Harj Taggar

VC schedules, and thoughts on being a VC noob. -- VC schedules to know -- Most venture capital firms hold partner meetings on Mondays. This is typically when the investment committee votes on new investments and other key decisions. Savvy founders learn the exact timing and may need to provide additional data over the weekend to stay in motion. It is also well known that many venture capitalists observe a “European summer,” with August often being light or fully off. Similarly, the winter holidays reduce activity across much of December. That said, data from Carta shows a meaningful year-end push to close deals in December, followed by a flurry of activity in January. Founders should be cautious about kicking off fundraising during these slower periods. You do not want a raise to go stale and fall apart. VCs talk to each other, the industry is highly interconnected. -- I’m a mid career Noob! -- I am an “emerging manager,” effectively a new VC, less than three years in. In venture capital, the timeline is long. On my Linkedin you'll see I have two roles at Blitzscaling: Limited Partner means I put money into a fund, but have no decision making ability, and General Partner means I'm actively finding startups, bringing them to the partnership, and funding. As a General Partner, you are often considered an emerging manager for close to a decade, as it takes years for a fund to fully mature and establish a VC track record. Investing is a long game, but the upside can be extraordinary. Fortunately, I entered this role with a positive angel track record from my own bank account, which is often a good idea to have as a VC. When I learn a new VC concept or term, I’m an AI first, I’ll link to my post a few days ago in the comments, I totally live for constant growth and learning, if you’re not growing you’re dying. Fun fact: Many/most start their VC career in their 40s, as they need to have enough tech and biz cycles, a broad enough network, resources, and a platform to stand upon. As we end the year, I'm sharing more career thoughts, and productivity thoughts, rather than industry trends and market maps and frameworks and forecasts. I wrote all of this by hand myself, but used AI to edit some of it.

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I’ve spoken to over 2 dozen MDs at PE firms I can confidently say that the arb of figuring out how to implement Vertical AI at portfolio companies is very real right now It will fundamentally change underwriting for those who can do it predictably and unlock generational returns. Most are aware they need to act. Very few have.

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**Challenging the Obsession with ARR: A New Perspective for Founders** In the ever-evolving landscape of venture capital, it’s crucial for founders to focus beyond just Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) metrics. Jennifer Li from A16z highlights the potential pitfalls of overvaluing these numbers, particularly in a climate driven by hype on platforms like X. At ElevenX Capital, we encourage entrepreneurs to build robust business models that prioritize long-term growth and sustainability over flashy short-term metrics. How can we better support founders in aligning their goals with realistic performance indicators? #investing #innovation #venturecapital #entrepreneurship

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🚀 Stop chasing investors blindly. Here's the 5-step system that gets startups funded: Define financial needs (12-18 months) Research aligned investors Build a killer pitch deck Systematize outreach Prep due diligence docs Most founders skip steps 1 & 5. Don't be like most founders.

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AI in Startup GTM Strategy Report Part 1 of our 3-part report series: Benchmark your startup's AI strategy against 500 peers. See how the funding stage impacts AI investment, team structure, and GTM performance. Data-driven insights for scaling smarter. I. Executive summary: The revolution in scaling smarter with AI When Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, he forever changed not just global literacy, but how humanity distributes and shares information. Fast-forward a few centuries, and the rise of AI has ushered in a change just as transformational: The ability to scale businesses efficiently. It’s no secret that scale is hard. Whether it’s headcount, budget, or expertise, constraints are inevitable and can stop a business in its tracks. AI will change has changed that. Marketing is now personalization, at scale. AI tailors every message to every buyer, based on their behavior, intent, and timing. Sales is now reached, at scale. AI listens, writes, prioritizes, and books meetings—so reps can spend more time selling. Support is now proactivity, at scale. AI predicts issues, deflects tickets, and solves problems before they escalate. https://lnkd.in/dvkx_XgU Credit : http://www.hubspot.com Repost by : Salem Bagami

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Obsession with GTM is killing your early stage startup. Why? Early-stage founders don't have a GTM problem. They have an identity problem. At day zero, GTM is too broad to be useful. While it sounds sophisticated, it usually hides weak conviction. Pre-seed founders love building plans around content, SEO, partnerships, outbound, events, and brand. That list feels like strategy. Most of the time, it is just avoidance. You don't need a full go-to-market machine this early. You need one sharp motion that gets you to real users fast and teaches you something in weeks, not quarters. You don't need a wide channel plan. You need one compressed path between your exact customer, your unfair founder edge, and the market momentum that already exists. My contrarian view is simple: the founder is the first channel. Don't think of your background as a biography. It is distribution infrastructure! Your past roles, your network, your reputation, your domain fluency; these are your earliest acquisition assets. I've met the founders of Manus AI, Wispr Flow, Genspark, and more. None of them won their first customers with a GTM deck. They all found a wedge and merged into momentum that already existed. Maybe that momentum lives inside a niche community. Maybe it sits on top of a platform. Maybe it shows up in a workflow people already use every day. Maybe it comes from founder trust with a very specific buyer. Either way, a wedge into existing momentum beats a channel built from scratch. And for pre-seed founders, this is doubly-true. This is why founder DNA shapes early GTM more than any strategy deck. A founder who already knows 25 perfect buyers should not pretend they need a broad marketing roadmap. A technical founder who can spot pain signals in competitor communities should not waste six months polishing a content engine. A product-led founder who can engineer a referral loop should not start with brand theater. Speed is your competitive weapon, not a nice-to-have. The startup that learns fastest usually wins before the one with the prettiest GTM deck even gets moving. So before you build anything else, answer my three questions: a) Who is the narrowest ICP with acute pain right now? b) What acquisition motion can you execute faster than anyone else because of your background, credibility, or skill set? c) Can that motion produce repeated customer learning within 30 days? If the answers are vague, the problem is not your messaging or your funnel math. You still aren't focussed enough with your acquisition model. You will eventually need a broad GTM strategy. But right now, you just need early proof. Pause the roadmap. Build the wedge. Learn what works. Then, and only then, scale it. Broad GTM is for scale. Focus is for survival. And survival is the only prerequisite for scale. #ai #startups #gtm

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New ARR formula just dropped for Ai startups… ARR = (BestMonth \times 12 \times MomentumFactor) + (Pipeline{DesignPartners} \times ConvRate \times NRR\_Boost + VC\_Tweets \times RetweetMultiplier) + ((YT\_Views + TikTok\_Views) \times CPM \times FOMO\_Index) + (BestMonth \times 12 \times MomentumFactor \times MoonPhase \times AstrologyAlignment) + (PublicCompRevenue \times SectorMultiple \times TimeOfDayPremium)\]

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