The Achieve Podcast - Leon Eisen (Venture Growth Group)
In this episode of the Achieve Podcast, host Taylor Baker interviews Leon Eisen, a physicist‑turned‑entrepreneur, venture studio founder, and venture partner. Eisen recounts his transition from a PhD in quantum physics to building the world’s first FDA‑cleared wrist‑worn medical device during the 2008‑09 financial crisis, raising $1 million initially and later $20 million. He explains how the lack of mentors then contrasted with today’s abundant advisory networks. Eisen now runs a venture studio that incubates five companies across the US, UK, and Israel, preferring to bootstrap as long as possible and hand‑pick co‑founders who can survive without salary. He describes his role as a venture partner at Network Vision, investing in Y Combinator and other startups, and highlights a recent competition win by portfolio company Zilli. A core part of the conversation is Eisen’s “5P/Fundability” methodology, which teaches founders how to position, package, and narrate their story to investors without traditional pitches. He stresses the importance of warm introductions, a fundability checklist, and the ability to let investors decide for themselves. Eisen also shares his perspective on AI: while all his companies embed AI in workflows, he discourages using AI as a marketing gimmick and treats it as a commodity tool. He argues that relationships are the primary constraint for any business, even AI‑driven ones, and warns that mis‑hiring or toxic team members can irreparably damage reputation. Eisen reflects on his biggest mistakes—people‑related errors rather than strategic decisions—and notes that, with hindsight, he could have raised $200 million. He teases his upcoming stealth venture, Applied, which aims to license expert knowledge into turnkey operating systems, and mentions his book, Substack newsletter (Fundable Notes), LinkedIn presence, and hubl.social for direct contact. The episode concludes with Eisen’s final advice: focus on people, not AI, as people ultimately decide wealth and success.
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Welcome to another episode of the Achieve Podcast, a show where we highlight leaders, creators, and entrepreneurs, those who are building meaningful businesses, shaping their industries, and having an impact. I'm Taylor Baker Baker, your host, and excited today to be joined by Leon Elson, the founder of several businesses, and you can find him at Leon Eisen.com. So Leon, thank you for joining us today.
So thank you, Taylor. Thank you, Taylor, for inviting me. I'm really happy to be on your podcast. I heard a lot about this and now just it happens.
My pleasure. You have so many accolades and so many skills and stories. We were just talking off camera. And so for those still getting to know you and some of the businesses you founded and run and boards that you sit on, Give us a little bit of backstory of how you got into the space and the different niches that you're serving and how you—
Yeah, that's an interesting story because for 15 years I spent for being a scientist. So I was working like a scientist. I did my PhD in quantum physics. And so I was going to continue like a scientist. But after the postdoctoral research, I realized that this is not my way. I want to to touch something, not just to make something that people will use in 50 years. So actually, do you know why professor has a low salary? Because what professor is doing will be implemented or find application in 50 years, like take quantum computers for example, right? And so just chop the salary, big salary of entrepreneur in 50 years, you will get salary of professor. Okay, so while you have to deliver a real value that really helps people today, not, not tomorrow, not in 100 years. So I left it and I went to the industry and was working like engineer in the industry. And at some point I understood that I want my, my own company. I have an idea and it's medical device. It's a wearable medical device. Only one problem. I had this idea in the middle of the crisis, 2008-2009. Not a good place to start the company. Now I understand it was the best time to start the company because many companies— take Uber, others— they started exactly these times in crisis. Yeah, but that time I, I just I think, how I'm gonna raise capital? No money. VC doesn't invest. Angels very, very greedy today. So what I have to do? But I have idea. I have PhD in physics. It's based on my knowledge and my experience. And suddenly I raised $1 million. Wow. In the middle of the crisis. First million, then I raised about $20 million for this company. But actually, first million, it was very surprising about it. And this is how I did start my first company and finally it became the world's first FDA-cleared wearable medical device that people can use in hospital. It's not Fitbit, it's not Apple. It's a medical device, if they clear it. It was world's first wrist-worn wearable medical device.
Wow, you guys pioneered, you guys developed that, you created it. And now—
Yes, something new, new category didn't exist before. Yeah.
Wow. So what has helped you with your businesses to grow and develop?
