Andy Dunn (Bonobos) - Mental Health for Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL)

Stanford eCorner

Journey, Startups, Education, Stanford, Culture, Strategy, Stanford University, Entrepreneurship, Business, Life Lessons, Thought Leadership, Creativity, Etl, Challenges, Leadership, Innovation, Founders

4.4 • 739 Ratings

🗓️ 8 November 2023

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Andy Dunn is an entrepreneur, author, and investor. Dunn co-founded the menswear e-commerce brand Bonobos in 2007 and served as the company’s CEO for its first 10 years, pioneering the digitally native brand movement. In 2022, Dunn published a memoir lifting the veil on the mental health demons he’d been privately battling as he built Bonobos. “Burn Rate: Launching a Startup and Losing My Mind” chronicles his journey at the intersection of entrepreneurship and bipolar disorder. In this conversation with Stanford adjunct lecturer Ravi Belani, Dunn shares his experiences with bipolar disorder and encourages everyone to acknowledge mental health challenges, including in the world of entrepreneurs.

This talk includes discussions of suicide and self-harm. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is a hotline for individuals in crisis or for those looking to help someone else. To speak with a trained listener, call 988. Visit 988lifeline.org for crisis chat services or for more information. The Crisis Text Line is a texting service for emotional crisis support. To text with a trained helper, text SAVE to 741741. It is free, available 24/7, and confidential.

—-----------------------------------

Stanford eCorner content is produced by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. At STVP, we empower aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations.

CONNECT WITH US

Twitter: https://twitter.com/ECorner

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/stanfordtechnologyventuresprogram/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StanfordTechnologyVenturesProgram/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ecorner

LEARN MORE

eCorner Website: https://ecorner.stanford.edu/

STVP Website: https://stvp.stanford.edu/

Support our mission of providing students and educators around the world with free access to Stanford University’s network of entrepreneurial thought leaders: https://ecorner.stanford.edu/give.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is the Entrepreneurial Thought Leader series.
0:04.0	Brought to you by Stanford E.Corp.
0:07.0	Welcome everybody to the Entrepreneurial Thought Leader seminar at Stanford University.
0:12.0	ETL, as you know, is a seminar for aspiring entrepreneurs at Stanford.
0:17.0	This is a very special ETL, and we're coming with a watch party here.
0:21.8	ETL, as you all know, is presented by STVP, the Stanford Entrepreneurship Center in the School of Engineering, and Basis, the Business Association of Stanford Entrepreneurial Students.
0:32.7	I am Ravi Balani, a lecturer in the management science and engineering department at Stanford, and a director
0:37.9	at Alchemist and Accelerator for Enterprise Startups. Today, we are thrilled to welcome virtually
0:44.0	Andy Dunn to ETL. Now, all, there is so much to talk about with Andy that I'm going to give a
0:50.2	little bit more of an involved introduction, just so that we can spend the limited time
0:55.0	we have with Andy on the more meaningful topics of today. And also because I want to create room
1:00.8	for all of you, if you have any questions, to ask Andy questions and start thinking of those questions.
1:06.7	We'll turn it over to the students in about 30 minutes. But Andy is the son of a Midwestern high school history teacher, father, and an immigrant
1:17.5	Punjabi Indian ultrasound nurse mother, who's an immigrant who came to the United States,
1:23.7	and they created Andy.
1:25.1	Andy grew up in a solidly middle class family in the suburbs of Chicago
1:29.6	and even today is a diehard Cubs fan. He was preternaturally smart. He skipped the third
1:36.4	grade, but school was not always easy. He was teased with a moniker from a student in school
1:43.1	called calling him a windu, a white Hindu early on.
1:47.4	And I think that sort of foreshadowed Andy's ability to straddle between worlds that oftentimes don't overlap.
1:54.3	But Andy went on to go to Northwestern University and graduated with a bachelor's degree in economics and history.
2:00.6	And then went on to get a
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -463 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Stanford eCorner, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Stanford eCorner and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.