Podcast November 26, 2024

E324 | From NFL to Venture Capitalist with Marques Colston

Summary

In this conversation, Marques Colston, a former NFL player transitioned to leading the boardroom playbook, dives into the dynamic world of sports and business ventures. Marques discusses his innovative investments in the sports value chain, including sports medicine, technology, and fan engagement. The conversation covers Marque’s insights on the socioeconomic impact around stadiums, the rising popularity of lacrosse, and his hands-on approach to parenting. He also opens up about coaching his son’s football team and the importance of instilling resilience in his children.

Marques also shares his football crossover strategy to finding sustainable and scalable investments, his philosophy on team dynamics, and the challenges athletes face when transitioning from professional sports. From founding Champion Venture Partners to raising a $100 million fund, Marques Colston’s story is a testament to innovation and resilience.

Takeaways

Marques’ investment portfolio focuses on the sports value chain.
From athlete to investor, Marques seamlessly transitioned from the field to venture capitalism.
Marques introduces his three levels of awareness—self, peripheral, and situational.
Understanding team dynamics and individual roles can maximise collective performance.
A focus on democratising investments, making it more accessible for others.
Marques shares his parenting approach to build resilience.

About Marques Colston

Marques Colston is a former NFL star now leading wins in the business field of venture capitalists. He is a Founding Partner at Champion Venture Partners, a fund dedicated to innovative investment opportunities that generate meaningful returns in the sports ecosystem.

Marques is humble about his outstanding 10 year career as a wide receiver for New Orleans Saints. He was the Saints all time leader in receptions, receiving yards, touchdowns, and he played a key role in their super bowl victory in 2009. Since stepping off the field, he’s seamlessly transitioned into the world of business applying the same Creating Separation mindset that defined his football career.

Over the last 15+ years, he has become a trusted leader in business strategy, private equity, and sports business, driving sustainable growth for companies across various sectors. He’s passionate about supporting athletes in navigating the shift from professional sports to business, creating a pathway and holding the door open for those coming up behind him.

Marques wants to democratise investment capability or the ability of people to invest in early stage businesses. His current $100 million fund aims to invest in sports, sports tech and wellness businesses at Series A.

Marques is also a dedicated father to three children, carefully navigating the role of coach and parent.

Follow Marques Colston

Book Recommendations

Hidden Potential by Adam Grant

Quick Fire Questions

Q: What drives you every day?

Marques Colston: Internal standard. Like I just have, I have a vision for myself, I have a vision for my family, have a vision for the impact that I want to create and that’s the North Star. Anything else is noise.

Q: What’s your genius?

Marques Colston: My ability to synthesise. I’ve been in, obviously team, team sports is a lot of experiences kind of baked into one, but just a bunch of various experiences through venture capital, through team ownership, through executive coaching. Been a financial advisor, so I’m a licensed financial advisor. Just being able to take all of those different experiences and kind of synthesise them into one vessel, I think that’s kind of become my zone of genius.

Q: What’s the most significant risk you’ve taken?

Marques Colston: I bet on me. I bet on me my entire life. And will continue to do so.

Q: How do you measure success?

Marques Colston: Back to that internal standard. Like, it’s. For me, it’s always a double bottom line. It’s the business success and the business metrics are one thing, but who. Who are you helping? Who are you creating access for? You know, who are you helping to build in the process? Those. Those are all measures of success for me.

Q: What do you want to be remembered for?

Marques Colston: Definitely more than football. No, in all seriousness, I’ve always been driven by, and this belief that I just want to. The things that I take on, I want to leave them in a better place than I found them. And it’s altruistic and it’s in a super high level. But that’s just my take, in my opinion.

Q: What’s the most recent thing you’ve learned or a new skill you’ve acquired?

Marques Colston: I can’t say it’s recent, but I will say that I have recently accepted the fact that I know strategy really well, and I think a lot of it is a function of the position that I played, because at playing wide receiver, you were literally a strategist. But it took me a long time to map those two things and claim that for myself as a tangible skill. That’s a recent internal win.

Q: What’s the worst business advice you’ve received?

Marques Colston: I don’t trust experts all the time because there’s tangible knowledge and it’s super valuable, but everything comes with context, and you can’t ignore the context.