# How Apollo, Citadel, Blackstone, & Bridgewater Built Their Brands Sourcery · 2026-09-28 · 65 min · https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJDb3bYkLfI ## Transcript Jennifer Prosek My name is Jen Prosek. Prosek Partners is known as an integrated market communications firm. Molly O'Shea You were top 3 in M&A communications, ranked number 1 globally in deal volume in 2026. You hit 9 figures in revenue. Am I allowed to say that? Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea That's crazy. You have a clear monopoly on all of the branding and marketing, PR, communications, and strategy behind some of the largest institutions and companies as well. You have $70 trillion in clients' AUM. Jennifer Prosek It's a lot of money. I started the business in my 20s, and I had this crazy idea that the finance world would care about brand in an offense way. I had this cockamamie idea that we were going to be the firm that did that. We were selling something no one wanted to buy for years. And then the financial crisis came, and Goldman famously had the vampire squid, and many, many other firms were damaged. Lehman went away. Bear Stearns went away. So famously, the Goldmans of the world decided this is not a defense game; it's an offense game. They went to the market and said, "Who does this?" And we were like, "We've been talking about this for years." Molly O'Shea Today, we're sitting down with Jen Prosek, one of the most influential brand builders in finance and technology. Jen is the founder and managing partner of Prosek Partners, the reputation-management firm behind some of the biggest names across private markets, asset management, venture capital, banking, and tech. For more than 2 decades, she's advised financial institutions managing hundreds of billions and, in some cases, trillions of dollars, helping them shape their brands, build trust, manage crises, and turn reputation into a competitive advantage. Today, I want to unpack what she's learned from having a front-row seat to some of the most powerful firms and financiers in the world: who has built the best brands, what they got right, what destroys a reputation, how to build one intentionally, and what happens when things go wrong. Jen Prosek, welcome to Sorcery. Jennifer Prosek Thanks for having me. Molly O'Shea Well, I'm so excited to have you here. We're at the New York Stock Exchange in their IPO Roadshow library. Jennifer Prosek Nice. Molly O'Shea Which is very emblematic of your career— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —and all of the huge financial firms that you work with building out the largest brands. So I want to ask you: What makes a good financial brand? ### Financial Brands Need A Narrative Jennifer Prosek Well, it's what makes any brand great, but I think first it has a distinctive narrative. We always tell clients, "Before you get out there and say anything, you need to nail the narrative." You have to figure out what is distinctive, interesting, and exciting so that when you say it, and all your people say it, there is some positive effect, right? Brands typically are somewhat emotional. They're aspirational. All those things are built into nailing the narrative. But I think great brands are—you know, the word "authentic" is always used, but it is true. They're authentic. They have some sort of purpose. They have some sort of reason for being, some right to win. I think brands are aspirational and emotional. You want to feel, as the customer of a brand, that you are part of it and that it represents you. Molly O'Shea So I don't know if you say this, but I'll say it because Prosek pops up in my inbox all the time. Jennifer Prosek We like that. Molly O'Shea You have a clear monopoly on all of the branding and marketing, PR, communications, and strategy behind some of the largest institutions and companies as well. So I think I wrote it down: You have $70 trillion in clients' AUM. Jennifer Prosek It's a lot of money. Molly O'Shea It's a lot of money. As we walk through this conversation, I'd love to talk through some core examples. Jennifer Prosek Sure. Molly O'Shea And I know alongside that, there's a handful of stats behind you, but you were top 3 in M&A communications, ranked number 1 globally in deal volume in 2026. You were ranked number 1 alongside FGS Global. You hit 9 figures in revenue. Am I allowed to say that? Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea That's crazy. Oh my gosh. And you have a long list of clients. But I guess to start, we'll talk through some client cases and some other brands. This might be a big question as well, but who do you think has built some of the best brands in finance? Jennifer Prosek Well, it's undeniable that the obvious ones have done a good job, right? And, by the way, they started incredibly early. But Blackstone, Goldman, JPMorgan—I mean, these are the obvious players. There are some financial brands that are newer, that were born only a few years ago, that are excellent brands. One is Arctos. I don't know if you know them, but they just got bought by KKR. I think they have an exceptional brand. ### The Offense Game Arrived I've been at this a very long time. I started the business in my 20s, and I had this crazy idea that the finance world would care about brand in an offense way. There was offense and defense. The only dollars spent in the entire industry were if you got in trouble, you would call a crisis firm, or maybe if you did an M&A transaction, but there was no offense game. I thought—thank God I was young and silly—what if all these investors changed their stance and went on the offense and cared about brand building? There was really no firm in the space that did that. I had this cockamamie idea that we were going to be the firm that did that. We were selling something no one wanted to buy for years. I would get the door slammed in my face: "We're under the radar. We don't engage with stakeholders outside of our investors. Go away." And then the financial crisis came, and Goldman famously had the vampire squid, and many, many other firms were damaged. The whole ecosystem knew that they had brand damage. Regular people on Main Street hated finance. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Famously, the Goldmans of the world decided this is not a defense game; it's an offense game. They went to the market and said, "Who does this?" And we were like, "We've been talking about this for years." So we had our magic moment in the GFC, and then we made a big bet on private markets, VC, PE, and credit. Our competition thought we were crazy. They were like, "Why are you hanging around with those weird, squirrely founder people who don't spend money?" And they didn't at the time. But we made a long-term bet, which super paid off. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Thank you for all those accolades. But I just want the audience to know we started at zero. We started small and ugly with a crazy idea, and we're lucky it hit. Molly O'Shea To put some dollars toward these budgets for the different categories, how much does each category of firm typically spend on marketing and branding? ### Brand Budgets Follow Complexity Jennifer Prosek Yeah. I would say if you're under $2 billion in AUM, your spend is probably $250,000 or less. I would say the more complex, the more global, and the more multiproduct you are—and also if you're retail and institutional, if you're public, if you start to get complicated—your budgets are probably $500,000 to $4 million. A huge range. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek It depends. You see, for the first time, publicly traded private-markets firms doing F1 sponsorships and U.S. Open sponsorships. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek That's to get to the retail audience, right? That's driven a lot of interest in brand, but it's driven a lot of spend. You could imagine the budgets could be $10 million if you're getting into that kind of marketing. Molly O'Shea And so what is the main objective, I guess, to market? Has retail changed the focus? Jennifer Prosek Definitely. So let's start with a rubric I call "talent, deals, and capital." When a founder is skeptical about the business impact of brand—because the old-schoolers often felt that brand was this fluffy, intangible thing that doesn't deliver ROI—we easily change a founder's mind when we talk about talent, deals, and capital. That's the rubric. We're going to make people want to work for you because you're a brand instead of you begging them. We're going to help you with deal sourcing. You're going to get better deals. You're going to compete better for deals because people are going to want to be with your firm. And then we're going to make fundraising more efficient and effective. That's the phone call we get the most, honestly. