SaaStr

JANUARY 13, 2023

They usually come in and handle compliance and oversight for an existing finance team that perhaps lacks the seasoned experience to handle models, venture capital and debt, prepare for an audit, etc. But Fractional CFOs are often different. Well, I just rarely see it amount to all that much. And worst case, it sets you back.

Sales Hiring 326

Sales Hiring Venture Capital Scale Finance 326

Tom Tunguz

OCTOBER 4, 2021

It establishes clarity: Redpoint is a leading venture capital firm. Content marketing, brand advertising, videos, events, sales pitches, all hands, candidate interviews. Great leaders coalesce their messaging around memorable, oft-repeated words. That’s one example of using this principle to align a team.

Venture Capital 279

Venture Capital Advertising Interviewing Branding 279

SaaStr

MARCH 27, 2022

Interview at least 20 potential customers. Venture capital is incredibly important, and for many of us, a huge enabler of success. It was especially rough working in venture capital. But give your “get it off the ground” phase an extra few months to find a truly great co-founder. 3. Go For It.

Sales Hiring 362

Sales Hiring Scale Venture Capital Startup 362

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 15, 2021

Like I was interviewing the CEO of $9.5 This conversation was candid as ever and Jason debunked the ease that startups and venture capital are often portrayed with. They knew what they we’re going to do. They’d been doing this for their whole careers, and they went to go commercialize it.

Entrepreneurship 260

Entrepreneurship Venture Capital Interviewing Cloud 260

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 20, 2019

Interview the executive candidates. The lead is expected to do the bulk of the interviewing of VPS and C-level execs. A little more on the first point here: How Bridge Rounds Work in Venture Capital: Messy, Full of Drama, and Not Without High Risk | SaaStr. But it’s a reasonable expectation.

Venture Capital 221

Venture Capital Interviewing 221

Baremetrics

APRIL 21, 2021

At Bigfoot Capital , we wanted to know how early-stage companies think about capital as a component of their business. To do so, we decided to ask 30 SaaS Founders their thoughts on raising money and venture capital. Experience with Raising Capital. Question: What has your experience been in raising capital?

Venture Capital 71

Venture Capital SaaS Finance Scale 71

The Angel VC

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014

In a Wall Street Journal interview that was published yesterday, Bill Gurley , General Partner at Benchmark and one of the smartest and most successful VCs of all time, said that the current environment reminds him of the tech bubble of the late 1990s: “Every incremental day that goes past I have this feeling a little bit more. and $41.8B

Venture Capital 167

Venture Capital Interviewing Startup Benchmarks 167

Tom Tunguz

JULY 20, 2014

In 2008, when I started working at Redpoint I knew very little about how the venture business worked, and before I started at the firm, I wanted to prepare by learning as much as I could about the industry. Unfortunately, not much was written about venture capital at the time. And other statements are pure anachronisms.

Interviewing 100

Interviewing Venture Capital Banking Benchmarks 100

SaaStr

OCTOBER 25, 2023

In this interview, David Sacks talks about how 70-80% of investor time is spent looking at AI. During the interview process, ask them who they’ll bring with them. Then go interview those two and see if they’ll come too (and if they exist at all). Many folks who are bootstrapped misunderstand how venture capital works.

Scale 284

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting AI 284

SaaStr

JULY 5, 2024

Jason has sat in on interviews with 50-100 VPs of Sales, and many of them don’t even know what the product was in their 4th or 5th interview. Today, you won’t fail if you’re not T2D2, and for venture capital, you can’t burn $700M while doing it. They hire a VP of Sales who doesn’t want to sell or learn the product.

CTO Hire 209

CTO Hire Sales Hiring New CTO Venture Capital 209

SaaStr

JULY 11, 2024

As a startup, most people who come to an interview appear happy. You interview 30 people. If it’s a role you’ve never hired, find someone great at it and have them do your final interview. How Do You Sift Out the Bitter and Broken Individuals When Hiring? How do you spot the ones who are burnt out?

Sales Hiring 286

Sales Hiring Scale Marketing Interviewing 286

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

When interviewing product managers at Google, we ranked candidates on four metrics: technical ability, communication skills, intellect and Googliness. For one startup ascertaining humility is so important, it is the first filter in the interview process. Disruptive companies reinvent.

Sales Hiring 124

Sales Hiring Startup Venture Capital Interviewing 124

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 12, 2019

We raised $0 of venture capital. ” Now, seven years later, SalesLoft has over 400 employees, has raised over $75 million of venture capital, and in the next two years, if not sooner, my prediction is that they will be a unicorn that you’ll be able to read about on Tech Crunch. We started the business in 2007.

