Christy, I am so excited to be here with you in your offices at BIP Capital. This place is gorgeous. And really, for those who don’t know, before I introduce Christy, I better share. BIP Capital is one of the leading venture capital and private equity firms in the entire South. One of the most active and one of the ones with, you know, this is just me talking, the longest visions. So, BIP invests in a way that most venture capital firms never will. When they invest in a company, if that company hits its metrics and they believe in it, they keep investing in that company, even out of the same fund. And most VC firms, they don’t do that. If they invest in you out of the seed fund, when you’re not seed, they don’t invest in you anymore.
You might qualify for their growth fund, but at BIP Capital, they’ve really engineered the performance of what it takes to be a great setting-the-stage, setting-the-bar startup in your industry. When they enter, they plan to help fuel that growth, and to do that, they focus on performance engineering. And the person who runs that and builds that is sitting right next to me right here. So, Christy, is that how you would frame
Christy Johnson
I was going to say? What a beautiful introduction. Yes, that’s perfect. And I do think that the way that we invest and the tranche investing and even our, the uniqueness of our investor base being, you know, high-net-worth individuals so that we have that flexibility is certainly what lends itself to the way we think about building the business as a partner with our entrepreneurs.
Lisa Calhoun
It’s absolutely visionary. One of the things I love about it is how people who have often made their own wealth or their family made their own wealth a generation or two ago, if not in this generation, are investing in the next generation within the same environment and culture at BIP Capital. And so moving back a little bit from the firm though, I want to really focus in this conversation on Christy. Her story, which I don’t know all the details of, is, I am sure, pretty revelatory. So we’ll start with maybe the beginning—where you grew up and how you first learned that you were interested in all things IT and growth. And please share a little bit about that.
Christy Johnson
Yeah, so I have, I would say, like a rather unusual path. I don’t think anybody would have looked at me, you know, 20 years ago and thought that was the path, including myself, that I was going to take. So, I went to graduate school for international business. So, I got an IMBA and grew up in Colorado. That’s where I went to school. And my first job was a joint venture between the IMF and the World Bank. They were doing micro…
Lisa Calhoun
Well, you got into finance, right?
Christy Johnson
Well, that’s true. Although when I say microloans, like 500 U.S., so it was going to mostly… Well, you know, everything’s relative. So, but that was my very first experience working with very small companies. And so when I say companies, that’s probably overly generous, but, you know, mostly entrepreneurs, small women artisans who had something that was certainly valuable and could be something they could build a business around, but they just didn’t know quite how to bring it to market. So when I say it was very rudimentary, like, even teaching them, like, okay, here’s how we catch the bus and we go down to San Jose, and we’re going to walk into these stores, and here’s how we’re going to negotiate pricing, and here’s how you keep your books.
But, you know, the whole idea was just that they were empowered, and they were in a position where they could pay that loan back. But one thing that was super informative for me was just how small incremental changes can make a massive impact on someone’s success and how you can leverage just very simple, basic understanding of things to help someone who doesn’t necessarily have that knowledge and put them on a different trajectory. So when I came back, I was there for two years. It was absolutely the best experience that anyone could have.
Lisa Calhoun
And so you’re in Costa Rica?
Christy Johnson
Yes, in Costa Rica.
Lisa Calhoun
San Jose?
Christy Johnson
No, I was in rural Costa Rica. It was a little town called Bijagua. So it was about an hour and a half bus ride, which we did often.
Lisa Calhoun
So I take it you speak Spanish?
Well, I would say that I did.
And you still love pollo frito?
I do. And you know what is really funny is when I came back, I had… Actually, that was my last year of graduate school, so you have to come back. And it was the University of Denver. And you had… There were three different schools: the School of Law, the School of Business, and International. And so part of the requirement for graduation is that you’re fluent in another language. So I came back to take the test, and you know, they were obviously speaking Spanish. And so, like, the professor stopped after five minutes and he said, “You know what? You pass.” And he said, “But I have to tell you, I have absolutely no idea where you got that accent.”
Lisa Calhoun
So clearly you’re very fluent in Spanish and you picked up that accent in rural Costa Rica.
Christy Johnson
That’s right. Well, and he said something like that would be like someone learning English in, like, deep… like the deep South. And he’s like, actually, I think it would be more like deep Virginia. So, I’m not entirely sure. I haven’t had any problems since then with people not understanding it. But we actually have both of our children, which I think because of my early experience going abroad, was just so foundationally important on so many levels that both of our kids actually attend college abroad. So, our daughter’s in Hungary, and our son is in Spain, so he’s in Barcelona. So I’m always kidding him when he’s, like, talking, and I’m like, “Let’s hear how good that Spanish is.” And his pronunciation is much better than his mother’s, but we’ll see.
