You're like a verbal Cliff Notes for year 1, and the reason you're clutch is that you hit on things most other entrepreneurial blogs don't. Keep on doing your thing, and if I didn't already have counsel, your entrepreneur-centric approach would've had me.

(Plenty concise, I might add. What does Brandon know? He's an ex-private equity guy. He demands short conversations because he's always got a tee time less than an hour away (sweet Mixergy interview, Brandon.))

I'd love to hear an entry on partnerships. Not LLPs, but between founders. I'm sure you've seen a failure or two and witness when and where the stress points typically are.

Keep on riffing, I'm sending people your way.

“Lesson #3: understand the deal terms and run models as to what happens under various scenarios. Fenwick & West puts out a quarterly survey of market deal terms in venture capital financings (see, e.g., http://www.fenwick.com/publications/6.12.1.asp?…). At a minimum, the entrepreneur should understand what is “market” and how each deal term plays out in a liquidation. For example, in Q1 ’09, participation only occurred in 51% of the Silicon Valley vc deals and 40% of those were capped.”

Thanks again.

Good post, but like a lawyer, it took too long to get to the point. Kidding! One thing I think you are missing here is “failure to understand the deal.” In speaking with many entrepreneurs, I find it interesting how few of them actually understand the terms of the deal. Yes, lawyers help with that, but they have a responsibility to themselves to understand the subtleties of the deals.

Here's an excert from an old post of mine: http://www.manyniches.com/entrepreneurs/the-vc-…

“I had a conversation with Andrew Warner, of Mixergy, about my last company. This is a guy who built a very, very successful business with a nice exit (he even bared his soul and showed the financials in a blog post – wow) and even he was completely clueless about the venture funding process (he never raised money – there’s a lesson in there kids), and what goes into a security that investors buy. This was astounding to me. What I take for granted is a black art to even the most successful of entrepreneurs. I suggested that he get the book Terms Sheets & Valuations, by Alex Wilmerding. This is a MUST HAVE for anyone who is thinking about raising capital.”