Tim J. Davey

A brief history

Rolling right back to the beginning, I started my first VC backed business at 19, where I was the youngest person accepted into YC (2008). We then built a distributed hotel-chain called onefinestay (think complex logistics business, mixed with super high-end brand). We scaled it across 4 countries, until we eventually we sold it for a few hundred million dollars.

More recently I've helped build the London Interdisciplinary School. Which has been dubbed “The most radical new university to open in decades” by the Times. Here we prepare people by integrating knowledge from across disciplines, because our messy world doesn't seem to respect arbitrary academic silos.

Right now, I'm continuing on this journey by building DISCO. A platform which guides professionals to find their unique leadership style. We teach frameworks, for making decisions and getting shit done, in a no-nonsense, yet empathetic way.

Life can feel overwhelming. There's just so much in our world which needs fixing. But the good news is, it's all so doable. We just need the old linear systems to get out of the way. This is my focus: working on cognitive tools (decision frameworks, statistical techniques etc) which leverage complexity.

Executive coach

Since 2018 I've had the chance to support some extraordinary founders. I know how hard, lonely, infuriating, rewarding, exhilarating... the journey is. It's a potent cocktail of feelings you can only understand once you've actually tasted it.

I give a shit-about-you-as-a-service. I care about you, the decisions you make. So you can have an outsized positive impact. I do this by smashing together practical experience as a founder, with the theory from developed at LIS and DISCO. Focusing on high performance management at a systems level, that's packed full of love and respect at a personal one.

Work together

Although much of my time is taken up with DISCO and research, I love working with passionate people, who give a shit. So get in touch and we can set up a free call to see if we're a good fit tim[at]disco.management

Pro-bono: I also obviously care deeply about the climate crisis. So if you're a founder doing positive climate work, I'd love to help you for free and likely invest. So if that's you, please get in touch too!

Complexity Research

When we started LIS back in 2018 we outlined 4 complex challenges we knew students would have to answer in their lifetimes. They were: vaccine rollouts in a pandemic, dealing with mass misinformation, supply chain breakdowns and what to do when gene-drives get out of control. Ironic that 3 of these engulfed the world before we'd even got through the regulation process.

The climate crisis, the rampantly rising global inequality, the fragility of all our major infrastructures... all the world's most biggest problems are so called "complex". They're "non-linear and ergodic", meaning they can't be broken down into neat little chunks, so can't be solved in insolation or by arbitrary disciplines. This is why LIS had to be Interdisciplinary, to join those dots and tackle the problems holistically.

Complexity Science is the single most important topic we should be researching. So I spend whatever extra time I have doing fundamental research on new statistical techniques to help us quantify and navigate complex decisions. Then translating them into techniques which can be used by leaders to make real positive change.

Collaborate and talks

I've taught systems design, data science and entreprenuership at LIS and Imperial. I've also done talks on this research at various organisations.

If you'd like me to do a talk at your organisation or would like to collaborate on a paper, then please hit me up.

tim[at]disco.management