Hot Seat: The Startup CEO Guidebook

The “how much money do we need” number also is linked to your credibility as founders. If you are first-time founders without a strong track record, you should target raising $250K–$1M in a seed round. If you are the graduate of a top-notch accelerator or have an impressive reputation for success in your field, you can go much higher with your firs

Startups don’t outthink their competitors; they outexecute them. The best startups have founders who stay in sync, but work independently. And there’s a single magic ingredient that makes this work: trust.

Decisions within 10 business days.

No autoresponders. Every email comes from a person. You don’t need an autoresponse when a human responds right away.

So, as much as I advocate transparency in most areas, candidate rejections are an area to consider keeping your feedback terse.

We send the candidate a real job offer. It’s pegged to the 50th percentile (higher than half of salaries at companies our size for that position) and has a generous stock grant. Then we give a little speech. It goes like this: We think you’re a fantastic developer/marketer/glassblower, and we’re really excited to make you an offer. We do it a littl

Another approach is a simple uncapped note with no discount but with a most favored nation (MFN) clause. This is very generous toward you (and not very good for them), but the MFN clause specifies that as you negotiate deals that are better for the investors, they get to opt in to those as well. It basically commits them to investing at whatever te

Third, give positive reinforcement for great referrals. On the first day when the new person starts, announce to the whole company who referred her and make a big deal of it.

Note that while founders usually invest as a part of the company’s creation without further reward (and this is part of their contribution for their founder shares), family and friends should have some form of structured agreement. An uncapped convertible note with a 20%–30% discount is a good, fair instrument for this that won’t bother most invest