Remove Down Round Remove Early Stage Remove Hiring Remove Management
article thumbnail

Why Raising Too Much Money Can Harm Your Startup

Both Sides of the Table

It is a truism that with more capital you will hire people more quickly and spend more liberally whether it’s on external contractors, PR firms, attending events, doing legal work (trademarks, patents) or whatever. It forces harder decisions about whom you’ll hire and whom you’ll delay. million or $4 million.

article thumbnail

Take Five – How will the downturn continue to play out on startups and venture capital

VC Cafe

Building on my post on ‘ Advice for startups in a downturn (May 2022 edition) ‘, this week I continued to follow with interest the impact of the current correction on startups and venture capital, particularly in early stage. Layoffs and hiring freezes have started. Sequoia’s Adapting to Endure.

Insiders

Sign Up for our Newsletter

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

article thumbnail

A Recently Exited Founder on Surviving the Contradictory Role of Startup CEO

View from Seed

I called the recruiter running the search and told him I was going to step down and hire a CEO. So, in order to hire a CEO, we have to give someone their first shot at the job.” Yes, it is hard to manage. It’s nice to get great valuations and hire A-players. Backupify was managed for momentum.

Founder 120
article thumbnail

10 Rosh Hashanah Resolutions for Startup Founders

VC Cafe

So in terms of hiring, get people that can help you build the product faster… anything that minimizes the time between observing a need or a problem, and the execution or the fix for it.” A good way to think about valuation in seed/pre-seed is to reverse engineer the next round. Remember that speed is the secret weapon of startups.

Founder 187
article thumbnail

Lean Startups aren't Cheap Startups

Steve Blank

In times when venture capital is hard to get, investors extract high costs for failure (down-rounds, cram downs , new management teams, shut down the company.) Lean Startups aren’t Cheap Startups « Steve Blank (tags: startup product-management strategy) [.]

Lean 244
article thumbnail

How to Fund a Startup

www.paulgraham.com

And if trouble withinvestors is one of the biggest threats to a startup, managing themis one of the most important skills founders need to learn. Lets start by talking about the five sources of startup funding.Then well trace the life of a hypothetical (very fortunate) startupas it shifts gears through successive rounds.

article thumbnail

On the Road to Recap:

abovethecrowd.com

These mutual funds “mark-to-market” every day, and fund managers are compensated periodically on this performance. With the public markets down, these groups began writing down Unicorn valuations. Their own ego is also a factor – will a down round signal weakness? Competition also has access to capital.

IPO 40