Trinity Distinguished Alumnus
John Thornton received this years Trinity Distinguished Alumnus Award! I also, had the pleasure of meeting and talking with him along with other Entrepreneurship students. Here's a little bit about why Mr. Thornton received the award in the first place. John Thorton graduated from Trinity summa cum laude in 1987 and went on to join Austin Ventures, a multistage venture capital firm in 1990, which he is a partner at now. After working for a bit, Mr. Thornton attended Stanford Graduate School of Business. Mr. Thornton has been involved in starting over a dozen software companies, has invested in dozens of others, and was the firm’s managing partner from 2005 to 2008. He is a former founding board member of the Entrepreneurs Foundation of Central Texas, a trustee of Trinity University, and the co-chair of Ballet Austin’s capital campaign. Recently, in 2009, Mr. Thornton founded the Texas Tribune, which is now the nation’s largest statewide nonprofit news organization.
Anyways, Entrepreneurship hall (both past and present), got to meet with him and pick his brain a bit. At first we all went around and did the typical "where are you from?" "what's your major?" and "what entrepreneurial venture are you currently working on?"So for the first forty five minutes or so, Dr. Martinez, the Chair of the Entrepreneurship department, asked Mr. Thornton pointed questions about his life and his path and how he got to where he is. The one thing I took away was that Mr. Thornton believes he got lucky, he worked hard, but he also thinks that he was lucky to get the experience he got. This peaked my interest because it made me think of potential opportunities I'm unintentionally passing up and what I could look back on and think "wow, this is where I really became an entrepreneur" or "this was the best opportunity that I didn't even realize at the time." After about forty-five minutes, we started asking questions, but unfortunately I wasn't able to stay for that because it was bid day! More on that later.
-Shivani
John's Address at the awards dinner is here
Anyways, Entrepreneurship hall (both past and present), got to meet with him and pick his brain a bit. At first we all went around and did the typical "where are you from?" "what's your major?" and "what entrepreneurial venture are you currently working on?"So for the first forty five minutes or so, Dr. Martinez, the Chair of the Entrepreneurship department, asked Mr. Thornton pointed questions about his life and his path and how he got to where he is. The one thing I took away was that Mr. Thornton believes he got lucky, he worked hard, but he also thinks that he was lucky to get the experience he got. This peaked my interest because it made me think of potential opportunities I'm unintentionally passing up and what I could look back on and think "wow, this is where I really became an entrepreneur" or "this was the best opportunity that I didn't even realize at the time." After about forty-five minutes, we started asking questions, but unfortunately I wasn't able to stay for that because it was bid day! More on that later.
-Shivani
John's Address at the awards dinner is here
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