markets they’re targeting, and then to help them know what to do next with those relationships once built.
What’s the impact focus of your venture? And how do you plan to measure impact?
Our definition of “impact” is human centered. We view our work connecting and deepening human relationships across cultures, borders, language, generations and industry barriers as the ultimate impact. We measure our “impact” by the numbers of clients we help, and the numbers of relationships we help them build. Additionally, through our own direct to entrepreneur content and programs consulting work, we measure the number of entrepreneurs mentored/connected with.
What’s driving your impact focus?
We focus on under-supported entrepreneurs and emerging entrepreneurial economies.
What are some obstacles standing in the way of the impact you have planned?
The ability to scale to take on more clients, or deliver more consultative program/event support.
How do you stay motivated?
I love what I do. It’s my life’s work/purpose. Our team loves working with the people we help. I get to wake up and talk to, learn from and help some of the smartest, most aspirational entrepreneurial people throughout the world. It’s easy to stay motivated to help good people pursue their dreams.
Tell us about your market, customers, and team.
- Geographically we focus on Latin America and the USA markets.
- Our clients are: funded startups, Venture Capital firms, governments, NGO’s, Universities and selectively, small-to medium traditional industry corporations.
- Our team is (5) of us (all remote, in LatAm), plus a 3rd party strategic partner content/media agency in Mexico we are invested in. Beyond that we have a “local ambassador” community throughout Latin America who help us deliver projects when needed.
How do you keep yourself healthy — e.g., mentally, physically, emotionally?
I walk a lot. I hike, and walk 6 days a week. I no longer drink alcohol much at all. I am also pretty disciplined about how I use social media and when/how I do my work or conversely, block off time in my days and weeks to live my life outside of my work.
What are you currently educating yourself on?
History and Human Behavior. Most books I am reading at any moment, help me dive into a better understanding “how we got here” and thus, how we repeat patterns of behavior and choices throughout human history. I study the histories of the cities, countries and cultures we work in quite rigorously.
What books, podcasts, or newsletters should our community read — to better understand your area of impact?
I’d start with our own podcast, Mentors Today (found on any platform) secondarily, you can follow my social media or the web @iamrobryan or ours @growthhax.
What do you do outside of work, that you like to brag about?
Most important job I’ve ever had and the single greatest thing I will ever do in this life, is be the proud father to my now 28yo daughter who is a writer here in the television industry.
How can the @posi2ive community support your efforts? (*Not public solicitation, nor securities offerings)
Connect me to relationships you have who are focused on the same work we are so that we can build helpful human connection and expand our tribe.
Copyright 2022, all rights reserved. If you’re a Founder / Investor focused on VC Impact, we’d love to invite you to share your story here (#EVOLve) with the posi2ive community. If you’re an LP or GP in venture, we’d also love to have you apply to our private VC Impact Capital Community.
