Two Natural Reactions That Great Managers Suppress
Most employees tolerate their managers more than love them. According to a year-old survey in Forbes: Only about 50% of employees say the boss values their opinion. Only 35% of employees feel inspired by their boss. Some 25% say they can do a better job than their boss does. Almost 20% say that their boss […]
Kellblog Predictions for 2019
Because I’ve been quite busy of late with the sale of my company, I’m doing a somewhat quicker and lighter (if not later) version of my annual predictions post. Here goes, starting with a review of last year’s predictions. 2018 Kellblog Predictions Review 1. We will again continue to see a level of divisiveness and social discord […]
Should Your Startup Have a Quota Club? (And How Much to Spend on It.)
December is when most SaaS startups are closing out the year, trying to finalize next year’s operating plan (hint: I know a software company that can help with that), starting to get a clear view on which salespeople are going to make their number, and thus beginning the process of figuring out who to invite […]
Highlights from the Fenwick & West 3Q18 Venture Capital Survey
It’s been a few years since I wrote about this survey, which I post about less to communicate recent highlights and more to generate awareness of its existence. The Fenwick & West Venture Capital Survey is must-read material for any entrepreneur or startup CEO because it not only makes you aware of trends in financing, […]
Lost and Founder: A Painful Yet Valuable Read
Some books are almost too honest. Some books give you too much information (TMI). Some books can be hard to read at times. Lost and Founder is all three. But it’s one of the best looks I’ve seen when it comes to giving the reader a realistic look at the inside of Silicon Valley startups. […]
Using “Win Themes” to Improve Your Sales Management and Increase Win Rates
At most sales review meetings what do you hear sales management asking the reps? Questions like these: What stage is this opportunity in? What value do you have it at in the pipeline? Is there upside to that value? What forecast category is it in? In what quarter will it close? What competitors are in […]
Video of my SaaStr 2018 Presentation: Ten Non-Obvious Things About Scaling SaaS
While I’ve blogged about this presentation before, I only recently stumbled into this full-length video of this very popular session — a 30-minute blaze through some subtle SaaS basics. Enjoy! I look forward to seeing everyone again at SaaStr Annual 2019. (Cross-posted @ Kellblog)
Important Subtleties in Calculating Quarterly, Annual, and ATR-based Churn Rates
This post won’t save your life, or your company. But it might save you a few precious hours at 2:00 AM if you’re working on your company’s SaaS metrics and can’t foot your quarterly and annual churn rates while preparing a board or investor deck. The generic issue is a lot of SaaS metrics gurus […]
The Domo S-1: Does the Emperor Have Clothes?
I preferred Silicon Valley [1] back in the day when companies raised modest amounts of capital (e.g., $30M) prior to an IPO that took 4-6 years from inception, where burn rates of $10M/year looked high, and where $100M raise was the IPO, not one or more rounds prior to it. When cap tables had 1x, […]
Bookings vs. Billings in a SaaS Company
Financial analysts speak a lot about “billings” in a public SaaS companies, but in private VC-backed SaaS companies, you rarely hear discussion of this metric. In this post, we’ll use a model of a private SaaS company (where we know all the internal metrics), to show how financial analysts use rules of thumb to estimate […]