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Fundraising is torturous right now. So the idea that what we do can create efficiency, effectiveness, and preference in a fundraise is really attractive. That's the speech that gets founders to say, "Okay, maybe I do need to experiment with some of this stuff." Molly O'Shea What's the typical process when you onboard a new client and build that brand out? Do you first strategize? Then are you trying to pick who's the key person in the firm who should be an image of it? Is a brand the image of it? How do you decide those components, and what are the steps to build it up? Jennifer Prosek Yeah. It depends where you are in the journey. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek But typically speaking, in this world, whether you're—JPMorgan has it pretty much down. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek But whether you're a large global financial institution, a technology company, or a startup, it starts with where you are on the journey, and we need to nail the narrative. Molly O'Shea Mm. ### The Narrative Comes First Jennifer Prosek Most financial firms would say, "We're not good at explaining what we do quickly, easily, with intention, and with excitement," right? That's where we start: How do we figure out that narrative? That's an internal and external research exercise. At the end of it, we basically tell clients, “If we were you, this is what we would say, how we would say it, and how we would amplify it.” Then you get to the work of amplifying your story and brand, right? There are lots of choices there, and some of the choices are based on what your culture is like, but most of the choices should be about what your business goals are, right? Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek Should I be doing media? Should I be doing thought leadership and speaking? Digital? Social? Should I stay quiet? I think even the most conservative brands are doing some version of all of this—media, thought leadership, digital, and, of course, fixing crises. But that's the way we look at it. Molly O'Shea Do people still need to do blogs? I mean, this is— Jennifer Prosek Eh. Molly O'Shea I feel like podcasts have kind of taken over where blogs were. Internal podcasts, I'm not really a proponent of this because I don't believe everybody needs a podcast, but I understand it creates content. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Everyone would make blogs for SEO and all that kind of stuff. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea And so you'd get more traffic. You'd have some collateral in case someone you're hiring or that kind of thing. Do they still matter? What are the key resources? Jennifer Prosek I would just say content matters, and you have to figure out what kind of content is going to turn your audience on, right? Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek And what content are you naturally good at? An internal podcast is a really uphill battle for most companies because you need distribution. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek You need an audience. If you're reaching 5 people, it's not worth doing. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek I'm a huge fan—it’s one of the reasons I wanted to get to know you—of the podcast because it is a long-form asset. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek I always say to clients, “This is not a one-and-done interview. This is an asset. If you do this well, you can advance this piece to an investor, a new recruit, or a customer. And if they even listen to half of it, again, that efficiency and effectiveness means they sit down and they're ready to do business. They might even prefer to work with you.” It's hard to get the story and the perspective of the person without that long-form interview, and people love audio, right? Even investors say, “Don't give me your deck. I'd rather listen while I'm on the treadmill.” People like the portability of audio, so I'm a big fan. But I wouldn't say the blog is in or the blog is out. I know this audience—your audience hates LinkedIn. I write a LinkedIn newsletter. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek It's one of the top 3 most effective things I do. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek Because if I get 100,000 views overnight on my piece, I know I'm reaching people, and I know that message is something I should continue with, not abandon. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek If I get 10,000, I know that's a stinker. The market research I get from social platforms is really amazing. So I would say I don't discriminate against any of it, and I'm a big proponent of experimenting. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek I tell my clients, “Let's try these things,” because we're going to get a feel for where we're moving hearts and minds, where we're hitting our audience, and where this is having a commercial impact. Then stop doing certain things and double down on the others. I have a top 3 list of things I do to build my brand and the firm's brand, for commercial reasons, and they might not be someone else's top 3. Molly O'Shea Yeah. I love that you love podcasts because— Jennifer Prosek I do. Molly O'Shea I saw the value of it when I started creating mine. Even when I had a tiny audience, I would have startups come on, I'd have funds come on, and they'd be getting customers out of it. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea They'd be getting, like, $50 million contracts—crazy things. And then they'd get funding out of it, millions of dollars, that kind of stuff. Jennifer Prosek I'm up to $17 million in fees on 1 podcast. Molly O'Shea Really? Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea No. Jennifer Prosek Yes, and I'll give him a shout. It's the Capital Allocators Podcast with Ted Seides. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Ted created an institutional investor marketplace. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek LPs and founder GPs listen, and that's a very powerful combination. They're very senior decision-makers. I guess I did the podcast when people were just really starting to think about marketing. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek But I still get calls from it, and I think that was 7 years ago. Molly O'Shea It's incredible. Jennifer Prosek It's incredible. Molly O'Shea When I was doing extra research on this, we sat and had coffee— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —in LA, and it was amazing. Jennifer Prosek It was. It was outside. The sun was out. It was great. Molly O'Shea It was beautiful weather all the time. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea I know you did this, too, and I know that it's become a forcing function for getting to know people and clients ahead of time. Before I interview anyone, I will look up every podcast they've ever gone on. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, of course. Molly O'Shea I'll go right to Spotify. I'll search their name, maybe their company. I'll go to YouTube. I'll search that up, too. But on Spotify, I saw that podcast. He reuploads it every year; he must be that good. Jennifer Prosek Oh, he does? He didn't tell me. Molly O'Shea Yes. No, you can go to Spotify. Jennifer Prosek That's amazing. Molly O'Shea It's up there. It's been replayed 7 times. Jennifer Prosek I love it. Molly O'Shea It's incredible. That's when you know you have a hit piece. For me, it's a goal. I want to be able to create evergreen content that you can replay every year, and it's still a banger. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea But you clearly— Jennifer Prosek But that's the thing. People who love your podcast will go back to the library and be like, “I didn't watch this one. I'm going to watch this one.” So the shelf life is actually quite long. Molly O'Shea Yeah. But I want to talk about that a little bit more. In terms of the podcast strategy and the content strategy, I want to know when you should play offense, when you should stay on the sidelines, and be quiet, because there's a point at which you're like, “Okay, maybe you don't actually need to do anything.” Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea But there is a point in time when you're like, “Okay, maybe you're growing really fast. Maybe there will be challenges along the way, and maybe you should get ahead of the narratives in whatever way they come at you.” How do you think about that in building out this offensive strategy? ### The Reputation Machine Needs Feeding Jennifer Prosek There's an overall brand health you should have, right? It doesn't have to be very complicated, but you should be monitoring: What does my brand look like and feel like to the outside? And by the way, in the world of LLMs, this happened yesterday. I talked to a $10 billion manager, and I almost didn't take the call because it was like, in LLMs, they look kind of puny, and there wasn't a lot of this and that. I'm like, “Do I need to take this call? Maybe someone else should take this call.” I get on the phone, and oh my gosh, what a dynamic, incredible fund. A young founder, up to $9 billion, who had, by the way, done none of this stuff. Molly O'Shea Wow. Jennifer Prosek Everything was inaccurate online. Molly O'Shea Really? Jennifer Prosek And I'm like, “Dude, you've got to fix this.” The way to fix it in good times is to feed the machine, right? If you don't feed the machine positive content about you and your brand—what I call momentum content—the machine just grabs what's available. It could be old. It could be wrong. Outside of bad times and a crisis, you can somewhat manage what the machine is going to say about you. I always say, even with your personal brand, I literally did a word cloud of the words I want people to associate with me: entrepreneur, connector, this, that, and the other. Those words come up in my profile. If you look, those words are coming back and being spit back about me when you ask about me online. I think there's just a certain amount of this, and it doesn't have to be fancy or complicated. But if you're not feeding the machine a little, you're not controlling anything. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek So if something bad happens, what's out there? Only the bad stuff. Offense is a good defense, so I would say to build the muscle of good, positive content. Obviously, people know this: third-party media ranks higher, whether it's Google or the LLMs. If the media said something nice about you, or you're quoted about something important in The New York Times, the FT, The Wall Street Journal, or your podcast, those things will show up more and be more powerful if they're ranked highly. I always say to everyone, do just a little bit of hygiene, right? But in terms of when to speak and when not to speak, if you're in a crisis, this is one of the hardest things, by the way. This is why you need someone who’s done this for 20 years by your side if you end up in a crisis, because these chess moves are so important, and they take a massive amount of judgment. There’s no playbook where you always do this or you always do that. In general, I would say—I’ll pick a couple of always-dos. If there’s a negative story about your firm, you have to assess whether speaking, participating, or putting out a statement will add fuel or oxygen to the story, causing the next news cycle, or not. I generally say to clients, “Let’s take a deep breath and not react too early. See where the news cycle’s going.” The news cycle might just pass you by like a wave, and then you do nothing. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Right? But in a situation where the news cycle is inaccurate or it’s going in a direction that’s going to really damage your reputation, and it’s wrong, you have to participate. Most journalists who are worth their salt will go off the record or on background and let you explain the context of what’s going on, and that will shape whatever story is happening. So I think—but I would never, ever— Molly O'Shea Okay. Jennifer Prosek …allow a negative reputation that is untrue to calcify around you. A fun example—not so fun for her and him: remember the Coldplay concert? Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Okay. I think that was viewed 8 billion times around the world. It became this crazy sensation. You didn’t hear from those people, right? The news cycle was just everyone online talking about this, right? The narrative that calcified was basically very negative around her because people weren’t sure: Was she divorced? Was she single? Was she this? There was a lot of narrative around who was the homewrecker, who was this, and who was that. Well, guess what? She finally came out, I think 9 months later, and did 1 podcast with Oprah Winfrey. Molly O'Shea Oh my gosh. Jennifer Prosek And it turned out she was separated from her husband. He was at the concert, so he knew she wasn’t cheating. She wasn’t whatever. Anyway, she told her version of the story. She said on the podcast that she received death threats, and what was said about her was horrific. She said it was mostly women. Molly O'Shea Yeah, of course. Jennifer Prosek It was a very sad story, in my view. She was obviously given the PR advice to stay low, and that was probably right in the beginning, but I believe she should have come out swinging at a certain point because this narrative calcified around her. Unless you listened to that Oprah Winfrey podcast many moons later, you still had the old reputation in your head. Molly O'Shea That’s a really good point. I want to talk about that a little bit more, and we’ll get into reputation management, but the media can stamp an image of you— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea …before you stamp it yourself. When is the period of time in which you can come in and disprove that and actually claim— Jennifer Prosek Well, any time something’s untrue, I think you have to participate. Whether you put out a statement or go off the record with a reporter, you’ve got to not let that calcify. Untrue has to be corrected. And by the way, if the media writes an untrue story and you can prove that it’s untrue, most of the time they will change certain parts of it, right? Because stories live online forever, that’s very useful. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Because what’s living in the digital world matters, so the beauty is that it can be changed, right? I’m a big fan of coming out fighting when it’s not true. We’ve worked with Ray Dalio for 18 years. He was the master of this back in the day when he was running Bridgewater. He would run full-page ads that said, “This is not true.” He was extremely aggressive, but I think he started to teach the market that you don’t have to stay quiet. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek And he had so many friends and fans on LinkedIn— Molly O'Shea He’s very popular. Jennifer Prosek If he speaks directly to his audience on social channels, it’s so effective. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek It’s like, “This is happening to me in the media. Guess what? It’s not true, all my fans and followers.” So that’s the beautiful thing about having your own social channels. This is what you see on X or what have you. You can speak directly to your people, and Donald Trump figured that one out. Molly O'Shea Yeah. People are a little bit quicker on X with— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea …commentary. Jennifer Prosek Very. Molly O'Shea Another part of talking through this is the journalist aspect of it. How do you actually engage with journalists, and how do you know to trust them or not? Most of the time, especially in the tech world, we’re living in a world where they’re just trying to get you. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Yeah. I would say that part of that brand-hygiene thing is to pick a few reporters to get to know, because it’s a very simple thing: relationships matter. If I’ve met you a bunch of times and you have a good impression of me, and we’re in a bad situation, you’re more likely just to talk to me off the record: “You know me. I want to tell you what’s happening.” So having relationships matters. Whether it’s a relationship for access or a relationship to be able to tell your side of the story, I’m a big fan—I know it takes time—of getting to know a certain number of reasonable journalists. There are always unreasonable journalists, but most of them, I find, are actually relatively reasonable, and most of them really want to learn about the business. You also get people who are on the retail beat going to the credit beat, the credit beat going to the tech beat. They don’t always have the backstory of everything going on, so I think the education of your business and industry, and the relationships, definitely helps. Molly O'Shea This episode is brought to you by Brex, my favorite. You become what you spend on, and I refuse to spend my time on work that shouldn't exist. Expense reports, receipt chasing, and manual closes. 