Colin Barry

Sittercity (FD, Monday, Week 4)

founders-dilemmasyear-two

Founding teams who were previously friends are less stable (generally break up sooner). Whether that means they are less successful, or simply quicker to realize that a venture is headed for failure...

Maxims for co-founding with friends/family: have difficult conversations, sign pre-nupts.

Great tactic (echoes of first-year Strategy course): When a new VC-funded competitor entered, Genevieve Thiers and her team built a "shadow budget" using publicly available information, informal estimates, and her own firm's financials. Effectively discerned that competitor was not gaining traction and was hemorrhaging cash, responded accordingly.