StoriesHow PeopleFirst Leadership Powers Growth at Ascend
Ascend brings Alpine’s PeopleFirst leadership to life, showing how people-first private equity can drive growth while preserving integrity.
Graham Weaver started a private equity firm from his Stanford Graduate School of Business dorm room more than two decades ago. Today, Alpine Investors manages $18 billion in assets.
In an interview with Business Insider, Graham discusses the highs and lows of Alpine’s early days. The first fund, raised a couple of years after he graduated from business school, actually lost money. Subsequent funds did better, but as the Great Recession approached, Graham and his partners were still unsure about what differentiated their company from other PE funds.
At the time, Graham hadn’t even heard of the term “executive coach.” But after meeting JP Flaum, a longtime executive coach based in Denver, Colorado, Graham was impressed. “His business must have been hurting because he offered me a deal. Joking, of course, but I took him up on it.”