Sales Recruiting 201

Sales Recruiting Scale Outsourcing Services Sales Hiring 201

SaaStr

JUNE 27, 2024

Job Stopped Participating in Every Interview Early On Many founders still interview everyone when their company is at 200 or 300 people. Job still does interviews for everyone, director and up, but not for the ICs and managers of ICs, for the most part. Job stopped when they were at 120 people, which is fairly controversial.

Scale 261

Scale Sales Hiring Scaling Sales Recruiting 261

Trint

NOVEMBER 23, 2020

In my 30 years of news reporting for ABC, CBS and CBC News I traveled to more than 40 countries, dodged bullets while reporting on wars, I interviewed prime ministers and presidents. I ran one of my interviews through it. I did it without an Ivy League MBA or a network of friends in venture capital. I was intrigued.

Branding 130

Branding Advertising Underperforming Technical Team VP of Engineering 130

SaaStr

AUGUST 26, 2020

Then there’s a question, “For proof, how important/good is a video of early-stage customer feedback interviews?” But that’s only the beginning for them, collecting data is the thing that they can do right now. Unfortunately, the reality is most of them are just waiting and sitting on their hands.

Scale 313

Scale Investment Venture Capital Technical Review 313

SaaStr

JULY 1, 2021

It became a part of our interview questions. What questions do you ask in the interview? You’re in the valley, you raise venture capital. It’s a team that’s only focused on a values type interview process. Every single candidate coming through Gusto does what we call a watermelon interview.

VP of Engineering 293

VP of Engineering Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Underperforming Technical Team 293

Divestopedia

APRIL 3, 2019

Whether buying, selling or growing, you are going to deal with capital. Rand Fishkin explains what venture capital did for him, how it falls short in certain situations and what other types of capitalization you can use to pursue your business dreams.

Venture Capital 42

Venture Capital Interviewing Business 42

Buffer Resources

APRIL 17, 2024

Showcase success stories Venture capital firm YCombinator ’s strategy of sharing their investees’ latest projects goes a long way to maintaining the trust that keeps startup founders applying for their programs. LinkedIn offers several features that allow users to live stream – whether through audio or video.

B2B 129

B2B Social Media Venture Capital Company Culture 129

Sales Hacker

OCTOBER 13, 2020

Now, without further ado, let’s listen to this interview with Ryan Walsh. So, when a sales professional interviews at accompany, all of that information flows one way from the candidate to the company. It’s not venture capital money. Who is Ryan Walsh and what is RepVue? [02:40]. I’ll say that.

Marketplace as a Service 111

Marketplace as a Service CTO Hire Sales Recruiting Scale 111

FastSpring

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

Less focus on venture capital or funding rounds. This mission of increasing the personalness of FastSpring’s relationship with businesses (and of course, the people who found or work for them) is also part of why we do things like interview our members. That includes: A global focus. Professional moderation.

SaaS Payments 148

SaaS Payments Payment Solutions Merchant Services Software Review 148

SaaStr

APRIL 7, 2022

I am a partner at Accel, the Global Venture Capital Fund, and I’m very happy to be here with one of these mythical creatures that people were talking about earlier. Any one employee, and you’re required to have at least three interviews, can say no and there’s no exceptions asked.

Sales Hiring 274

Sales Hiring Scale Sales Recruiting Outsourcing Services 274

FastSpring

MARCH 28, 2019

This book by Ben Horowitz, co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz, the renowned Silicon Valley venture capital firm, should you put you at ease. If you’ve ever struggled to understand what exactly a brand is and why they wield so much power over all of us, Debbie Millman’s book of thoughtful interviews will be a revelation.

Scale 113

Scale Venture Capital Branding Advertising 113

Sales Hacker

JANUARY 27, 2024

Take a look at these contrasting statements: GTMfund is an early-stage venture capital firm investing in pre-seed to series A software companies. Running qualitative interviews with your ICP is an effective way to gauge how clear your messaging is. Let us help you get from 0 – IPO.

Technical Review 119

Technical Review Venture Capital Social Media Generative AI 119

Buffer Resources

DECEMBER 12, 2023

7 creators on the systems that support their content creation I’ve interviewed several creators for our Creators Unlocked and Social Proof series, and a question I always ask is: what systems allow you to do what you do? Use your network to its fullest : Reach out to your connections for collaborations, interviews, or guest posts.

