Blue Horizon’s reading list is a curated collection of articles for SaaS founders and management teams. We are entrepreneurs and operators who have lived through the process of founding and scaling software companies. Here are the articles and resources we found useful this week.
Choosing Your North Star Metric
Lenny Rachitsky on a16z.com
There’s a lot of power in where you focus your attention…Whatever companies choose as their guiding metric, all energy and brainpower will flow in that direction…refining your ideal North Star Metric (NSM) — deciding which of the six categories above to focus on — depends heavily on your business model, how your product grows, and how your product is used…Whenever you have a candidate for your North Star Metric(s), determine what levers move this metric, and then focus your ideation around those input metrics.
The Key to Achieving Change Management Buy-in
Sophie Endean on Productplan.com
3 Critical Considerations That Affect Change Management Buy-in
1. Intentional thinking from the start.
2. Anticipating downstream ramifications.
3. Centralized change management.
5 Interesting Learnings from Five9. Which Zoom Just Bought for $15 Billion.
Jason Lemkin, SaaStr.com
Five9’s revenues were 60% enterprise at IPO in 2014, but now are 83% enterprise. And Five9 has grown from just 3 $1m ACV customers in 2014 to 91 today…Five9’s NRR was a so-so 112% until recently — not that impressive for a mission-critical enterprise app. But they’ve since grown it to a more top-tier 121%. A reminder it’s never too late to increase your NPS and NRR.
9 Conversations That Bring Goal, Role, and Plan Clarity—And Drive Growth
Matt Roberts on OpenView Partners
Conversation topics include:
Long-term plans
Strategy
This quarter’s biggest opportunities
Culture
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Blue Horizon acquires and invests in profitable software businesses with stable recurring revenue streams. The Blue Horizon platform combines long-term capital and industry expertise with an operating model that enables businesses and their leaders to focus on growth and profitability.