What helped me? First of all, nobody helped me because that time And, you know, today founders are happy to have thousands of advisors. Just choose it, go to Hubble, you can choose a thousand advisors and talk to them. 15 years ago, we didn't have anything. Anything. It were some hundreds of people who did some exit. Most of them in '90s. That's totally out of the, out of the consideration because it's a totally different world. And so people just started after their bubble and they didn't have time to get, to get exit yet in 2008, 2009. So I didn't find mentor who can help me. So all people whom I talk to They were from '90s, they couldn't give me any value, unfortunately. So, the main difference between what happens today and what happened 15 or 20 years ago, today founder in a totally different position. Yes, there are many founders, but also there are many advisors. Also much more money in the market. So I think today, if you are a founder, you have some premium position with respect to us 15 years ago.
Yeah, knowledge and access to people and information, good strategies. So how big is the team and organization you're running now?
Oh, which organization? Just Let me— so I'm not running any organization. I decided to— I spent 12 years like CEO and brought company to success, but actually I decided I don't want to be CEO anymore. Maybe CEO of my company without people of agents. Yeah, I agree. But I decided to stop working with people, to stop give some orders to employees. Because, you know, it's not mine. It's not mine. So I'm actually co-founder. I built my own venture studio. It's about 5 companies there in the UK, in Israel, in the United States. And I'm looking for co-founder and CEO for these companies. And I teach them. So they grow very quickly because, you know, you get me like a founder and I invest in infrastructure of each company. So then we will— but my approach to bootstrap as long as possible because you create a company and it's your asset. Immediately as you get somebody inside from the side, You lose your freedom. Yeah, you get your money, you can create your dream, but you lose your freedom. So bootstrap as long as possible.
That makes sense.
And this is what I teach my co-founders. So I'm looking for co-founders who has capability to survive a couple of years without salary. This is one of the requirements to people I'm working with. If somebody's gonna work with me, this is required.
Gotcha.
And I have a lot of ideas. I am ready to build infrastructure, and I'm ready to work with people. I'm ready to extend my ventures to them. And so this is from one side. From another side, I'm venture capitalist. So 3 years ago, I joined Network Vision like a venture partner. It's a Menlo Park venture capital fund. We have more than 100 portfolio companies. And last week, yeah, or this week, it was a huge competition created by Deel. Deel, it's an $18 billion company in the HR space worldwide. And they created more than 100 companies participated in each country. I don't know how many countries maybe were involved. And then in Paris, it was a final pitch of these finalists. And one of our portfolio companies, Zilli, just won. So we're very proud about it. And also in our portfolio, we have a dozen Y Combinator companies. So we invest in Y Combinator companies directly. That's all. This is what I can say about it. So I invite people to, and founders to talk to me, to send me. I don't like, I will talk about strategy and process how to raise capital later. Okay.
Okay. And so for you looking back, what turning points have had the greatest impact and molded the way you think about business, the way you run them and structure them?
What, what different? First of all, I never give orders. Okay. I do conversation.
I like that.
With employees, with partners. I get to my goal pro conversation. So people should think by themselves that this is, this is their idea. So the most important when you're working with employers, with partners, to deliver the message. So you can say, for example, uh, you know, to multiply by 2. You don't say 4. You just say 2 multiplied by 2. And you calculate immediately it's 4. But it's you calculate, not I tell you that this is 4. And this is totally different dynamics. And this is how founders should work with investors. I take about 5 companies, sometimes 5, sometimes 4, depending on my spare time. I take like advisor. So I get into the company and I start to advise the team, advise the founder and change their and transform them into the fundable team and fundable company. And so I apply a lot of tools and this is one of the tools I teach them how to talk to investor. Not to pitch, never pitch, talk to investors, speak with investors, make investors decide by themselves. Not come into the meeting and say, we are the best team in the world because we were working in Facebook, Google. I decide like investor if you are the best team. You just say where you were working. And 90% of founders come with this kind of pitch. Claim, or our product is the best product, or we are world first. I will decide if they are world first. Give me just what, uh, opportunity to decide by myself. And these founders, they really raise— don't claim.
Yeah, I love that. It's like, here's, here's the, here's the evidence. You can decide.
