The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 18 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Yanisse: Checkr has fired over 20 failed executive hires
“I think I hired over 20 plus, I kind of stopped counting leaders over time and that didn't work out for one reason or another after some time.”
Yanisse: 25% to 50% of executive hires fail at any company
“I think between one and two and one in four executives don't really work out in any company.”
Yanisse: Give underperforming executives 3 to 6 months to course-correct
“You do need to give them some time and, you know, also founders, I would say suck at giving feedback. There's many reasons why For some days it's hard to give, you know, constructive feedback to senior leaders, but you do need to give them feedback to talk abo…”
Yanisse: Behavior change is nearly impossible without a coach or therapist
“I think no one can improve on their own. It's almost impossible. Even if you're very self-aware, you need a friend to improve, whether it's like a therapist in life or a coach at, or in a professional setting, I do think you need others to help you. Otherwise …”
Yanisse: Saying you lack time for a CEO coach is nonsense
“Many people tell me that they don't have the time to spend time with a CEO, with a coach. I think that's BS because having a coach helps you better prioritize your time be more effective as a leader.”
Yanisse: Most board meetings fail to add value and create excess burden
“Many board meetings, it's not adding value. It's actually, you know, Creating more burden and work for the leadership team and the CEO.”
Yanisse: Checkr renegotiated Series C terms after missing revenue targets
“I think it was our Series C hardest. I mean, overall we've been lucky. I've had really fast, easy fundraisers because the business has been performing well and we have a good team. But the Series C was one of the hardest because we got the term sheet for the S…”
Yanisse: Expanding Checkr into enterprise too early was his worst decision
“The worst decision for sure was to go too early into the enterprise. So after we had really good traction in the gig economy with tech companies, we decided, I read crossing the chasm. And so I decided, okay, let's expand to enterprise customers. And that was …”
Yanisse: Early NFT applications are a waste of top engineering talent
“All of the smart engineers are working on like, you know, million dollar NFTs to sell, which I, and I love web three and NFTs, and I think it's the coolest technology in opportunity in the world. It's just the early applications are a little bit underwhelming.”
Yanisse: Founders must keep control of executive hiring, vision, fundraising, and customer relations
“So I completely agree that the highest leverage activities you can do as a founder is hiring the best bench and C-suite and VPs you can. Setting the vision. That's only something you can do, you know, finding the values and the purpose of the company or missio…”
Yanisse: Startups should hire executives for their two-year scale target
“I think you have to hire them for what you need in the next two years. So if you look at the scale that they've operated at and you project yourself one or two years in the future, that that's, you know, let's say if you have a hundred people in the revenue te…”
Yanisse: Hiring an executive coach is the best investment a CEO can make
“So I absolutely recommend it to any CEO. I mean, unless you are a CEO and you feel like you're doing amazing and there's nothing you can improve on which I would be skeptical for any founder or CEO. I think it's the best investment you can make.”
Yanisse: Accel's Rich Wong is exceptional at coaching first-time founders
“Rich Wong from Excel is amazing. So he is really founder friendly really good at coaching, you know, first time founders and helping without imposing any vision or strategy, just helping the founders grow and learn.”
Yanisse: Checkr suffered 2019 headwinds when gig economy clients went public
“2019, you know, was starting to get some business headwinds because we grew very fast in the gig economy and with tech customers and those companies like, you know, Uber, DoorDash and others went public at those days and then started to suffer themselves. So t…”
Yanisse: Late-stage investors judge startups like public companies
“As you start to get very late stage and raising money from, you know, New York investors and mutual funds, they're going to be a bit closer to judging you like public investments. And so the accuracy and the forecast and those things are becoming more importan…”
Yanisse: 'Accelerate' provides the best framework to measure engineering performance
“It's called Accelerate. It's a book about engineering and DevOps, but it's very readable by any non-technical people. And that's the first book that gave me the answer on how to measure engineering in a tech company, because that's actually one of the hardest …”