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AI needs more than chips. It needs power, land, and infrastructure. Zone develops next-generation data center campuses, partnering with AI companies, site developers, and technology leaders to bring compute online faster and at scale. Zone is building the foundation of the AI frontier. Visit zonefrontier.com to learn more. That's zonefrontier.com to learn more. So when you started the firm, finance was going through a hit-piece era. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Everyone was down on finance. “It’s evil. Capitalism, it’s evil.” We’re swinging back into that with the rise of socialism. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea But I want to talk through that because the narrative right now that the media has taken over is, “Hate on data centers and AI,” right? Jennifer Prosek Definitely. Molly O'Shea So how do you combat something like that, and how do you build back the narrative? They’re pretty deep in right now because they started off so negative. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea But in terms of that, what happened in the financial era that caused it to wash over, so that now people really look up to some of these firms, versus the shifts that are happening now? Jennifer Prosek Yeah, so I think—and we work with some data-center builders. The reality is, I believe, that Silicon Valley likes to speak to itself, and that’s a very tight circle. I always say there are very tight ecosystems, right? There’s Silicon Valley, there’s Wall Street, there’s Hollywood, whatever you want to pick, and very seldom do the people in those ecosystems really mix and talk to the people in others. Politics is another ecosystem, right? Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek The problem, I think, began when AI was speaking to its ecosystem about truths that don’t appeal to maybe the political ecosystem or the Main Street ecosystem, right? So I will tell you, I went to an amazing AI founder conference, and the narrative was, “You are a great CEO if you cut your teams and increase your profits.” Duh, that’s what you’re supposed to be doing. But the reality is there are societal impacts of that, et cetera, et cetera. So I think this narrative grew, and then it started to leak outside of Silicon Valley. Actually, it didn’t leak. The CEOs of Silicon Valley started to say, “Everyone’s going to lose their job.” Not everyone, but it’s like everyone was talking about— Molly O'Shea Well, they really needed to— Jennifer Prosek What percentage. Molly O'Shea More of that, yeah. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. So they created this narrative— Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Right? So what happened all of a sudden is Main Street cares. Eric Schmidt gets booed at his convocation speech or whatever it was—graduation speech. My daughter just started college Sunday. The minute AI came in, all the students booed. So you have to look at that and say, “Ooh, we’ve kind of stubbed our toe with students, with regular Main Street people.” I think there’s always been what we call NIMBY—not in my backyard. People don’t necessarily want construction in their backyard. But I think the bigger deal is this out-of-control narrative on the evils of AI. Molly O'Shea Totally. Jennifer Prosek And I would say, I’ve got to give Jensen Huang some props. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek He’s been on a roadshow. He’s broken out of Silicon Valley, and he’s talking to Wall Street, Washington, Europe, the UK, and Asia. He has become somewhat of an ambassador for why AI actually could be good for you, and I think that’s the most important thing right now: figuring out how the narrative shifts. I think people get American competitiveness, good job creation—things that are positive around AI. So I think that’s just the shift that needs to happen. Molly O'Shea Yeah. I mean, that’s a good example. Anybody in the Jensen sphere— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea —of leaders is super competitive. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea They’re very competitive, and they all probably have the same components and characteristics of one another, but they are viewed differently externally. So take Jensen as an example. He’s adored. People love him. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Meanwhile, Elon—they immediately say he’s evil, even though he’s creating all these sustainable companies— Jennifer Prosek Yes, yes. Molly O'Shea —and has a huge, pure mission and all that kind of stuff. So what would be the difference between a Jensen brand and an Elon brand? Jennifer Prosek Well, I think Jensen’s been a bit more gentle with his commentary and his messaging. Elon goes on X and just says what’s on his mind, which we all love—I mean, I’m super entertained by it. By the way, I admire Elon Musk so much. I think every entrepreneur does. I think he’s the greatest engineer of all time, maybe. But I think his execution is rough sometimes— Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek —and I think that matters. That sticks in people’s heads. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. So that’s the biggest difference. Okay, so I think... Oh, yeah, what I wanted to mention on that, walking back to what you just mentioned, is your role in this. You told me this beforehand: you kind of play the role of chief EQ officer. Jennifer Prosek Sometimes. Molly O'Shea What does that actually mean? Jennifer Prosek I think it means being the truth-teller at the table. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek It means sitting beside your very powerful client and pointing out, “If you say this, it may be translated like that. I would do this this way.” I had to tell a client—a founder. I do these salon dinners for founders, and I moderate the table, and he was so... He’s so smart, but he was so domineering at the table; it was terrible. He just wouldn’t let anyone speak. So afterward, I had to call him and tell him, “You are brilliant, and I can make you a star, but you cannot dominate like you did at that table,” because I got all this feedback. So telling the truth sometimes is really hard, but it is true—and I worry about this with myself—the higher you go up the food chain, the fewer people are telling you the truth. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek So you need somebody not to tell you, “Oh, you’re amazing. You were so great. Your speech was awesome.” You need the person who tells you what you need to improve. I think the chief EQ officer just means we all are living in our bubble, and it’s our job sometimes to look beyond the bubble and translate what’s happening and how that client can actually function at their highest level in every ecosystem there is. Molly O'Shea What are some types of low-EQ moves? Jennifer Prosek Oh. Well, one—and I should say this—you need to think about your employees a lot. Your employees are your ambassadors, and I would say more than 50%, probably more than 75%, of negative stories start with employees leaking information. So they can help you out in bad times or bury you. That’s not why you should be great to your employees. You should be great to your employees because they’re so incredibly vital to the lifeblood of your firm. But I think sometimes internal communications and employee communications are not as highly ranked, right— Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek —as investor communications or whatever. So I think one low-EQ move is just not being present when you’re speaking to employees and understanding that, as the leader, every move you make is watched, right? That seems very obvious, but I see that a lot. Molly O'Shea Do you see people double down when they should probably be quiet? Jennifer Prosek Sometimes, yeah. I think emotions run high when risk goes up and there’s tension. So I think making calm, smart moves— Molly O'Shea Do people sometimes not take your advice? I think that’s kind of— Jennifer Prosek Sure. Molly O'Shea —the question. And you’re just like— Jennifer Prosek Actually, not often— Molly O'Shea Really? Jennifer Prosek —I have to say. No, well, I choose my spots, like everybody else. But yeah, sure. I think especially in a crisis, there’s often pressure to act or react. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Also, if you’re not organized before a crisis happens, you have too many advisors, too much of a mess going on, and mistakes can happen. So yeah, it happens. Molly O'Shea Yeah, I want to talk through a couple examples of that. Meta—we were talking about— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Meta. Jennifer Prosek Meta’s fascinating right now. Molly O'Shea What just happened with Meta? Can you explain that a little bit and how they... I mean, they’ve— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —been going through stuff for a while now. ### Meta Has Three Brand Layers Jennifer Prosek So I’ve thought about this. I think Meta is such a fascinating case study because there are 3 brand and reputation things happening at once. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek There’s the product level. If you love Instagram, you love Instagram. I don’t want to say you don’t care about Meta, but there’s a product-level reputation and brand. There’s a corporate-level reputation and brand—that’s Meta—and then there’s a Zuckerberg reputation and brand. I think they’re all at different levels. I think at the product level, again, it was like Uber. If you loved Uber and it really made your life better, you really didn’t care what was going on with Travis Kalanick at the moment, right? You wanted to take Uber. Now, some people care about that, but a lot of people only care, “Do I like the product?” So I think they’re doing pretty well on the product side. On the corporate side, I think they made... This settlement is smart and— Molly O'Shea Could you explain the settlement? Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Obviously, they settled for billions of dollars in these lawsuits, and obviously it’s all about whether social media harms children, right? But they are making amends, and what they’re doing with the amends—meaning, we’re shutting down likes for this long, and I don’t know all the details—but now they’re asking the entire industry: If we’ve got to make amends, it’s an industry problem. You’ve got to make amends, Snapchat or whoever. So they’re running full-page ads basically saying it’s an industry problem, not a Meta problem, so everyone should get on board. Some of the heat is now going on the competition because it’s like, “We care about children, and we’re doing these things. Are you doing these things?” So I think that has been masterfully done, honestly. Molly O'Shea Right. They’re taking the hit for everyone else. Jennifer Prosek That’s right. And I think as a corporate and institutional brand, they are creating their sort of right to survive by doing this, right? But then there’s the Zuckerberg brand, which I think we could all agree started in The Social Network, then there was Cambridge Analytica, then there are the trials, then there’s just hit after hit after hit. But the question is—and this is a question I always ask myself—can Meta survive Zuckerberg going away? I would say yeah. Molly O'Shea You think so? Jennifer Prosek I think so. But this is me. Molly O'Shea Okay. Jennifer Prosek This is a debate. This is always a debate. Can the firm survive the big founder? I think they’ve turned into an institutional corporate entity, in my mind, that can probably survive, and they’re making the right institutional corporate moves. Molly O'Shea He’s the one who’s been punished for it more than the brand, is what you’re saying. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, I think he has had a difficult personal brand since the beginning. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek And that has not changed. The only way that would change is through consistent, different actions over a long period of time. Molly O'Shea I will say from the consumer standpoint, and as someone who loves technology— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —there’s nothing better than when Zuck is just being a bro. Molly O'Shea People just love to see it. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Molly O'Shea And I'm not just saying the MMA stuff, but I think he was wakeboarding with an American flag— Jennifer Prosek Yes, yes, yes. Molly O'Shea On the Fourth of July. People just want to see that more. I don't know. You want to talk about rebuilding your aura— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Be cool. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea I don't know. Do some of that. Get on more podcasts. Maybe don't bite your tongue so much. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Because some of them will get you in trouble. Because someone who operates at such a high level, who's so tech-focused and in the weeds of engineering— Jennifer Prosek Yes, that's right. Molly O'Shea You know— Jennifer Prosek He should be loved in your community. Molly O'Shea Yeah, you should be loved. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea But you also miss some of the social— Jennifer Prosek The cues. Molly O'Shea And what you probably should say and shouldn't say. But he is a quirky guy. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Jennifer Prosek He's built an incredible, large company and has impacted many people in many different ways, but for the most part— Molly O'Shea It's hard to knock his entrepreneurship, that's for sure. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, but— Molly O'Shea I think everyone agrees with that. Jennifer Prosek I just wonder how to build his brand up so he can, you know... At that certain point, I'm curious if you have clients like this, getting burned so much— Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek You don't want to do media. There's no positive benefit for you, so you want to stay hidden. Molly O'Shea Yes. Jennifer Prosek How do you reconcile that tension of being such a big part of the brand but not wanting to do any of it because you've been burned so much? Molly O'Shea I think there are alternatives to traditional media now to make impressions on your audience. This podcast, for instance—I'm not saying you're not going to ask hard-hitting questions, but you're more interested in an interesting conversation for your audience than you are in gotcha-ing— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Mark Zuckerberg. So Mark Zuckerberg should come on your podcast. Jennifer Prosek I agree. Molly O'Shea But there are places and spaces. Most podcasts are run by businesspeople— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Actually, so there's more empathy there. So I would not put yourself in harm's way. I agree, there are certain journalists and publications where you're never going to get a fair opportunity, right? But again, you could speak directly to your audience. On X, like you said: an American flag on my surfboard or whatever. That's a direct image and message to your people, right? Jennifer Prosek Mm-hmm. Molly O'Shea So I think social channels, owned media, podcasts, being on stage. Why not go on stage at the most impactful, gravitas-y business conference there is? When Trump did his trade stuff, the stock market tanked and the whole country was worried about it, Scott Bessent showed up at the Milken Conference and got on stage and told everybody why it was going to be okay. Masterful. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Because that conference tends to have a lot of power. Jennifer Prosek Mm. Molly O'Shea CEOs, billionaire investors, tech giants. Everyone talked about it. I really think he just calmed the entire financial ecosystem by doing it. It was so good. So you can really change the tide on something if you perform really well in a situation like that. And I'm sure Mike Milken was probably the moderator. The moderator is not out to get you. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Sometimes. Molly O'Shea Sometimes. But— Jennifer Prosek Sometimes you choose the wrong one. Molly O'Shea Well— Jennifer Prosek Sometimes you go to DealBook, and you can just get burned. Jennifer Prosek A journalist moderator may be, but a Molly moderator isn't. Molly O'Shea Yes. Molly O'Shea You know? So I think you have to pick your shots really carefully. And in those moments, I do think you have to have a lot of good advice. If you're going to do one thing a year, if you're going to do one big-impact thing to turn the tide, what's it going to be? I mean, I remember when we did 60 Minutes with Ray Dalio on saving the oceans, and you've got to be worried about that because he, at the time, ran the biggest hedge fund in the world. Everybody wants to poke the biggest hedge fund in the world in the eye. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Guess what? The entire thing was just about his philanthropy, saving the oceans, going down in his submarine off his crazy OceanX yacht. It was positive, and everybody thought, “What an amazing human being, saving the oceans”—how incredibly serious he was about that philanthropy. Jennifer Prosek Mm-hmm. Molly O'Shea So you can go into high-stakes situations. Back in the day, 60 Minutes was it—maybe it still is—and you can have a win. Jennifer Prosek That's good. Molly O'Shea Yeah. ### Finance Rebuilds Its Aura Molly O'Shea So I want to dive back into traditional finance. Jennifer Prosek TradFi. Molly O'Shea We're going to go into TradFi. Jennifer Prosek We are at the New York Stock Exchange. Molly O'Shea I know. Because we talked about some really good scenarios beforehand. Why don't we just start with the meatiest one? Jennifer Prosek Okay. Molly O'Shea So let's talk about Apollo. Jennifer Prosek Okay. Molly O'Shea And the resurrection of Apollo— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea After the Leon Black era. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea How did they do that? Jennifer Prosek So I think Apollo always had this sort of black-boxy, I don't want to say negative, but mysterious kind of reputation. Which might have served it well back in the day, by the way. But then, as you know, they wanted to become a diversified asset manager— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea And go public, right? Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea So those 2 things don't really go together. But clearly, it is tough to survive a founder moment like that. Leon Black obviously went down, and he went down for some pretty negative stuff. And I think Mark Rowan came in and decided, “I'm going to change the culture, and the reputation, and the brand of Apollo.” So, of course, they needed the world to understand we're not just in credit or whatever they started their business in. We do all these other things. That's from a business standpoint. But more importantly, I think they had to convince the best people in the world to work there, and they had to convince investors to stay with them. Jennifer Prosek Mm. Molly O'Shea I mean, LPs are extremely sensitive to negative news. Can you imagine what they had to go through with Leon Black, keeping their LPs? And they are just a rocket ship. He has done an amazing job. I think he's accessible. He shows up places. He's easy to talk to. They have really softened their brand and educated the market. I think it's an A-plus case study in surviving what could have been an existential moment. Jennifer Prosek What about Mark Rowan? His characteristics—do you think it was great that he stepped in? Molly O'Shea Yeah. So I don't know him super well, but people who work under him respect him and like him. Again, back to the employees, people are always going to ask your employees, “What is he really like to work with?” Jennifer Prosek Mm. Molly O'Shea Right? The vibe is pretty good, but I see him showing up in the circles I show up in. He is out there as the ambassador of Apollo, and again, he comes across as whip-smart but approachable, and I think that's a nice mix. Jennifer Prosek What about Ken Griffin of Citadel? Molly O'Shea Yeah. So I've been watching Citadel really closely the last few years because I feel like they're another one that went from—I mean, they used to call it the gulag. They went from this reputation of being the worst place to work, quant trading, black-boxy, et cetera, to, I think, being so well respected. Jennifer Prosek Mm. Jennifer Prosek And I think, again, this is the founder taking the brand and the reputation by the wheel and deciding, “I'm going to get out there.” Jennifer Prosek I'm gonna showcase not just what Citadel does, but my smarts in policy, politics, and economics. The guy is so amazing to listen to. So he creates this sort of impression that it might be a tough, intense place, but that's gonna be good for me. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek And I'm gonna get to work for people like him. And I think he's done it. If you look at their social channels—oh my God—I would've never thought Citadel would have the Instagram they have. It's all happy, smiley people going to work. But I'm not making fun of it. I actually think it's extremely well done. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek So I think this whole use of social channels, being more transparent, being out speaking in the places and spaces that matter, I really think they've shifted their reputation. Everyone will still say it's one of the toughest places to work on Wall Street, but I think it has this different, positive twist now that it didn't have before. Molly O'Shea Yeah, they come off completely badass, but, like— Jennifer Prosek Badass. Molly O'Shea Somewhere you are inspired by and you want to go work at. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. But I think that was the trick back in the day for Bridgewater, too. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek They had a very tough— Molly O'Shea Oh, they're very tough. Jennifer Prosek You know, they had this reputation— Molly O'Shea Radical truth and transparency. Jennifer Prosek Everything you do is taped— Molly O'Shea Monitored. Jennifer Prosek —and monitored. And that was all true. But the thing was, they built a reputation for that radical truth and transparency. There's a reason for it. It leads to the best returns, and the best people are down with it— Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek —because they want to learn. They want to be critiqued. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek So I think that was the twist there. They went from a fully culty, negative reputation to admired and respected, and then, of course, Ray had the principles and all that stuff. Molly O'Shea Well, that's a fair point because we even see this in the tech world with Anduril, the campaign “Don't Work at Anduril.” If you— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea —can't handle it, just don't work here. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea But for finance, it's super-hypercompetitive as well. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Maybe one of the most competitive places ever. People admire that. They want to go work for a competitive firm. Obviously, you're gonna be slaving away a little bit. Jennifer Prosek Listen, who would— Molly O'Shea It's gonna be hard. Jennifer Prosek Who wouldn't go work for Elon as an engineer? Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek You know what you're in for. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek But who wouldn't want that? Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek That's like— Molly O'Shea The CEO is sleeping— Jennifer Prosek —historic. Molly O'Shea —on the floor. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, exactly. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek So I think intensity. I always say, I had a photographer ask me once, “How do you wanna come across in this picture?” And I was like, “Wow, no one ever asked me that.” And I said, “I wanna be fierce but approachable.” Do those two things go together? Not really. But two things that don't go together can go together. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Meaning, a rough, intense experience but the best experience of my life can go together. Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea I was really surprised last year. I moderated a panel at the Citadel Securities Conference with Kalshi's co-founders. First, the room—it was beautiful. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea The lineup of people who came to speak, I was so nervous to go moderate there. This was the first big moderating thing that I've done. But I'd worked with Kalshi for a bunch, so I was very comfortable with that. I remember, because I'm putting myself in the shoes of, “Okay, what if I interviewed Ken Griffin?” Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea I'm watching the moderator on stage. I watched that a couple of times afterward, and I'm watching this, and I'm like, “Ken's just gonna say whatever he wants. You just have to assist him.” Jennifer Prosek But that's another— Molly O'Shea At that point, you know— Jennifer Prosek —great shout-out. He has something to say. And he's pretty direct about it, and people love that. What people hate is corporate speak— Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek —and empty conversation. And I think that's the balance, right, for a Ken or anyone on stage: How do I—I don't wanna get myself in trouble, I'm so edgy—but how do I give the gift of insight and straight talk and entertainment to the audience? Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek As the moderator, because I do a ton of moderating, that's kind of what I'm trying to draw out of somebody: What's the gift to the audience? What's the insight? What's the takeaway? And I always tell my clients, “Don't even bother taking the stage if you're gonna be empty.” Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek Because that backfires. People remember. They actually remember who the worst speaker was. They really remember, and they remember a terrible moderator, too. Molly O'Shea Completely. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Absolutely. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea No, this is a good point, too, with the whole podcast movement. If you don't have something to say, I've heard you say this before: Don't do it. Jennifer Prosek Don't. Molly O'Shea I feel the same way. I've had podcasts before. I'm obviously not gonna name names or anything, but I'll run through all the questions in 10 minutes. I'm like, “Well, why aren't you speaking? You asked to come on a podcast.” Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea “This is to help you. I'm not a gotcha person; I'm just genuinely curious. I wanna learn. If you're not gonna come and speak, why are you doing this?” Come and have something to say. Jennifer Prosek That's something people who don't moderate a lot don't understand. You could get through 30 questions—I think that's a lot. It's like, no, that could be 15 minutes. Molly O'Shea Yes. Jennifer Prosek I've got 30 more to go. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek And guess what? I'm gonna go off-road. Molly O'Shea Yes. Jennifer Prosek I'm always warning people. I'm like, “You know, I know your comms team gave me this stuff, but I know what the most interesting things are. I'm not gonna embarrass you, but let's be interesting on stage.” Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek We're gonna go off-road. Molly O'Shea There was one time I was talking to this very big AI company on stage at their office, to a room of VCs, GPs, some founders. Again, not gonna name names. It was just corporate answer after corporate answer. There was no answer— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea —and they were all very short. I'm like, “You know what?” Again, we kind of ran out of questions. Jennifer Prosek Yes, yes. Molly O'Shea “You all signed NDAs. I'm gonna start asking some questions.” Jennifer Prosek Oh my God, and they all signed NDAs. That's crazy. Molly O'Shea It was wild. But to go through some more examples, we have a short bit. I think we have a couple of minutes left. Let's talk—we talked about Bridgewater, we talked about Citadel, we talked about Apollo. I wanna talk about Blackstone. Jennifer Prosek I knew you were gonna get there. Okay. Molly O'Shea Blackstone is the—I don't know what it is—but they've created kind of a fun finance brand— Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea —because they do some quirky stuff. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea So what's going on there? Jennifer Prosek So first of all, they are the brand fascination of everyone. They've done a great job. First of all, they were early. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek I just wanna say, I always make the point, because people say, “Why is Blackstone like this?” These were early marketers. They had a marketing mentality early. But the first big move was when they went public, they had to speak to more audiences, right? You have to worry about your investors—retail, institutional, the whole thing. But then the next move was, “Let's get into retail early.” So people often roll their eyes at the John Gray running videos or whatever. Brilliant. Cheapest marketing ever on LinkedIn, gets to every financial advisor in the country, and it worked. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek And so they're spending very little money to reach everybody. They did it early. They were the pioneer. They were unafraid to do their holiday video, and this and that. I think the holiday video is more of a culture play. Molly O'Shea It's kind of a meme. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, but they're really smart. They don't do anything without a strategy, right? Molly O'Shea Mm. Jennifer Prosek People who don't understand what Blackstone is today don't get the running videos, but people who do understand get that this is a retail juggernaut that started early and has probably been the most successful. They are doing high-net-worth and financial-advisor marketing. That's what they're doing. Molly O'Shea Yeah. I think it's fascinating to see. They're a good example of how audience has shifted over time as they expand out— their categories of what they're offering product-wise. Jennifer Prosek I would also say John Gray kind of represents the leadership people want today. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Like, killer serious and smart, but, again, approachable, funny, and not afraid to make fun of himself. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek These are attributes that are attractive to people. Molly O'Shea We have to talk about this, though, because sometimes people will take the authentic route— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —and say, “Oh, we're cool. We can do a chill video. We can do something a little funny.” Jennifer Prosek And it goes the wrong way. Molly O'Shea And it's just so cringe. Jennifer Prosek Well, you know what? This is when it comes back to advisors. You have to have people who tell you the truth, because God forbid you think something's cool and it's not. Molly O'Shea Okay. Jennifer Prosek It can be embarrassing for a long time, and these things live on forever. Obviously, they catch fire. If it's cringe, it's one thing. If it's inappropriate, it can really bury you. Molly O'Shea Yeah. ### VC Brands Need Focus Molly O'Shea So one of the most interesting asset classes to build their brands, do this marketing, and be external is VC. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea I get a lot of inbounds about it. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea I'm sure you're doing that. You're opening a San Francisco office. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea There's so much going on there, and they kind of do the same thing. Jennifer Prosek Mm-hmm. Molly O'Shea But there are many different types of brands, right? You have a16z. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea They're literally a media company. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea They will say that. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea You have Thrive, which is kind of the quiet luxury of VC. They're a little bit mysterious. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Josh completely crushes it. He's the idol. They probably have the biggest aura. Everyone wants to get funding from them. People want to work there. They've built this really interesting brand with very little content. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea And then there are some other types out there that kind of do the same playbook— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —that have a podcast, do conferences, and do these hackathon-type things. So what are you seeing in the VC market? Jennifer Prosek Overall, I would say that private equity has always been pretty early to all of this marketing because they have portfolio companies that are in consumer, tech, and healthcare, and those are sophisticated brand firms, so they understand the value. They also obviously want to build value into what they're buying and increase the value so they can sell it, so they get that brand as part of the equation. VC was doing stuff, but not as sophisticated as I think it is now. We have a lot more VC clients than we ever had, and they all kind of popped in in the last 4 years. I think it comes down to what you want to be in the market, what you're trying to accomplish, and which avenues fit your culture, your comfort level, and what you're good at, right? Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek John Gray's running videos are a great example. If he actually likes to run in cities all over the world, it's real. You can't copycat that now, but it was a simple execution, right? I agree. I think Andreessen is a media company, and that's the route that they've taken. I'm sure they're getting business impact from what they're doing there, while the other firms have different styles. I think it's really about how you want to be thought of and what you want your brand to stand for. If great content and being a media company are part of that, that's great, but if they're not, you need to choose something else. Molly O'Shea What can they learn from TradFi? Jennifer Prosek Here's a great example: the Allen + Company conference. I don't think Allen + Company is in the news. They do one thing really well, and they got known for it. That's amazing. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek They're a convening brand, right? I actually do almost no media myself, partially because the media doesn't like to write about PR firms, but partially because I discovered that convening founders is my superpower. Giving the gift of a network to people who need more network is the most valuable thing I could do in the world. I always say, “Selling is giving to receive.” I gift, gift, gift, and then, surprise, I get something back because I've done something for someone, right? So convening and moderating have been my chosen ways to build my brand and market. I think it's all choices, but the choices have to be comfortable, and they have to be on-brand for who you are. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Allen + Company is a good example. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea They've built out a very mysterious— Jennifer Prosek Early. Molly O'Shea Kind of an exclusive brand. Jennifer Prosek Everyone wants to copy it, but they can't. Molly O'Shea Yeah, exactly. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Exactly. Jennifer Prosek Yep. Molly O'Shea And what do you think is the point at which these VC firms are doing too much? Because they will just— Jennifer Prosek Mm-hmm. Molly O'Shea —be like, “Give me the whole buffet.” Jennifer Prosek I think overexposure is generally bad, right? Molly O'Shea Okay. Jennifer Prosek The moment your audiences, or anyone, is eye-rolling you for being everywhere and overexposed, I think you've done something wrong. I always tell smaller clients, “Do 1 quality thing a quarter, and build the muscle for doing that on a repetitious basis. Watch how LLMs start to describe you. Is it making an impact?” You don't have to do everything. The most embarrassing thing is these posts with 3 likes. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek Think about yourself like a teenager. Would you be happy with 3 likes? I don't understand why you keep putting out this content with 3 likes. So I'll be the person in the room to say, “Could we stop with this?” You know? Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek Because it's just not a good look. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. It's been interesting to see how some of them pop up and how the different strategies change. Jennifer Prosek I do think for VCs, though, like private equity, deal sourcing is everything, right? Why does a founder want to work with you? Why do I want your check versus somebody else's? That's really the question. How are you appealing to those founders? Raising money is one lifeblood, but the other lifeblood is: Do those entrepreneurs want to work with you, and why? I would want to unpack all of that. That's really important. Molly O'Shea That's a really good point, because I talk to all these different firms. They ask for help. They ask for advice. Some of them have the world's best performance— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —but no one knows who they are. I went to Accel. I'm like, “I don't know who your partners are.” I know of Accel, but it seems like something I knew about 5 years ago, not today. It's not really relevant today. It's okay that I said that. I went and talked to them. I met with them. Their team is awesome. They're so cool. They won the Cursor deal because they just had a really good internal reputation. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, that's huge. Molly O'Shea And so at that point, how much does internal reputation matter more than external reputation? Jennifer Prosek So I think one of the most powerful things you can do, whether you're a VC, a PE firm, or me, is get onstage with your portfolio company and tell the story of how you came together, why you came together, and what you've been able to do together. Let the audience see the chemistry. Let the audience see the excitement of the portfolio company. You don't have to say a word. You can tell by the body language that these people have transformed this company, right? Molly O'Shea Hmm. Jennifer Prosek I think there are all kinds of ways to showcase things subtly. Molly O'Shea Yeah. Jennifer Prosek That's one of those subtle ones. People just rock up because they want to see the conversation, but you're really sending a lot of messages there. You're sending a message about what a great partner you are. Molly O'Shea What's interesting is that I came from the investor side. I've been investing my whole career. Now I've been interviewing, and I'm much more of a founder now. I see myself more in the founder realm than on the investor side. I see the complete bifurcation of how each one of them carries the weight. And so the more I see VC content celebrating themselves— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —the more I cringe, because it's like— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —you didn't do anything— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —I mean, you gave them a check— Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea —but, oh my God, I can't believe how much the founder went through. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea And so, it's just interesting to see that some VCs still will take credit for the success of the founder and the company. Jennifer Prosek Yeah, that's a delicate balance. Molly O'Shea Mm-hmm. Jennifer Prosek Yes. Molly O'Shea Do you see that often? Jennifer Prosek Yeah, sure, and I think you have to be very careful about amplifying—giving yourself too much credit for something you've done. You're better off being a little humble. Molly O'Shea Yeah, this is where the chief EQ officer comes in. Jennifer Prosek Yes, exactly. Molly O'Shea So as we close out, I have to ask you. Maybe you have an answer for this, maybe you don't. What is your hottest take right now? ### The Digital Blink Matters Jennifer Prosek My hottest take—meaning something I'm obsessed with? Molly O'Shea It could be anything. It could be a strong opinion on how people are communicating, who should do it better. Jennifer Prosek I would call it, “Watch your digital blink.” Molly O'Shea Okay. Jennifer Prosek If you're of my generation, you read a book by Malcolm Gladwell called Blink. It basically says people will size you up in 15 seconds or less. Now, it's a digital blink. If I don't know Molly O'Shea, I'm going to ask my LLM, “What's she all about?” That's my digital blink. That's what I think about you. That impression is now lodged. It's going to be very hard to change it. Like you just said about the company you were talking about, if that impression online is out of date, negative, or doesn't represent you, oh my gosh, get it done. So I would just say the digital blink is everything right now. Molly O'Shea That's a great place to end. Jennifer Prosek Yeah. Molly O'Shea Well, Jen, this was so much fun. I could probably talk to you for hours. Jennifer Prosek I could. Molly O'Shea I know we're on a time constraint, but we'll probably do this again. So thank you so much. Jennifer Prosek Thank you. Molly O'Shea Hey, it's Molly. If you enjoy our interviews, check out our newsletter, Sorcery.vc, where we deliver a once-a-week top deals and tech headlines email and also go deeper on our podcast interviews. Subscribe to Sorcery today. And don't forget to subscribe to the podcast on YouTube, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen. Link in description to sign up.