Systems Review 132

Systems Review Social Media Technical Review Scale 132

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

But it was super interesting that the two big interviews I did were with Ben Chestnut from Mailchimp yesterday and with Dharmesh and Brian from Hubspot. Aaron Levie of Box had this story in one of the interviews of how their first VP of Eng quit, and he thought they would never recover. And it was interesting that they broke rules.

Outsourcing Services 243

Outsourcing Services Banking CTO Hire New CTO 243

Neil Patel

JANUARY 11, 2021

Take surveys, make questionnaires, and do one-on-one interviews. Reach Out to Venture Capital Investors or Local Angel Investors. Venture capitalist investors look for proven teams that require a capital investment of $1 million or more, which is why you need some traction before approaching them.

Underperforming Technical Team 141

Underperforming Technical Team Business Sales Hiring Scale 141

SaaStr

JUNE 19, 2020

We’re an early stage venture capital firm focused primarily on B2B SaaS and B2B marketplaces. ” And then he suggests to do a couple of things, like check their interview process, ask for their internal newsletter, ask for their employee engagement survey, join one of their team meetings as an observer.

Development Team Review 185

Development Team Review Software Review Management Sales Hiring 185

Kellblog

AUGUST 9, 2021

” It usually comes up in an interview, with a candidate running through their background. OK, I suppose technically they could think, “the board brought me in,” but didn’t the CEO interview them and make the final call? Did the board really bring them in — as in, against the CEO’s wishes?

Interviewing 134

Interviewing Startup Communication Venture Capital 134

Intercom, Inc.

JANUARY 5, 2022

You can also read the full transcript of the interview, which has been lightly edited for clarity, below. Drata recently raised $100 million in venture capital funding, which I believe makes it San Diego’s latest startup unicorn with an evaluation of $1 billion. Security on auto-pilot. Are you tense?

Scale 212

Scale Software Review compliance Technical Review 212

Sales Hacker

FEBRUARY 24, 2020

Blake is a partner at one of the most well known SaaS venture capital firms in the world, OpenView Venture Partners, based in Boston. I’m interviewing Blake Bartlett , who is a partner at OpenView and a leader in the discussion around product-led growth. The Key Mistakes of Startups [22:38]. Sam’s Corner [40:37].

Startup 83

Startup Scale Venture Capital Forecasting 83

Intercom, Inc.

SEPTEMBER 8, 2021

When Maggie’s in an interview process, she likes to dive deep not only into the candidate’s proudest wins and the moments they went above and beyond, but also their mistakes and losses: “During my interview process, one of the biggest telling signs for when I pass on a candidate is probing into why a deal was lost.

Scale 118

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Underperforming Technical Team 118

Sales Hacker

SEPTEMBER 2, 2019

He’s also one of the most well known and well respected writers on venture capital and early stage investing. Now, without further ado, let’s listen to this interview with Semil Shah. That was a really interesting interview with Semil Shah. What You’ll Learn. About Semil Shah. Sam Jacobs: Hey, everybody.

Scale 66

Scale Sales Hiring Venture Capital Finance 66

SaaStr

JUNE 28, 2020

A venture capital investor, she is the founder of Cowboy Ventures. SaaStr CEO, Jason Lemkin shares his interview checklist. 346: Aileen Lee is a U.S. seed investor. Lee coined the often-used Silicon Valley term unicorn in a TechCrunch article “Welcome To The Unicorn Club: Learning from Billion-Dollar Startups.”

Part-Time VPE 194

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring Payment Methods SaaS Payments 194

Sales Hacker

AUGUST 4, 2020

Years later, he’s got a thriving business that is not venture capital backed. Years later, he’s got a thriving business but one that is not venture capital backed. Now, without further ado, let’s listen to this interview with Matt Rizzetta. Check them out at www.outreach.io. It’s Sam Jacobs.

Scale 120

Scale Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Outsourcing Services 120

Intercom, Inc.

MARCH 4, 2021

I was so hungry for capital and access that when I finally got it, I didn’t know what to do. My favorite example is when I got an invitation to be interviewed by one of the editorial reporters for Ink Magazine, I think he’s at Vox now, but he had invited me, he learned about my business somehow.

Outsourcing Services 151

Outsourcing Services Outsourced Development Business Scale 151

User Pilot

JUNE 13, 2022

We covered the best blogs on SaaS growth, product marketing , UX analytics, venture capital, and sales. The Brad Feld blog is one of the best venture capital blogs dedicated to entrepreneurs and investors. Venture capital. Christoph Janz, a partner at Point Nine Capital, is an investor in his own right.

Venture Capital 52

Venture Capital SaaS Data Scale 52