Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

No one is born with business writing skills, and everyone can learn them. Thus, I thought a quick refresher on business writing basics might help you more than any tip on the next big thing on the business horizon: Select clear purpose and focus. Tailor writing to your audience. Develop a friendly business writing voice.

Writing 90

Writing Content Email Tips 90

SoCal CTO

APRIL 2, 2013

I'm going to be looking at aspects like: Things to consider before building your MVP Features often overlooked when documenting an MVP for developers Understanding important metrics you want to measure Risks and challenges in developing an MVP. Have you Documented Your MVP for Your Developer s? What's going to go wrong?

CTO Coach 219

CTO Coach Metrics Framework Software Development 219

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

I’m over-paying for every check I write into the VC ecosystem and valuations are being pushed up to absurd levels and many of these valuations and companies won’t hold in the long term. If you’re going to play in the big leagues you need to be writing checks from a $700 million?—?$1 Are we in a bubble?” By definition?—?I’m of the fund.

Venture Capital 471

Venture Capital Writing Invest Pricing 471

socalTECH

AUGUST 1, 2011

Los Angeles-based LegalZoom , the online legal document provider, is the target of a class action lawsuit in Missouri, which is looking to block the ability of the firm to provide wills, leases, and other documents.

Legalzoom 160

Legalzoom Software Class Writing 160

Berkonomics

SEPTEMBER 5, 2024

As I write this in late 2024, legislation is being proposed at the national level to eliminate non-competes. Further, there is no expiration date on these poisoned documents. You cannot complain that the document or information in question is more than five years or two employers old. Both in business suits and looking somber.

Design 156

Design Writing News Email 156

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 8, 2012

The trouble is, nobody has an incentive to agree to write the first check. There is simply no reason for the first angel to write you a check until you have the whole round secure, which is why people herd cats. Especially if it was memorialized in the documents why you were doing it. why buy anything? why buy me? why buy now?

Pricing 294

Pricing Venture Capital Writing Equity 294

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 5, 2011

500 Hats , January 10, 2010 Developing new startup ideas - Chris Dixon , March 14, 2010 Batch Processing Millions and Millions of Images - Code as Craft , July 9, 2010 jQuery Plugin: Give Your Characters a NobleCount - The Product Guy , March 23, 2010 How do the sample Series Seed financing documents differ from typical Series A financing documents?

Startup 378

Startup Venture Capital Blogging CTO Coach 378

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2009

This post covers the first out of 10 that I’ll write about. The moderator asked the question, “if an entrepreneur writes an email to a VC and doesn’t hear back what should they do?&# This VC responded, “Move on. The picture above is from the actual event courtesy of Dan Farber who was writing for ZDNet.

Entrepreneur 338

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital Google 338

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 19, 2019

You will often find these governing conditions in the “protective provisions” section of your company’s legal documents. I plan to write a series of posts on the topic. Equally, I plan to write for the benefit of investors and independents, too, to offer some tips on how can you get the most out of the boards on which you sit.

Startup 204

Startup Writing Framework Summary 204

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 24, 2016

Even in this age of videos and text messages, the quickest way to kill your startup dream with investors, business partners, or even customers, is embarrassingly poor writing. You have to be able to communicate effectively in all the common forms, including business writing, as well as talking, presenting, and producing videos.

Writing 62

Writing Summary Email Ideas 62

Berkonomics

MARCH 28, 2024

They write in their investment documents that they will occupy a seat on the board for as long as they are invested in the company, thinking of this as a protection for their investment and tool for them to influence growth. All other board functions are secondary.

Class 282

Class Coach Invest Sales 282

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2010

There’s one attribute (coming soon) that I need to have in order to write a check but I don’t believe is vital for success. My first company launched in 1999 and we were offering a SaaS document management in the cloud (we were called ASPs back then). It will be controversial – I know. I know this stuff cold now.

