 Hello, hello, everyone. So I'm Rachel de la Cour and I'm trying to give you that first year, you know, a view about what I've been through and what was important to do, what to get good at and what to absolutely ignore. Some off. So, allo, allo, it doesn't work. Ok, cool. Ok, so, I'm, you know, I started the first company called Bi-Manalytics and it was all about Cloud Business Intelligence and we've started this company in 2009 and by 2015, so we've been acquired by Zendesk that you all, I guess, all know and by this time, you know, I was pregnant of my second child in this picture it's a time where I so I've worked at Zendesk it was great but it's also a time where I saw that post-acquisition I put my family in a safe place, ok, just because of money and actually I've read my first IPCC report in a plane while flying, it's not kidding and I just understood that I put absolutely no one of my family in a safe place so I had to try to do something to do my part and I started to tap into the portfolio of former customers I had at Bi-Manalytics but also at Zendesk interviewing those CEOs ok, and they just told me Rachel, yeah, we just what, I was asking them what are you doing guys to save the planet, to make sure that your carbon emissions are on track etc because the world is being completely derailed and they told me, you know what, we just don't know where to start and the more they were talking to me, you know, the more we understood that actually carbon was a data and a network problem, they just don't know where to start and they were actually asking us to do Bi, business intelligence you know, for carbon so we started that company in 2020, SWIP now we are 80 people and at SWIP actually it's a software platform and we are helping businesses to track and act on their carbon so they can become forever companies, they can really transition to this low carbon world but I'm not here to talk to you about SWIP but still you know, in this journey so it's pretty small figures but in this journey through BIME, through Zendesk, through SWIP in figures, this is what I have been through so I have been through you know, I started my first company during the pure subprime crisis not easy but actually it's kind of pretty cool to start during a crisis you know, you are focusing on the essential at Zendesk, you know, I was in this the first year I was at Zendesk I was, you know, witnessing you know, from the inside post-IPO company hyper gross company, you know Silicon Valley based style etc at SWIP, I started you know, in this recession coming you know, time as well in terms of fundraising I've been through 6 fundraising 3 at BIME, 3 at SWIP for a total raise of 5 plus 100 millions by myself and my co-founders and at Zendesk, I've been through it's not fundraising but I've witnessed also from the inside what it is to prepare an earning call when you are post-IPO you know and I can tell you that it's the energy of 10 fundraising when you are preparing this so much stress and in terms of, so I made one exit for 45 millions by Zendesk do an IPO at SWIP this is what I wish for my team and for Klimtech in general to broadcast that message and from an employee standpoint I've been from an environment of 45 people at BIME then at Zendesk with thousands of employees and at SWIP, you know, in a year you know, 80 people so yeah, so we've been navigating, you know those environments with my co-founders from a go-to-market standpoint I've been through an environment of B2B, SAS a very transactional business model at Zendesk transactional but moving up market when I join them and at SWIP right away, so still B2B SAS, but right away in an enterprise size, you know enterprise business model if I'm targeting those enterprise and from an office you know, location standpoint at BIME, we were very traditional world we have to all work in the same room so we had one office in France one in the US but I also discovered even before COVID while joining Zendesk that an hybrid environment could work and at SWIP, because we've started during the lockdown we had to set up our team for being purely remote, you know, and today we are on three continents but we are also getting back to an hybrid model with offices in London, Paris and Montpellier so this is what I have been through as an entrepreneur so far and if I have to tell you tell you my my experience, you know about what to focus on, what to do at least in year one so definitely speak about your business, your idea absolutely to everyone I'm showing this driver but even the driver of your Uber or else you absolutely have to, your former co-workers you have to spread the word about what you are doing everyone is telling you this already there is no, you know it's all about execution, execution etc it's definitely true so tell about that to get as much feedback as possible and during this first year I definitely, so they are my co-founders and I definitely recommend you to share the load and be sure that you are starting your business being several co-founders it definitely helped first to triangulate with people who are willing to disagree but it's also good for the complementary team you know from a gender standpoint of course this is great and most importantly when the female is the CEO and yes it's enriching your experience in this picture we are two above 40 years old and two who are in their 30s and I can tell you that from a dynamic standpoint it's really interesting when you are speaking with customers when we are hiring employees it's really great so and you are sharing the loads and the concerns and the stress etc during this first year also try to start at 100% of your time I am seeing too many founders who are still working I know it's difficult I know it's difficult to give up on a salary when you are starting but the sooner you see results for yourself for your own motivation the better it is because don't waste too much time I am the most of this momentum of motivation and if it means that you have to be back to your parent's house because you can't pay rent accept to do this I have done this and you know what I have done that and I returned to my parents in law and when you are almost 30 years old I can tell you that it hurts but at least we start full time also when you are setting up the foundation there is one with when you are setting up that first year when you are setting up the foundations it's absolutely critical that you think about your future of course and in our case you know it was all about saying what company would we want to be which kind of companies do we want to manage through time and for us it was super important to chase that big corp logo I think the company on the right track because we know that we will win you know that we will be a fantastic SAP or Salesforce of everything related to extra financial through time but we could also become a jerk through time so at least we try to prevent the fact that even if we are making too much money we are on the right guidelines and it's super important also to choose the right equity story so your equity story counts it counts to get access to the right customers it counts to because it