Cageless shark diving.
Listen to “Focus Music.” No lyrics.
Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink.
Playing the guitar.
My amazing better half and two awesome kids.
Success, to Brady, does not have a tangible end. Rather, success is the ongoing pursuit of personal improvement while lifting those around him. He realized a long time ago that his goal was never to achieve a singular accomplishment; the goal was to achieve consistent cycles of learning throughout his career.
As both a lifelong student and a mentor within the field of entrepreneurship, Brady has noticed consistent traits of successful, high-aptitude founders: the ideal founder is coachable, lacks significant ego, never hires inferior capability as a means of maintaining control, and, most importantly, understands the fundamental drivers of value creation for the organization. Those founders look for team members who can tie revenue growth, margins, expenses, investments, and cash flow into the equation of value creation, and thereby drive success for their teams and shareholders.
One portfolio company that benefited from such a leader is Cradlepoint. A standout company with tremendous learnings and achievements, Cradlepoint became successful under the helm of a highly productive, calm, collected CEO. Through business model transitions, competitive pressures, and a host of other growth challenges, the CEO built a high-aptitude management team and enabled that team to operate at its maximum potential. The result was a $1B+ outcome that was a tremendous achievement for all involved.
“Successful outcomes don’t arrive without moments of friction.”
As mentioned, the equation of value creation is an important tenet of Brady’s investment philosophy. Understanding the levers that drive enterprise value is critical to any high-growth organization, and those leaders who well understand and manage that economic engine will obtain great success. One such example is LiveView Technologies. Though the traditional calculations of efficiency and payback period may yield incorrect conclusions, the team’s deep understanding of cash-flow unit economics reveals a substantial contributor to the company’s tremendous achievements.
Brady very much enjoys the business-building journey, and working with portfolio companies is the best part of his day. Bringing the Sorenson GTM toolkit together with great product minds within the portfolio allows Brady to drive consistent differential value as an investor and partner.
“Every step in the go-to-market motion from lead gen through upsell is critical in scaling a high-growth B2B software enterprise, and Sorenson has the playbooks to help the portfolio drive differential value.”
So, if you’re a B2B software founder looking for investors who build, reach out. Sorenson may be a great fit for the next stage of your company’s entrepreneurial journey.
The portfolio companies listed above represent a subset of all investments made by Sorenson. It should not be assumed that future portfolio investments will be profitable or equal to the success of the companies in this list. A complete list of Sorenson investments is available upon request.