Entrepreneur 267

Entrepreneur Startup SaaS San Diego 267

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 21, 2017

Ultimately the Goldman Sachs report gets picked up by a journalist who writes a hyperbolic headline with emphatic conclusions because nobody wants to read that tomorrow will be just like today. Since I had built 2 document management companies I knew all the reasons why building a document management company would “never work.”

Venture Capital 182

Venture Capital Statistics Writing Report 182

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 23, 2013

I’ve been writing a series on a simple methodology that we used at my first enterprise software company. If you’ve done a good job in the sales process you’ve already written out a needs document in which your wrote out what you believe the customer problems are with specific examples.

Sales 328

Sales Customer Custom Examples 328

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 9, 2023

Even in this age of videos and text messages, the quickest way to kill your startup dream with investors, business partners, or even customers, is embarrassingly poor writing. You have to be able to communicate effectively in all the common forms, including business writing, as well as talking, presenting, and producing videos.

Tips 123

Tips Writing Startup Summary 123

socalTECH

MAY 21, 2009

Santa Monica-based DocStoc , the online document sharing site run by Jason Nazar, just released a new feature Thursday afternoon, DocStoc Collections , which allows users to create their own groupings of documents by topic. Tags: docstoc collections topic sharing document. DocStoc is venture backed by Rustic Canyon Partners.

Rustic Canyon 100

Rustic Canyon Santa Monica SoCalTech Writing 100

InfoChachkie

APRIL 16, 2012

Large companies write business plans, why of course, that’s the organizing document for a startup. Yet we took this document, the business plan, because we knew nothing else and said, ‘Go write one of these.’. That was the implicit statement. Most startups…(are) dealing with a series multiple unknowns.

Startup 229

Startup Class Press Custom Development 229

TechEmpower

MARCH 27, 2013

At the time of this writing, Java 8 development is still very much in progress. I'll do my best to keep this document up to date. This seems odd at first, given that some interfaces actually define their equals behavior in documentation. It performs better than RRWL when used as a plain read-write lock.

Java 560

Java Class Software Review Examples 560

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 10, 2010

There is a common misconception that an idea can be protected by documenting it, placing it in an envelope and then mailing it to yourself. Underlying this presumption is the belief that if the envelop is unopened, the postmark will “prove” the date the idea was conceived (or at least when it was documented). Know Thou Prior Art.

IP 256

IP Patents Company Companies 256

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 20, 2012

This can be your star Chief Architect who loves to code but hates having to handle the admin like testing, documentation, recruiting, etc. Three years ago during Thanksgiving I told Nivi I would write down what I look for in an entrepreneur for a series of posts for VentureHacks. And the best individual contributors are Doers.

Venture Capital 400

Venture Capital Conference Ideas Entrepreneur 400

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 13, 2011

With all these companies vying for attention & others just here to soak up the vibe I thought I’d write a much broader piece on how startups can make the most of their attendance at conferences & events. Write them in advance and request meetings. We didn’t have any documents due that night. We just hung.

Conference 289

Conference Startup Technical Review Writing 289

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2010

I’m writing this post to make sure you’re all on that same playing field. 18% of all errors come from people using the wrong documents. hours are spent every day by workers searching for documents. So, where is this all coming from, Mark? What are you on about? It becomes folklore. I encourage it.

Statistics 415

Statistics Startup Report Research 415

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

If I could persuade you that they’re already in these documents would you consider abandoning this structure? Those terms you fought so hard to get out of “clean term sheets” by using TheFunded, VentureHacks and the like are in your current documents. That’s right. They are not necessarily cheaper.

Startup 354

Startup Pricing Equity Venture Capital 354

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 2, 2014

So I might have to write a document, complete a spreadsheet, handle a negotiation or plan an event but somebody else is telling me when each task is due and we both hold me accountable for my work outputs. ” I write. This is a help in itself. Re-reading and editing is for completer finishers. I need to hit send.

Startup 416

Startup Entrepreneur Writing Help 416

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2018

These collective sets of documents form the basis of what somebody looking at investing would call “financial due diligence.” What happens is 18–20 firms access the data room and download all of your documents. He told me to stop responded to RFPs where I wasn’t the person who helped write the specs for the RFPs. It doesn’t.

