Upgrade to Pro
— share decks privately, control downloads, hide ads and more …
Speaker Deck
Features
Speaker Deck
PRO
Sign in
Sign up for free
Search
Search
VC Secret Decoder Ring
Search
Calibrate
September 21, 2018
Business
0
74
VC Secret Decoder Ring
Marcy Swenson
Calibrate
September 21, 2018
Tweet
Share
More Decks by Calibrate
See All by Calibrate
(2019 - 1 of 10) Opening Keynote: The Product Triangle
calibrate
0
200
(2019 - 2 of 10) Making the Unknown Manageable
calibrate
0
87
(2019 - 3 of 10) Why Great 1-on-1s Are Like Perfect Formula 1 Pit Stops
calibrate
0
130
(2019 - 4 of 10) How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Grow High-Performance Teams
calibrate
0
120
(2019 - 5 of 10) Reshaping the Leadership Model - How Introverts Are Redefining What it Means to Lead
calibrate
0
190
(2019 - 6 of 10) The Platinum Rule: Manage Others as They Need/Want to be Managed
calibrate
0
170
(2019 - 7 of 10) Building Impact Through Essentialism
calibrate
0
260
(2019 - 8 of 10) Lessons From the Trenches
calibrate
0
97
(2019 - 9 of 10) How to Keep Up Your Technical Skills Without Annoying Your Teams
calibrate
1
98
Other Decks in Business
See All in Business
AI推進における「勝手に広がる仕組み」の」作り方
notty
2
190
jinjer recruiting pitch
jinjer_official
0
180k
「きっかけ作り」から始めるKiro定着の軌跡
iamme
0
150
特定領域から複数領域へ、そのとき何を求められるのか?縦と横、2つの影響力:統合型を目指す大規模な開発組織での実践
keitatomozawa
3
470
VISASQ: ABOUT US
eikohashiba
15
560k
第47期 中間期決算説明会資料
tsuchihashi
0
260
メドピアグループ紹介資料
medpeer_recruit
10
150k
toypo Company Deck
kanseikogami
0
750
Claude Coworkで 非エンジニアも業務効率化しよう
suzakiyoshito
0
1.8k
㈱サンエー 会社 採用資料
uemura2024
0
1.7k
ARグラスが当たり前になったら、デザインってどう変わる?Spectrum Tokyo Festival 2026 #spectrumfest26
arisan
0
150
ONE CAREER People & Culture Report 2026
onecareer
0
1.4k
Featured
See All Featured
Why Our Code Smells
bkeepers
PRO
340
58k
Reflections from 52 weeks, 52 projects
jeffersonlam
356
21k
技術選定の審美眼(2025年版) / Understanding the Spiral of Technologies 2025 edition
twada
PRO
118
110k
No one is an island. Learnings from fostering a developers community.
thoeni
21
3.6k
Odyssey Design
rkendrick25
PRO
2
540
How To Stay Up To Date on Web Technology
chriscoyier
790
250k
Speed Design
sergeychernyshev
33
1.6k
Taking LLMs out of the black box: A practical guide to human-in-the-loop distillation
inesmontani
PRO
3
2.1k
The Power of CSS Pseudo Elements
geoffreycrofte
82
6.2k
Deep Space Network (abreviated)
tonyrice
0
90
Agile Leadership in an Agile Organization
kimpetersen
PRO
0
110
BBQ
matthewcrist
89
10k
Transcript
VC DECODER RING VC Secret Decoder Ring
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
1. VC secret levers drive many decisions 2. what is
required for next fundraise? 3. how will your company exit? 4. insider info is powerful & dangerous VC DECODER RING
1. VC secret levers drive many decisions GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS VCs Promise *their* investors 12% yearly invested
over 10+ years VC DECODER RING 1.12^10 = 3.10 12% annual return fund length 3x return
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS $100M 10 year fund must return $300M
(3x) for the VC to raise another fund from LPs VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Startup Outcomes dead or zombie: 50% acquisition:
45% IPO: 5% VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS given that 50% fail the other 50%
have to return $300M+ VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS VC DECODER RING >3x 5% 2-3x 10%
1-2x 35% < 1x 50% VC Fund Returns
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS VC job: raise money invest in companies
push CEOs to grow/exit pay investors back at least 3x {repeat} VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS CEO job: vision & strategy great team
enough cash VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Investment Stages: angel / F&F Seed A
B C, D, … IPO or Acquisition VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS CEO under crazy pressure to grow VC
DECODER RING
2. What is required for next fundraise? GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Why is my CEO asking for more
& faster revenue & more users? VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Why is my CEO asking me to
ignore tech debt & hack together features? VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Why is my CEO asking me to
cut costs *while* building more features? VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Why is my CEO asking me to
“make it social”? VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Why am I spending cycles on an
integration with this lame partner? VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS How do I explain all this to
MY team? VC DECODER RING
3. How will your company exit? GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS possible exits… dead or zombie: 50% acquisition:
45% IPO: 5% VC DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Does partner XYZ have “strategic value”? VC
DECODER RING
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS Diligence looks like: • meetings w/key staff
• senior people OOO • requests for tech docs • hiring freeze • no decisions VC DECODER RING
4. Insider info is powerful & dangerous GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS
GROWING YOUR HAPPINESS