Career Path of an Attorney at Gunderson Dettmer

I went to Cal in the seventies. I was recruited to be an athlete there. I didn't receive money or a scholarship, but I was accepted, which was very helpful because it was competitive.

I was there for a couple of years and then I got hurt. I started doing some extracurricular activities because I couldn't continue with the sport I was in. I had a lot of free time after I stopped playing.

I got involved in some political activities, mostly ballot proposition work, which had just started. You could actually sign people up and get things on the ballot. I did that for a quarter; Cal was on the quarter system at that point. I became interested in politics.

Then I left school and went to D.C. I figured I'd wait tables, as I'd done during summers, and see if I could intern for a congressman. I got an interview and then an internship. I lucked into it when someone left five weeks later and they gave me a full-time job.

The congressman was an interesting guy. He said, "I'm hiring you, but if you're still here in 18 months, I'm going to fire you." He meant that if I hadn't gone back to school by then, he would fire me. I thought, "Of course I'm going to go back to school," but I didn't really get it.

It turned out that a good portion of his staff had never graduated college. They just got into being there, and it's really fun, especially a young person's experience. I did that for about a year and a half.

Then I went back to Cal and finished up over the next year and a half, I guess. I double-majored in history and political science. I didn't have any minors. It was more a function of trying a bunch of different things and finding that I loved history. Then it turned out I had almost enough credits for a major in political science, so I did that too.

After finishing, I went into the Peace Corps. I was in Southeast Asia. I did that mostly because I wanted to see what it would be like to live in the developing world. I wanted to teach to see if I'd like that, and I wanted to learn another language. It worked great for all of those things. It was a fantastic experience. If I could convince my wife, I'd probably do it again.

From the Peace Corps, I went to law school. I went to Michigan Law School and completed the three-year program. Then I started practicing in Los Angeles at a big firm that had a transnational, cross-border practice. That let me do business deals and that kind of work, mostly representing companies and businesses.

I did that for about five years. It was a very traditional corporate lawyer role, which means I worked with litigators, regulatory lawyers, and business lawyers. I was on the business law side, mostly buying and selling companies and debt financing. I didn't like it that much, but the clients I had all made things and weren't in finance. They produced products, and I got more interested in that.

They did a lot of joint ventures, and it was very intellectual property oriented. I had to learn a lot about intellectual property law. After about five years, for some health reasons, we needed to leave L.A. I found a job up in the Bay Area and was with one firm for a couple of years. Then I helped start another firm. My career trajectory changed from being a traditional corporate business lawyer to helping work with startups. That's what I've been focused on for the last 30 years.