Lisa Calhoun
Maybe more Castilian, but not necessarily better. You know, it just depends on what you’re doing.
Christy Johnson
And if he was in Bijagua, they might not understand him, but they would understand me. So anyway, I love how you said that.
Lisa Calhoun
So one of the things we have in common, actually, is that pull towards international finance at a very young age. So I… My other country was Russia.
Christy Johnson
How about that?
Lisa Calhoun
I know it was very different, and so I got to spend a few months in Russia, and I really appreciated that as I was growing up. But let’s touch on finance… I want to know if you feel that the things that work at the small scale tend to work at the larger scale. What, if anything, do you feel like you’ve pulled forward from some of those very first impressions when you were very young fresh and very new in the world?
Christy Johnson
So I think the answer is yes, because I think that getting… there’s like, when I think about, like, so what do we do today? And so, like, what is the approach and what is the methodology?
You’re going to meet every company where they’re at, because they’re all at different stages. They all have a different, you know, assortment of talent that they’re bringing to the table and completely different backgrounds and things that they have strengths in that they’ve leaned into. But it kind of comes down to sort of the basic things. The first is getting visibility to what they’re doing. So, you know, putting in software and setting KPIs and measuring things, that’s not necessarily the first thing on an entrepreneur’s mind when they’re getting started, because they’re all about, like, getting revenue, and then we’ll figure out the rest of it. But what they don’t understand is that they’re super handicapped if they’re not using data to really understand what’s happening underneath, even if they’re super early.
So one thing that we prioritize is bringing that visibility forward and prioritizing that super early on. It also gets us on the same sheet of music. I’m sure that you’ve been in situations where, you know, they’re talking about, hey, we had X amount this month. And, you know, then you find out that’s kind of a mix of renewals and new, and it gets convoluted, and you’re not, you know, talking the same language. And so you’re seeing the business very differently as an investor and the entrepreneur. So it’s really important to get aligned on what’s important and what are the milestones and get all that agreement up front. So I think regardless of what size company you are, like, getting visibility to what’s happening is super important. The next is foundation. And so oftentimes, you’ll, like, people say, “Well, we’re having a problem with the top of the funnel.” And so I think we just need to think through our sales processes. And what you recognize already is that, okay, it could be that, but more likely it’s an issue that you’re not targeting the right, you know, ICP or you’re…
Lisa Calhoun
You haven’t defined an ICP.
Christy Johnson
Got it all? Exactly.
Lisa Calhoun
One of my… I just blogged about it, but it’s like an ICP is not the last 50 customers and a definition that includes all of them.
Christy Johnson
Well, or it’s not the last three customers, which is typically what ends up happening. And, you know, if you think about it, it makes total sense because they’re, you know, when they come to us, they’ve been kind of bumping around trying to find product-market fit. And that actually means, like, selling to pretty much anyone who’s willing to pay you. And so you’re not especially focused, you’re not especially disciplined on how you’re doing that. You’re just finding opportunities and then exploring, saying, “Well, if that person is willing to pay us, maybe other people who look like that person are willing to pay us.” That doesn’t mean that’s the best…
Lisa Calhoun
It doesn’t mean they’ll pay you the most or the fastest.
Christy Johnson
Exactly. That your product brings the most value for. Right. Like, it could just be, like, tertiary, and you just happen to luck into finding people who that’s important to, but not as important as others. So it really is sort of like this foundational thing that we do every single time, because also your segmentation, your ICP, your value prop, all of those things are… if every single company that comes on board, like, do you have these? Yes, 100%. And what you said was very apropos that what oftentimes is, they’ve watered down the value prop to fit everybody. And it’s not really a value prop if you’re not speaking to the specific needs and the pains of the people that you’re trying to sell to. So double-clicking on those things, it’s great. If you’ve done work on it, that’s probably a really good start. But then trying to validate that with the data and then that’s another reason that you have to start with getting visibility. Because so often you’ll say this like cursory… it’s like, who is paying us, who is growing, and who are returning? Like, and then let’s do some segmentation against that and see if we can see a pattern. Well, if you don’t capture those things and you don’t know and you can’t understand what’s happening, it’s… you’re blind.