Funding 336

Funding Venture Capital Startup Email 336

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 31, 2021

In fact, the process of organizing and documenting these elements is the best way to make sure you understand the answers yourself. It only takes a little extra work to make it a professional document, with a cover page, table of contents, headings, and page numbers.

Sample 137

Sample Writing Mentor Content 137

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Generally speaking in venture capital financings the legal documents will specify that only “major investors” (a threshold set in the agreement – which can be $500,000 investor or more). We are doing what we do – writing larger checks and playing an active role at the company. There is a reason for this.

Venture Capital 352

Venture Capital Seed Funding Email Blogging 352

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 10, 2012

Persuading a journalist to write about you rather than the 1,000 other companies bugging them. Their modus operandi is, “send us all your comments by marking up our entire document.” You get back a document that has 5,000 redlines on it. And take less than their big companies paid them and with less security.

Startup 322

Startup Training Outsource Development Design 322

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 19, 2010

I’m writing this post as part of my series with Advice on Raising Venture Capital but will file it under Sales Tips as well since it applies equally to both scenarios. tip: write it down when asked / parked). Let me write that down.&#. - Congratulations. Do you mind if I answer that a little later in the presentation?

Venture Capital 318

Venture Capital Startup Sales Writing 318

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 17, 2019

I know it may feel this way since I’m writing this tongue in cheek. The person writing things he or she is doing me a favor. They had to physically write a letter, address it, put a stamp on it (pay) and then put it in the mailbox. I’m on all of them and they’re all used in some form for business communications.

Email 250

Email Writing Conference Mobile 250

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2009

I hired a senior exec from the building materials industry (we were a document collaboration company for the engineering & construction industry) who was also ex McKinsey. The expectations of our company having raised $16.5 million were enormous. We had to ramp up our team quickly and ramp we did. He was to head up UK operations.

Startup 299

Startup Venture Capital Technical Review Training 299

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 14, 2018

Here’s Why You Should Just Send the Deck I know you have your document sending tool to send your fund-raising deck to VCs and track who read your deck, which pages they read and how much time they spend on each page. I Know Everybody Told You to Send Your Fund-Raising Decks as a Link.

Funding 239

Funding Venture Capital IP Email 239

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 13, 2020

Yet, most of us would want to have such documentation of progress other than an invoice. In California, there are still suits pending as of this writing as to whether app-based gig employees (think Door Dash, Lyft, Uber and many more) are really employees. An undefined period of time favors the ruling as employee.

Outsource Development 177

Outsource Development Tool Services Report 177

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 21, 2010

When to get a lawyer - If you plan to be a venture or angel backed technology company (what I mostly write about) the best time to start meeting and getting to know lawyers is long before you ever start your company. I write about some of the lessons in my post on Startup Mistakes. Many people start companies arse backwards.

Startup 318

Startup IP Southern California Entrepreneur 318

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 3, 2020

If you can’t quantify or document your service for repeatability and new employee training, you will kill yourself trying to grow the business. Even artisan-based services, like graphic design and writing good ad copy, have innovative processes and principles. Capture your “secret sauce.” Start with a service you know and love.

Startup 174

Startup Training Services Writing 174

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 10, 2010

When you write your email to the person assume it will be forwarded “as is&# so ask for an intro in a way that you wouldn’t mind somebody else reading. DON’T send me a frigging link to your document on DropBox or a request that the recipient visit your website to watch a video. this is all more work for me.

Help 332

Help Email Mentor Blogging 332

TechEmpower

JULY 5, 2016

We should write an alternative to JSON.stringify that produces an exact representation of our number.” We can no longer write Mustache or Handlebars templates like this: {{! We can no longer write functions like this: function updateEmailAddress(user, newEmail) { // Oops, we failed for user #2^62! The call will be hidden.

JavaScript 294

JavaScript Java Class Framework 294