#128. From the stage to startups—Lorenzo Thione knows how to tell a story

Lorenzo Thione is a serial entrepreneur. Having founded a handful of companies, he’s now a Co-Founder and Investor at Gaingels, a Venture Capital firm that’s focused on showing that representation and diversity in Venture Capital leads to world class returns.  He estimates he’s seen thousands of pitches in his lifetime and has (more than) a thing or two to share about the structure, the storytelling and the presentation strategy of a pitch deck. In addition to this skillset, Lorenzo is a Tony-award winning producer and advocate for theater arts. As anyone in the pitching/startup space will tell you, presenting is a performance and Lorenzo has blended and balanced these two worlds beautifully throughout his career.  This is an episode for: founders, theater enthusiasts and anyone that needs help pitching. What’s in the Spice Cabinet??  Find more Lorenzo and follow his work! Gaingels Allegiance - Lorenzo’s first produced work!  LinkedIn Favorite speakers? Presenters? Thinkers? Sam Harris from the Making Sense podcast Favorite musical or play?  The Last 5 Years (for the score) The Inheritance (fave play) The Lion King (just a general favorite) “Quintessentially everything that’s right about theater” Hadestown (fave to be moved by) What’s your walkout song?  I’m Coming Out - Diana Ross Final piece of advice for Presentation Nation? “I think the single most important piece of any endeavor has always been my network. And so I tell people: tend to your network. Tend to it as if it were a garden. Find out how you can be of help and support what is it that they need. Just like your plants will need something. And then, you know, it'll be able to kind of bloom and fruit and give you the fruits of it.”