And so I can tell I’m right. In the heart of your day-to-day. So I want to do a little bit more. Looking back, I know you’ve been at BIP Capital for many years, and so this has become the heart and soul of your work. Were there any other experiences between Costa Rica working with the World Bank and IMF? And I really wanted to ask about your tenure at AchieveIt as CEO, and that’s a… Please share a little bit more about what you learned there and what AchieveIt did.
Christy Johnson
Oh my goodness. Okay, so AchieveIt is execution software. So it helps companies…
Lisa Calhoun
What a surprise.
Christy Johnson
Yes, that is true. There’s no lack of commentary, and the people that I know… that’s ironically where I ended up. But it helps companies, you know, execute against their biggest initiatives. And so it… I was very fortunate that by far, that experience informs and helps calibrate all of the things that are important today. I think that the only… the main reason that I can be successful in this position is because I was in those shoes, and there’s nothing… And you know, ironically I also… I was on this side, then went on that side, then came back to this side. So I have, I’ve been blessed with a really, like, generous set of experiences that help form, like, how I approach business building today. But I can tell you that when I first came… Well, first of all, it was such a humbling experience because I was on this side. It’s very easy to tell other people what they need to do. You know, it’s, “Oh, you need to do this, you need to do that…”
Lisa Calhoun
To even have an opinion, you know? You know, and yeah.
Christy Johnson
And I…
Lisa Calhoun
Founders hate VCs with a lot of opinions and very little execution skill.
Christy Johnson
And also an uninformed opinion oftentimes, like where you’re tone-deaf, and you know, you’re saying things. I mean, I’ve certainly… I’m not…
Lisa Calhoun
Sure, I’ve done it too.
Christy Johnson
I was just going to say, when I got to the other side, I was like literally thinking to myself, “Man, I hope I didn’t do that.” But I think I probably did. Right. And so it is completely different to have to execute against things. And it’s also… it’s not like you have a singular thing that has to be solved and you can do that and then focus on the next thing. You have a thousand spinning plates, and they all have to be solved in order for you to go ahead and get traction.
Lisa Calhoun
And so one of the things I… Think about is like VCs like to talk about risk and there’s the unquantifiable risk, and we talk about that, and it’s sort of an area on our spreadsheet. It’s an unquantifiable risk area and we have a number on it. But the entrepreneur is swimming in unquantifiable risk, and for them, it is a day-to-day living experience. It is not on a spreadsheet. And I think that’s why so much VC unconstructive feedback and criticism lands poorly, because we can easily forget that very large area that we feel that we’ve accounted for, called that risk, is actually their day-to-day. And there’s opportunity in that risk too. And also, that’s the entrepreneur’s responsibility, and it’s not necessarily our responsibility. We’re working on a portfolio. And so it’s so interesting to me, that dynamic. But, you know, anyway, I don’t want to lead us no more off base.
Christy Johnson
No, it’s actually a very great observation. The other thing that is really evident, at least when I got here, was that, you know, I have my framework of like how much has to get solved in order for all of these things that they’re saying is going to happen. And then I’ve also been on the other side where, what were my forecasts when I was trying to get funding? Am I realistic? Does anybody on my team really believe that we’re going to be able to hit that? Well, if every single thing and every factor that we’ve modeled goes right, yes, we can hit it. Do we feel totally confident? No, but we have the expectation that we’re not going to come in here and give you some super conservative forecast.
So now, on the other side, I recognize that, and I also recognize that we’re most of the problem because we accept like, things that are unreasonable to expect, that we know that they’re not going to be able to execute. And then what’s that? Either thing that we do start putting pressure on them to execute. So do they think that they have to, you know, or that they even have the luxury of putting in the foundational building blocks and that they have the luxury to slow down in order to speed up? No, of course not. And what are they saying? Well, we’re going to take some of this and then we’re going to invest in sales and marketing because that’s all we need. We got the system, we got the… We understand who we’re going after.
Lisa Calhoun
We have the magical hire that’s going to fix everything. Okay, but let me back up. How did you get into VC?
Christy Johnson
Okay, so I came back from Costa Rica and I actually got. I was looking for a job internationally, and so I ended up working for a company called… It was a manufacturer in steel. It’s called Florida Wiring Cable. So this is really interesting. And you’re like… So you’re like… And I still don’t see where the connection came. So, but I was doing import/export, and they liked your talent, and, you know, Spanish is probably an asset on the job.