has to be you have to enjoy meeting with your financial partners they have to help you on all the different faces of your business so I don't know if Pierre is here but we have the best 2015 New Wave, La Familia, Balderton Nifadel et during this first year and I wanted to mention that it's super cool trying to find a name don't over engineer it because the first company we were super frustrated with my co-founder to not be a rock band and we said at least please ourselves with a name that we find super cool we are cloud but actually it was so bad from an SEO standpoint so the company must be the same name of the product that you are selling or it's super messy and don't over engineer it but you absolutely have to spend money at first when you are finding a name you must spend money on IP checks it's super important because I can tell you that for my two companies fortunately I was really well I had a good counsel for that but when you are starting to raise funds when you start to communicate about your brand there is always people coming at your door trying to get what they can from the name at some point they have registers or else be super careful because if it's not done the right way early on you can really mess with all the marketing you've done all the positioning it's really important so don't save money on that and from just for yourself you know that first year you have to track what matters to you to show progress to you first and don't confuse because I know that there is this hype about being an entrepreneur but don't confuse the company goals with your desires so it's super important to be aware and conscious of that and that first year as well so it's plenty of recommendation but that first year as well what you have to do is so back to the lawyer IP you know to check your IP but from a general standpoint you absolutely must to choose your lawyer carefully a good lawyer is expensive but it's really important I thought to be honest that all lawyers were the same but like good restaurants you know there is a bad restaurant the first one super cheap super junior of the first company I was just thinking that I was thinking some boxes we'll do the corporate but it definitely almost crash the company it was an nightmare so be sure to spend the right money also here and start also to understand that everything is forgiven when you have a revenue traction ok so don't wait don't wait to execute as much as you can and when you start to have also during that first year those first customers ok because there will be plenty of people also your vices ok telling you that you should do that from a product standpoint or the competition is doing this etc you must accept at least this is my recommendation it worked for us you must accept the feedback the product feedback from people who are already paying ok there will be an army of prospects who will tell you if you are doing this I will pay you or if you will add that kind of features yeah certainly no ok so accept feedbacks only from people who start to pay ok who started to pay and I put this picture as well about that first year when it comes to recruit people or if during that first year you have to you have to establish because of the geography of your customers in another area compared to where you are living for example as a founder be super creative you can be super creative and in our case we try to be the big fish in town we didn't have lots of money but when we started very quickly when we started this US office we went super local and instead of picking New York City or San Francisco where we would have cash burn so much money we chose Kansas City so on the misery on the cool part ok but during that first year we absolutely bet on US guys to sell to US customers because that go to market team that sales team they were doing that uddle every morning do you really think that as a French female founder I would have thought about doing an uddle you know everyday coming at the office absolutely no so during this first year you know it's important to be the big fish in town go in an area where you can hire as much people as possible so be creative on all this and don't forget so I know that lots of founders are so disappointed with PR but don't forget that big gates were saying that if you had only one penny to invest you would invest in PR press relations are important it has been important for us go to chase good PRs where it matters for example even if we were a French European company we were not in the US in the first days but we had a US PR agency it was the only marketing budget in San Francisco and because they were writing about us finally European reporters wanted to interview us and you know what it's still working this way so look at where your core activity is and try to chase those reporters mostly in the US unfortunately but yes this is important and just remember that good things take time and be ready for the long run so that picture is a bime when we were in the US but what I am proud of in this picture is that little kid because don't forget to make babies during this first year this kid is staying that bime office is not anymore in the US it's been acquired by Zendesk etc but don't forget to make babies and where to get good at during this first year improve yourself it's about low signals so feel the low signals you have to put yourself in a position where you are taking the pulse of your churn customers at first because it's so difficult to get a paid customer keep them happy it's so complicated be in a mode of capturing all low signals and continue continue continue to be good at selling selling selling the sooner you test your market the best people must buy the other label version so it's referred to what I told you with product feedbacks there will always be a roadmap to sell and to wait for and to perfectionate etc but you have to test your legion because it costs a lot so the sooner you make mistakes the best you absolutely have to nail with the team who is starting to help you you have to nail the commissioning structure this is something that is coming because I am a business angel in many startups etc I am seeing that questions of commissioning structure coming far too late and this is really something that you have to structure to get the smartest sales guys because they won't come at yours if you are not fair and sophisticated also on this so be careful about that there is plenty of literature about it and I am not supposed to talk about to make the promotion of Salesforce or LinkedIn here but because Salesforce is incredibly expensive they are so good but think about the future and when you will grow your company and when you will hire the best sales guys they all want to use they all want to work with Salesforce maybe I am wrong but this is my experience and I can tell you that I am so happy to have started to put all my CRM all my data in Salesforce because now that I am growing I have all the historicals and all those great guys that are now joining they are up and running with Salesforce that reference is good and LinkedIn, yes, abuser of LinkedIn it's your cheapest but you can also really