The financial valuation of any company—any deal, any enterprise—is prominent in Bee Partners’ thoughts as we consider, plan, and proceed with investment decisions. But what’s less understood is how much of our thinking is driven by a set of other values we hold deeply. We express these values in both business and human terms on our website:

We practice “integrity investing.”

We invest in building companies.

We balance intuition with data.

We believe that time is worth more than money.

We strive always to think beyond ourselves.

We live the Bee values in our daily engagements with everyone in our business community. But, as you’ve no doubt experienced in your own life, we in business have lost the hard division between work and personal life. And one thing I determined early on, and grow more convinced of as time goes by, is that I don’t really want those divisions. I mean, sure, I want to turn off my phone and get real time with my family. But the person I am when I’m with my family… well, I want to be that same person when I’m with a Founder or a limited partner. The ideas behind, say, integrity investing or prioritizing human qualities like intuition are the same values I want to teach my kids through my actions—and to live all the time.

The need to be grounded in meaningful values has been on my mind recently as repeated examples have surfaced of men in our business community behaving horrendously toward women. I’m glad to have a solid foundation in values that express what it means to be the best human I can be, and that everyone in the Bee community knows our commitment to those guiding values. In the next several months, I’ll be saying more about each value and how it affects our daily lives.