About this episode

John Kim shares insights on effective fundraising strategies and the principles behind raising significant capital.

Today my guest is John Kim. John is one of the world's top and most prolific fundraisers.  He was chief client officer at General Catalyst, where he helped raise many of the firm's flagship funds. He is now chairman and president of corporate development at Lila Sciences, a company building scientific superintelligence, where he has helped raise several hundred million dollars.  He is also the author of The Tao of Fundraising.  This conversation is really a guide on how to raise money from someone who has done it at the highest level. We talk about why persuasion equals desire minus fear, the difference between belief and trust, the laws of fundraising, and how to build the consensus that moves big pools of capital.  Please enjoy my conversation with John Kim. For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.  ----- Become a Colossus member to get our quarterly print magazine and private audio experience, including exclusive profiles and early access to select episodes. Subscribe at ⁠colossus.com/subscribe⁠. ----- ⁠Ramp’s⁠ mission is to help companies manage their spend in a way that…

People in this episode

Host: Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Guest: John Kim

Topics covered

• fundraising
• persuasion
• capital raising
• investment strategies
• business development

Keywords

• fundraising
• capital
• investment
• persuasion
• business

Sponsors

Ramp

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: General Catalyst, Lila Sciences

Books & works: The Tao of Fundraising

More episodes of Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

• Matthew Smith — Natural Gas: The Next Bottleneck - [Invest Like the Best, EP.483] · July 21, 2026 · 56 min
• Jeremy Giffon - The Billion Dollar PDF - [Invest Like the Best, EP.481] · July 7, 2026 · 1h 15m
• Etched - Building AI Hardware to Make Inference Faster and Cheaper - [Invest Like the Best, EP.480] · June 30, 2026 · 1h 27m
• Vlad Barbalat - Investing $120 Billion in Permanent Capital - [Invest Like the Best, EP.479] · June 23, 2026 · 1h 10m
• Kareem Amin - The Unusual Approach to Company Building - [Invest Like the Best, EP.478] · June 16, 2026 · 57 min

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy podcast page.