Exactly. Even not evidence, you have to a little bit to push people to decide, because if you just say, fuck, okay, evidence, good. But you have to somehow to build narration. And in my 5P process or methodology, narration, I call it positioning. It's a third P where you exactly learn how to talk to investor in this way, how to get into the meeting, how to— for example, if investor, if founder get into the meeting and look at the floor, No way to invest. No way. Founder, early founder, young founder, they don't understand this because they are very, they are pushers, you know, and this works against them.
Okay. So when it comes to messaging and marketing outreach, what have you found that works well to attract and retain good clients and customers?
I sold to more than 100 hospitals in United States. Wow. And I can tell you that the most important, the warm introduction. Without warm introduction, I don't understand how to make business at all. Yeah, if for example you will come or I don't know. Seth Godin will call me or somebody else very famous. They don't need warm introduction because I have warm introduction from learning about these people, from reading their books. This is some kind of introduction as well. So if I write my book, 1,000 people have a warm relationship with me already and I don't need introduction. But for founder, for people who don't have these ability, they need warm introduction because I don't know who are you. Yeah, yeah, this is the most important in founder investor dynamics.
That makes sense, that makes a lot of sense. That referral, that warm introduction, that human connection, that way it's not like, like you're reading through it's just what's presented to the actual heart of the person.
Only one difference, one difference. That's okay. This gives you some— so you can get into the door this way. So your door is open. But in any case, you have to deliver some value. You have to have a proof. That's very important. So I call it packaging in my 5 P. Okay, how to create this pro. So otherwise, the difference between warm introduction and cold introduction is that in cold introduction— introduction— in cold message, you will never— oh, sometimes maybe, but you will— won't get into the meeting. But in warm introduction, you have the same result now but with smile. This is the difference, but result the same. If you are not ready.
That makes sense.
So when it comes to— I can even tell you more, a little bit.
Please.
Yeah, so founders bombard me. Help us, help us to connect us to investors. We will pay you fees, something like this. Everything we will give you. Just connect to investors. And my answer usually like this. I value my reputation. I don't know you. I don't know how are you ready for fundraising. I cannot bring you to my peers, investors, without understanding that you are ready. Are you ready? And most of the time they are not ready. But they don't understand this. They think if they get into the big numbers, meet with 300 investors, they will raise. Maybe, but not in the terms they want. And maybe investor won't be good or appropriate for them.
So how can somebody know if they are ready or not?
First of all, I have, I offer people my checklist. So they can go and check their fundability level. This is first. Second, they have to prove they are ready. I can meet, if I like them, I can meet even in the cold with a cold outreach. And if I see they are ready, I have some questions, specific questions, but I start from questionnaire.
Okay.
And usually, usually, you know, I have more than 3,000 answers in questionnaires and most of them bullshit. Wow. Okay. Yeah.
So when it comes to marketing and sales, where do you still see potential and opportunity with these businesses?
In marketing and sales, it's a very wide question. So could you elaborate?
With your businesses that you help out, like, how do you help them see and grasp the opportunities that are available, the money that's on the table, that they're adding the value and they're gaining everything in exchange for the value?
Yeah. Have you kids?
Do I have kids?
Yeah.
Yes.
Good. So when your wife was pregnant, did you notice that every day you see so many pregnant women on the street? Suddenly.
Mm-hmm.
I bought a good car and suddenly I didn't see a lot of cars like this, but suddenly I see a lot of cars exactly like this.
Yes.
It means you have to leave in this. I call it transformation, and this is what I'm working with founders on transformation. So you have, you cannot just talk to investor or talk to client and with checklist, you know. I can give you checklist. One very famous guy said, I can give you checklist how to drive airplane. But it doesn't mean you can drive an airplane. Yes, I've heard. Yeah, you can have checklist. You can come to me, pay a lot of money, get checklist. Okay, let's do deck better, better deck, better narration, better this, better that, better outreach message for sale. But it doesn't mean you will make money. Make. Because finally you have to live there, you have to feel every second what to answer. It should be generated from inside. This is the difference between just engineer and system engineer. System engineer live with this. Just engineer use checklist. This is the difference. So this is what I, what I teach you, how to have the fully embedded mentally in what you are doing.
Mm, that makes a lot.
