#Bergerpaint

Given closing basis Breakout

Upside 4 digits possible

👇Thread.

Published a new essay: The red flags and magic numbers that investors look for in your startup’s metrics – 80 slide deck included!

This was a deck that I created on my (longish) interview process with @a16z. It was a long path, starting with meeting folks at the firm 10 years ago. But the purpose of the deck was to explain how I would use my superpower in an investing context

Here's what I explain in the deck. As investors (whether angel or VC) we're often confronted with an up-and-to-the-right graph. Is it going to go up? Or down?

One solution to forecast these growth curves is the Growth Accounting Framework, where you add up New+Reactivated and subtract churned users. In each time period that gives you the difference in monthly actives.

The problem with this is that it's a lagging metric, not a leading one. We need to go one level deeper and look at the underlying loops that drive these numbers, to understand the quality.

1/ I am seeing more and more founder secondary in venture rounds (Secondary = founders selling some of their shares before some other shareholders are able). Series B-D. I see both as an investor and through entrepreneur circles.

2/ I like secondary for entrepreneurs. Moderation is key but in a lot of situations I think it helps accelerate the co. Lots of very smart investors disagree. Here are my thoughts.

3/ Magnitude: My basic rule of thumb from what I see is market is 4+ yrs and up to 10% of founder’s equity stake with some $ cap that makes sense given stage etc. (typically <$10m)

4/ The entrepreneurial journey is brutally hard. Giving some financial relief helps remove one piece of pressure. I don’t think that secondary in the magnitude mentioned impacts the drive/persistence of great entrepreneurs.

5/ That secondary means they will be able to just sleep knowing they can pay their kids’ tuition. Secondary will make most founders better at their jobs, thus accelerating the co.

Choosing the Right JavaScript Framework

Thanks for joining me @pluralsight to talk about javascript frameworks. We had 150+ awesome questions, so I'll try to answer the ones I couldn't get to online right here in a tweet stream

Watch the video -->
https://t.co/G7zeiKhXme

Q. Do arrow functions really make dealing with JavaScript's "this" keywords easier?

A. Yes! When using arrow functions, the scope of "this" is effectively passed in from the outer scope. See here in this REPL

1/n

Q. Where does Polymer fit in? Is it considered a framework like the others?

A. @Polymer is an excellent way to create web components, which are ideal for creating sets of interactivity that can be shared in web apps.

2/n

Q. Have we gone framework crazy?

A. At one time, quite possibly. A few years back we literally had framework overload. I feel it really has solidified into a few very strong choices.

3/n

Q. [Is] there no more need for @polymer?

A. See my previous question on this ... but in general, I think there is a lot of room for Web Components with frameworks.

4/n