First Round Capital

Most people describe finding PMF as an art, not a science. We're here to change that. Introducing PMF Method. After 20 years and 500+ investments in pre-product-market fit companies, we've drawn on our data and worked with some of the world's most iconic enterprise founders, distilling what they did in their first 6 months into a free 14-week intensive experience that helps sales-led B2B founders build epic companies. In tactical sessions, we help early founders discover what customers really want, build the right v1 product, and close your first sales — all while keeping 100% of your equity. You'll work alongside a tight group of other builders at your same stage, and get to learn from the hard-earned insights from founders of $1B+ B2B companies, like Vanta's Christina Cacioppo, Looker's lloyd tabb, Plaid's Zachary Perret, Ironclad's Jason Boehmig, Lattice's Jack Altman, and Verkada's Filip Kaliszan. The Summer 2024 session of PMF Method runs from 5/29 to 8/28. Any early founder working on a new B2B SaaS company is welcome to apply — just get your application in by 5/7 (or tag a founder friend below!) More details, FAQs, and application link in the comments below 👇

Your life is defined by the thousands of decisions you make, yet most people just fly by the seat of their pants. There’s a better way… Decision-making is a skill. You can learn it, and improve at it over time. Your gut is a powerful engine, but it can be trained and honed. Some of the best decision-makers out there are investors. They have to process tens of thousands of data points across hundreds of companies and then pick just 3-5 that they can invest in per year. VCs in particular have to do this with extremely limited information - they are often investing in a company with no financial projections, no track record, and few customers. Even if you will never become a VC, you can learn a lot from them. Some things I’ve learned from VCs: - Patience. The best decisions take time to develop and sometimes you look like you’re wrong before you end up being right. - Have a rubric. Even if your decision will ultimately be gut-driven, you gotta write down what your goals are and what you expect. That forces you to truly think through the edge cases of your decision. - Prioritize the best case scenario over the worst case scenario. Most decisions we make are reversible. As long as they are, focusing on upside is far more important than downside. Human nature is to be risk averse, but the true winners in life are those who take smart, calculated risks. One of the best VCs out there is First Round Capital and they have been working extensively with Annie Duke, a decision-making expert and former professional poker player, to improve the firm’s decision-making process. Next week, Brett Berson, Partner at First Round, will be joining Annie to share their process in a Lightning Lesson on Maven: How to Make Decisions Like a VC. Join on November 4th or sign up to get the recording: https://bit.ly/3AfYB3E

We’re hiring! We’re looking for a savvy Demand Gen Director to join our Founder Success team in either NYC or SF. In this role, you’ll build and lead pipeline generation programs that provide our founders with more "at-bats" — the crucial early customer interactions that drive pipeline and help them achieve their first few million in ARR. From launching LinkedIn campaigns and hosting marquee events to crafting playbooks that support our founders, this person will be instrumental in accelerating our companies’ early path to product-market fit. You should apply if: -You have deep experience working with founders at early-stage companies (<$10M ARR) -You’re prescriptive and data-driven with a knack for tailoring strategies to specific company needs. -You’re scrappy and fast, thriving in dynamic environments and ready to tackle challenges head-on. Learn more here: https://lnkd.in/eApEZX3G

In the middle of a sprint? Resist the temptation to daydream about new ideas. Clay’s Kareem Amin has learned to rein in blue-sky thinking when the team is in execution mode. “Once we agree to something and it’s on our sprint planning, nothing will shift it. If you’re walking to work and you happen to have an idea, throw it away,” he says. “There’s only one moment to think of things, and that’s during our planning.” Listen here for more of Kareem’s insights from building Clay: https://lnkd.in/dk-vBcEs

Stop delegating your startup’s tough calls. Jack Altman learned it’s tempting to offload important decisions to your investors, co-founders, or execs in moments of uncertainty. But he warns: “You can’t do that.” “If you’re 55/45 on a decision, don’t pulse the wisdom from those around you. The times I ignored my gut were when I experienced the most regret.” Founders must own those tough calls, whether it’s hiring against the board’s advice or reversing course on a product bet. Otherwise, you’ll risk regret later. More insights from Jack’s 7-year journey building & scaling Lattice here: https://lnkd.in/esQEZDBZ

PSA for PLG startups: Your bottleneck isn’t your headcount. It’s your product-market fit. Oliver J. unpacks why traditional enterprise forecasting can mislead PLG startups and shares the playbook he ran as Asana’s CRO. More tips on avoiding the "PLG trap" in the full episode: https://lnkd.in/eeR7WHuW

We've long been fans of Dr. Emily Anhalt's knack for taking jargony psych concepts and putting them in plain language that busy folks can take action on (and she's a must-follow on X @dremilyanhalt). Excited to dive into her book this spring, but in the meantime, revisit the Review article with her framework for hitting the emotional gym, where she shares tailored exercises for shaping up your emotional health: https://lnkd.in/gjPRSRnr

Thanks to Jessi Craige Shikman and the First Round team for putting together such a helpful piece & for including me with this wonderful group of women in tech! Jiaona Zhang (JZ), Cristina Cordova & Stevie Case - love your insights here. Lots of great advice for the next planning season!

Are you asking for other opinions too often? Matt MacInnis, COO of Rippling, says yes. “As an executive, as a CEO, as a founder, you are constantly bombarded with these decisions where Option A and Option B both suck and there's no more data available to you to differentiate the outcome between A and B. In a way, that sort of gave me the confidence to act with velocity over perfection — because perfection was unavailable to me.” These are the 2 big hazards in defaulting to getting input from other people, he says: 1️⃣ You let others do the hard thinking for you 2️⃣ You stall, hoping for comfort that will never come “You can't give someone the grass, have them chew it, and give you the milk. You’ve got to do the work yourself.” More of his insights on the In Depth podcast. 🎧 Link: https://lnkd.in/eVB4dMim

One of the most common mistakes early-stage startups make during annual planning? Not tying new bets back to revenue. You still have to actually write out the math of your business. I love this advice from Vanta CRO Stevie Case on making revenue forecasting a habit early on: “Even if it’s your first year, your first product, your first sale, you still have to develop a basic understanding of how the math of that sale is going to work — and how that might translate into the next set of scaling activities you take on. It could be just half a page, but write it out. Get the math to work and justify what it looks like when it grows 10%. That’s the foundation of planning. If you skip that, it's all kind of pointless. It doesn’t have to be the big process that we do at a Series C company like Vanta. It does, however, have to make sense. All businesses are subject to the laws of math and physics.“ We’re sharing tons more tactical advice for the annual planning process today on The Review, with wisdom from seasoned annual planners like Stevie — including Linktree CPO Jiaona Zhang (JZ), Linear COO Cristina Cordova, and Notion CFO Rama Katkar. Give it a read at the link in the comments.