For example, for example, I see a lot of tech and they write AI for this, AI for that, uh, something like, you know, Like, check your contract. But you should think about the final value. Check your contract is not the value, it's a process. AI in legal tech, it's a process. It's something too. Think about outcome, value, volume. And they don't know how to think about it, you know. How to think about it? Through the set of questions "Why?" If I start set of questions "Why?" for you, for example, I ask you, "Why do you need money?" You will say, "Oh, I need money, I want to buy home." "Why do you need home?" "Oh, I need home, I want to live there in a good place." And finally, after 10, 12 "Whys," it is possible to uncover the deep deep goal, and you don't want value, or you don't want money. You want totally different stuff, even you don't understand this. So working with founders, we understand exactly what they want because they start from vision, mission, all this bullshit. What kind of vision Okay, for founders, B, C round, yeah, they are inside for a long time. They have vision. They are already inside. I just started the company. I started to make money actually. What kind of vision? But why I want this money? What's the value I have to deliver? This is most important.
Yeah.
Wow.
So with AI, I'm glad you brought that up because there's so many questions people have. With AI, how to use it properly, when they're overusing it. How have you found ways to use it internally and where do you see effective balance with that?
First of all, all my company are using AI today, but I just forbid them to use AI in, in their deck or in their website. Don't write AI anymore. AI is not magic anymore. AI is a tool like your car was 100 years ago and today. So it's commodity today. So intelligence became commodity. Everybody can be intelligent today. So what's the most important? Not how you use AI. Everybody can use AI. By the way, only 1% of people using AI in our world actually using All other people just ask questions. And not how you use AI, the question, how you can build infrastructure for your workflow with AI? How to embed AI into your infrastructure to solve your problems? Because for example, I also was part of all this movement about AI Cloud, ChatGPT. Now people get back to ChatGPT from the cloud because actually this is the same shit. And I built 5, 5, 6, 6, 6 agents. I don't use them today. So one agent check my mails and said me what to do. Miss so many important mails that only me with my feeling and 20 years of experience can understand, okay, this is very interesting, but they cannot do it. So, and what I realized, even easier for me to quickly look all the mails than waiting when this agent just create the summary. After the summary, in any case, I have to go to these mails, they read it and answer. So sometimes you don't need it at all. You think, okay, I automated it, it's cool, but you don't need it. Yeah, what AI for me does really, I have some meeting for a month ahead and I ask, I have very big, very, very good agent there to summarize all people I'm meeting with, who they are, how I can help them, how they can help me. So all information, definitely I cannot do it. That's okay. That's, yeah, where I, I'm using AI. All my company based on AI, but it's hidden AI inside the workflow.
Mm-hmm.
I can see that.
I love that. Where, like, my dad does a bit of farming. He's talked about where you can't just set it and forget it because if you blow a line or something, you have to inspect it.
You just—
I mean, the best fertilizer is the footsteps of the farmer because he's walking, you're checking in on it. And like you said, the emails, you have to check it and because there's problems, but it can help augment and simplify things.
But yeah. Have you noticed when you ask something ChatGPT or Claude to do, you don't read? Because it's a long story, you don't have patience to read it and you move to another. For example, oh, create this. I don't read. I have another idea. Okay, from this, create that. So finally I lose everything and I have a long list of some tasks and things and the chats. I never get back again.
I think we're all guilty of that to one degree or another, for sure.
Yeah. Wow.
So Leon, if you had to focus on, when you think about the trajectory of the business that you're working on, one constraint, focus on it for the next 90 days to solve, what would that be?
Constraint? The, the main constraint today, I think, relationship. Relationships, because, you know, let's get into the foundation of the business. Foundation of the business is relationships. And the main constraint, when you understand you need this guy and you cannot get them. So I think constraint not around technology, not around the market, constraint, all constraint are around people. So old school never changed because even in AI business, finally AI serves people and AI is built on our intention. They don't serve one— no, if you want to buy something from AI to another AI, from agent, from sales agent to another, but finally everything comes to the people.
Yeah. Wow. That's crazy. So when you think of your own journey and the wins, the mistakes, what lessons stand out to you?