nail it for your prospections matters you also have to accept and you have to get good at understanding that your customers may evolve the persona may evolve over time and you know what, that's okay that's completely okay so yeah don't force so in a low signal capture mode and that's okay and it happens I would say in a majority of time but when it comes to your team in general what you have to get good at everyone is telling you also to hire better oh yes, I have always hired better better than me as a founder etc we know that it's super difficult to do so we have our egos but you have really to fight against that and for real to hire better than you and give them the keys you have to give them the keys because if you want to grow you definitely have to spread the workload and you also have to understand how to fire ASAP okay, how to fire ASAP this is key during this where you have to get good at and there is plenty even in your first year that's fine to buy some software to help us to take the pulse of your team doing those 360 it's not only for a very large companies you can do that and the sooner you are doing this the best, the better I have personally massively invested it's completely disproportionate but I have massively invested in my HR team 80 plus people now and I'm really happy of that because in this world in this hybrid remote world it's super difficult to take the pulse of your company and be there so this is what I have done and so far I am happy and as I mentioned you really have to fire ASAP you have to be transparent with as many people in your company maybe it's because you have to leave them out during this first year also what you have to be super good at it's understanding your ASAP mechanism because you you can have the surprise of having several round of funding you know in a very short amount of time all of them so you have to you have to think about your ASAP mechanism how you will share the value of your company really early on to not be surprised or to not be to please your salaries in the future you could raise much more earlier than expected so it has to be super clean to make sure that everyone will be happy and a good office is important but I didn't put the shitty picture of my first office the former founder on this stage did but it was a same battle and yes you have to be good at understanding that make the most of your financial partners you carefully picked them because of the equity story they are bringing more than money etc but understand that your financial partners are partners do the whatsapp thing be sure that you are Marie Eclon, she is one of my founder she is part of my relationship with all of them and it has to be this way and send love also during be good at understanding that you have to send love to your co-founders because no one is giving good feedbacks to co-founders ok no one so if you are not the co-founders giving them love you know back and you have to over celebrate but it's important to send some presents you know and as a personal you need to invest in your comfort a little bit you can be creative for that but for example during my first company where we had absolutely no money I was trying to save money on the lounge on good wifi because it was costing but it was such a bad decision of course you need to sleep in a good hotel of course you need a good wifi maybe it sounds crazy to save money on this but I started doing so and this is not smart at all so yeah don't save money in the wrong place and don't add stuff to the pain and try to be as good as you can on everything try to be good enough on legal, on security and finance because you can't give all those keys it's important for your company you can't give all those keys all those keys to outsource people so just try also during this first year to get good at some speaking slot you have to get out of your comfort zone for your resume speaker as well for your team they are so glad when they see you but it's coming with lots of stress I completely agree and you have to get good at continue to make lots of babies in this Gitanos parking but yeah you have to to be good at that continue, continue, continue and what to ignore guys but what to ignore the noise of the competitions the noise of the competitions because I love Red Allure like many of you but new is overvalued relative to great you are not here to be freaked out by new competitions or always competitors they are popping up but you know what, that's cool at some point and I don't care I'm building something great and the noise of that competitions you know it's you don't know what there is behind those super fundraising round of my competitions at some point there is lots of cash out so nothing is really going in the pocket of the company you don't know what is behind all those news so just move on and the noise of headlines even if it's not your competitions you know we are seeing lots of headlines about oh they are far better than us they are growing far better than us etc reporters love overnight success but it's so exceptional do something great everyone was praising this guy look at the ftx guy look at what's happening today so just move on as well also ignore the noise from vices cher vici ignore the noise of vices because you know what most of them they are lazy they are not doing their homework so they are counting on you guys to give them as much intel as possible about the market they are lazy to deep dive into so be careful about that they are using your time they are not paying you they don't get their money so move on as well and build a list you want to have a relationship with and stick to it and trust the one and to build that list actually you know what you remember the good lawyer bad lawyer there is good vices but to build that list start with the ones who are giving back who are giving you intel a few ones vices again just ignore some of them they are trying to ask you to scout what the fuck it's a fantastic they focus how can they dare to ask you this while you are building a business so ignore that first run fast and again you know focus on what matters this is my first kid make more babies ignore your company ignore your company everything can fail there is crisis everywhere but at least you have your kids you have your husband everyone is talking about securing the secoya partner was talking about oh you can secure your girlfriend I secured my boyfriend but you can build your family as your personal growth and just ignore also this presentation ok this presentation go back to work and trust yourself you know your stuff more than anyone else don't think that I can give you the best advice etc there is patterns but you know your stuff more than anyone else don't be hard on yourself as well and be responsible start the next you know the fast fashion thing you are building companies now in a world where you have to be responsible so good luck to all of you do care about the planet please of course and if you don't know where to start you can do your you can assess your your carbon if your company is on track it's carbon or not you know with this QR code and don't forget about all this bye bye