Tag: Strategy

The only thing your investors want

Your investors want one thing: Growth. That’s what you sign up for when you raise venture capital. We have all read the stories of the big outliers. The Shopifys, Facebooks, Airbnbs, etc. That’s what VCs are looking for. The next […]

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Finding the right investor for your business

There is so much written about fundraising, yet many founders make basic mistakes. That was OK in the last 18 months when $ were flowing. Now, there is no room for error. This list is an actual pipeline from from […]

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Why are you here?

Why are you here? This simple question is perhaps the most important question of our lives. First, consider it in the existential sense: Why are we here? Why are humans on this planet? Why are these creatures, capable of such […]

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War Time CEO, War Time CEO…

Of all the former operators turned VCs, a16z’s Ben Horowitz gets it the most. He truly gets and articulates the struggle that is operating. As a result, he is essential reading for startup CEOs. It is no surprise then that […]

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Sometimes you don’t need an investment bank

Back when I was an investment banker, I joked regularly that bankers have a well-deserved bad reputation. The fact is, most bankers are useless. Especially in the mid-market (where most VC and PE funded companies are). They charge far too […]

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To pivot or not to pivot…

The term “pivot” was added to the startup vocabulary in the past decade or so to describe when a startup changes its mission or focus. Some pivots are small, such as changing the target customer from enterprise to mid-market. Others […]

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