You want exact mistake lesson? Yeah, I think like a founder. Yeah, I can give you mistake like a founder because I spent 15 years like a founder and only 3 years like an investors. And by the way, if I knew what I know today, like investor, I would raise $200 million.
Yeah.
So the main mistake, I think the main mistake are again people, not decision. Decision you can, you can change. Decision you can just say, this is my word, I gave, I took back. Okay, so it's not a problem. The problem, if you miscalculated with people, you, you can, you cannot build trust again. You lost trust, you lost reputation, that's all. You lost forever. This is what nothing you can undo. Undo here. So if you have the wrong co-founder and you told, oh, this guy very good and he will bring me money and the connection, and finally something happens and it's not this guy you expected to have, or you got employee who is a toxic and you cannot immediately remove this employer because one of the One of the traits of toxic employer, they build something and control it. So if you remove this employee, you remove a huge part of the business because they, they know how to control it. Yeah, that's the problem.
That makes a lot of sense. So last question for you. When you think about the next stages of your business or businesses that you're working on, what are you most excited about?
Oh, I'm most excited about my last company. We are going to get, get launch, launch in a couple of weeks maybe. I'm not talking about my book. My book is most excited, but I'm talking about business. Is a company called Applied. It's actually, it was in stealth mode. We were working a lot on it. It's an amazing opportunity to take any expert in our world, license it, and build everything what you want from this methodology.
Oh, wow.
You want to build how to make a podcast? Podcast, you go to expert who wrote a book about podcast, get it, get the book with 100% of fidelity, no any, no any hallucination, I would say, and build your operating system.
Man, you have such a wealth of knowledge and depth in this, so many different categories. We were talking off camera just some of them. For those who want to learn more, who want to reach out, LinkedIn obviously is a good place. Going to your website, Leon, L-E-O-N-E-I-S-E-N.com. Where else do you want to send them if they want to get a copy of your book? Is there an audio version as well as a paperback or digital? What's the best way to connect?
I think first of all, The best place I am in is LinkedIn. So just send me invite, Leon Eisen, find Leon Eisen, PhD, and send the invitation to connect, a message, a DM, and follow my post. I post every day about fundraising, about founders, about everything. So I do not follow this hype. I created Every time I see people who I knew very well and were good wiki investors, they were, I built so on cloud recently, something just takes the code, all the bullshit, yeah? So, so hi. And 1,000 comments, give us, give us, but nobody use it after that. So no, go to LinkedIn. Follow my post, follow me, connect to me. Another place is Substack where every— that's very important— every week on Monday I publish analytical report about fundraising this week. It's amazing report. So you can go to Substack or in parallel to subscribe in LinkedIn to the same Fundable. It's called Fundable Notes. And it's not only analytics about fundraising, it's playbook based on this analytics. What to do for founders, what trends we have from last week, and how to change your narration, how to change your process, proof, positioning, packaging, and planning. This is my 5 Ps with my, uh, Aisin Fundability Score. So you can calculate for your company as a fundability score and you get score for each company we present which raised capital last week.
Wow.
Also website, website. And if people wanna, if people wanna talk to me, learn from me, get my advice, feedback, or pitch me, you can find me on hubl.social.
Okay.
And we can set up the meeting there.
Wonderful. So any final thoughts for our listeners or others on a similar journey?
Listeners, so final thought, still, still work with people, not with AI, because people All AI, everything is built for people. So never forget that people decide your future. People decide your wealth.
Yes.
Not you decide, not AI, not Claude. You people decide your wealth. And if you are not ready, if you are not eligible to be wealthy, you won't get it.
Mm.
And AI won't help you.
I like that. If you're not eligible, it'll cut out the fluff. So thank you for coming on, Leon, and sharing your wisdom, your wealth of knowledge, and your story. Like, it's fascinating. And thank you to our sponsors of today's episode, Achieve Fractional, which provides Fractional Executive Leadership for Growing Businesses. And if you enjoyed the episode, share it with a friend, with a colleague. If you're not sure where your business is, where it's ranking, Leon's just given us very many good tools and resources. Reach out to Leon and the team, connect with him, get the analytics, get your information, get the diagnostics, see where you're at. Leon can help you get there where you want to go. So reach out, and we'll see you on the next episode of the Achieve Podcast.
