Success means a variety of different things. To some, success is dependent on their significant relationships, while for others it’s their job and their income. Regardless of the metrics used, most can agree that happiness is a universal measurement of success. For Travis May, CEO of Shaper Capital, success has come in a similar variety of forms, especially with his 2016 Forbes 30 Under 30 recognition in the marketing sector, an award that highlights the top 30 most influential or significant individuals under 30 years old in the world within a specific region of impact.
Travis May was born in Cary, North Carolina in 1987 and attended Cary Academy for both middle and high school. When speaking on his upbringing, May revealed, “I had amazing teachers who were passionate about the subjects they taught, parents who encouraged me to follow my interests and a community of friends who liked to help intellectual debates.”
It wasn’t only this favorable environment that pushed him to success, he contributed a lot of his success to key character traits. “[I] developed intellectual curiosity as a high schooler… I think intellectual curiosity is a very valuable trait for successful careers; it can help motivate going the extra mile to understand how systems work and really consider problems.”
May also believes that his academic leadership experiences, and the skills he gained from these, were essential to his success. “Leading a club or a sports team has a lot of parallels to leading a business, as you learn how to bring out the best in people and how organizations work… critical thinking in an academic context is also really helpful to… business environments.”
However, the most integral trait in May’s development at Cary Academy that led him to attend Harvard University, was intellectual curiosity. He explained that, “starting in high school,” his passion for entrepreneurship developed. “I liked to start organizations; I found it was one of the best ways to have a big impact. I started the ultimate frisbee team at my school, and started a summer tutoring program.”
As he grew older, these projects became even more significant and rigorous. “In college, this started translating into starting companies – first I started a web development business with a few friends, and then I started a few tech startups.” His work in startups throughout his time at Harvard led to an amazing internship opportunity at Rapleaf, a tech startup run by one of his mentors and close friends, Auren Hoffman. He revealed “I fell in love with that startup, and ended up staying there instead of business school,” which he planned to apply to at Stanford directly after his senior year.
“My career since has been a succession of bigger and bigger technology companies I’ve started.” These projects include LiveRamp, a data onboarding corporation, Datavant, a health data ecosystem connection and most recently Shaper Capital, an equity investing business that looks to “shape the world” by providing funds and support to impactful startups throughout the world.
Of these, the one that recognized him as a 2016 Forbes 30 Under 30 list member was LiveRamp. “At the time, I was running LiveRamp and had a team of about 500 people and we were working with most of the Fortune 500.” Despite this immense recognition, May didn’t “think that the award itself changed my trajectory,” but his ability to be successful with LiveRamp certainly inspired his future projects.
From this success and recognition, May has developed some major pieces of advice for the ambitious and talented youth in his hometown of Cary and throughout the world. “[To achieve success] find ways to play to your personal strengths… Find ways to start things and ways to lead [and] surround yourself with people you enjoy spending time with, are ambitious, and are kind – those traits are infectious.”
A Harvard bachelor’s degree, a Forbes 30 Under 30 feature, and multiple multi-million dollar companies later, Travis May still works with the same ambition and determination that he started with two decades ago. While the path is different for everybody, the advice of May can apply to any field and any future in an amazing platform to reach happiness and success.