Christy Johnson
It was. And the fact that it was actually, in like an odd way, an advantage to be a female because it was such a rarity. It’s so odd to see anyone in our… In that field.
Lisa Calhoun
So everyone in the room looked at you, got it. You got a shot.
Christy Johnson
I’m like, I’m sorry, what? Yeah. And so, and funny enough, I was married to someone that was also selling in that industry, and he would get so frustrated. He’s like, “I’ve been trying to get into that account for 10 years.”
Lisa Calhoun
And you’re like, what?
Christy Johnson
Yeah, exactly. I don’t know how to explain it to you. Wink, wink, you know, but yeah. So, it actually, I’m sure you know, you, as most things, you have to like… Like be overly knowledgeable, and you have to, you know, demonstrate acumen, probably beyond.
Lisa Calhoun
Opening the door because you’re different is cool, but you still have to close the door 100%. Takes a completely different skill set and…
Christy Johnson
Maybe even a stronger skill set than would be expected of, you know, someone else. But be that as it may, I was doing that
Florida Wire and Steel.
Christy Johnson
Yeah. So we… I moved from that, and there’s actually a process called plastic injection molding. And so they make chairs that hold the steel. And so I ended up with the opportunity to go to another manufacturer. And so that took us to Sugarland, Texas. We were there for a while. During this time, we were getting ready to start our family, and I was trying to think of how I could balance those two things. So I decided I would open a gym for kids. I put together a business plan, and we had a mutual friend who knew Mark. He said, “Hey, I have this friend Mark Buffington, and he works with companies all the time.”
Lisa Calhoun
He invests in crazy things.
Christy Johnson
Well, and it wasn’t even for investment. It was because I was being asked to, like… this was the first time I’d ever tried to negotiate a lease. They were asking for all these personal guarantees and other things. It was getting a little beyond my risk threshold. Our friend said, “Hey, why don’t you call Mark and just see what he thinks? Run your business plan past him and all that.” So, I have to pause right here.
Lisa Calhoun
And just say, many VCs, especially younger VCs in my Kaufman Fellows network, are constantly asking how to be more referable to entrepreneurs. There are some VCs—and I’m very fortunate to be one of them—and I hope I never lose that touch. Entrepreneurs do seek me out. But it’s for the odd question, just like what you’re talking about. It’s very hard to explain to younger VCs who are building their chops that there is indeed a component of knowledge, just pure execution, operational knowledge, that will attract entrepreneurs to you. The more you share your expertise, even if it’s gritty, even if it’s not sexy, the more entrepreneurs will refer to you for that expertise.
And so that’s just such a beautiful example. Because an office lease isn’t something that people say, “Oh, wow, you’re a worldwide expert.” But that you were referred to Mark for something like that, which isn’t necessarily his zone, but he understands and can share his knowledge. That’s a great lesson for younger VCs—and aspirational VCs—to really hear. Maybe their expertise is something like building muscle. Whatever it is, entrepreneurs love people who know how to get something done. So, you got Mark’s perspective on your lease.
Christy Johnson
Well, ironically, he was in the beginning stages of starting the well side with Bill. I don’t know, maybe a month or six weeks later, he and our mutual friend were playing golf, and Mark said, “Hey, whatever happened to your friend Christy? Did she decide to sign the lease?” Our friend said, “No, I think it’s beyond her risk threshold.” So Mark said, “Hey, I’m doing something in Atlanta. Do you think she would be open?” And he said, “I have no idea.” So Mark called me and said, “Hey, I don’t want to throw you off your dream or anything, but I’m actually doing something. I was just wondering if you are interested”
Christy Johnson
He was talking and explaining how he was going to disrupt the way high net-worth portfolios were run, that the people who could least afford the fees were the ones getting them. He goes on for 10-15 minutes. So, he was super passionate. And I said, “Are you sure you have the right person? I have absolutely no experience in any of this. Like, there are a lot of things I’ve done, but this is not one of them.” He said, “Actually, that’s exactly what I’m looking for.”
He says, “I’m a good read on people, and I don’t want anyone who has a bias of, ‘This is the way things are done,’ because the people in the industry are like that. I’m here to disrupt it, and I just need someone who’s open-minded. There’s something in our conversation that made it interesting, and I think I’d like to explore it further.” So, long story short, our youngest was starting kindergarten, and we figured if we were going to make a move, now was the time. So, we leased our house in Texas, leased a house here, and gave it a shot. I gotta admit, the first six months, I was thinking, I’m going home.
You know that feeling when you leave something you’re really good at, where you’re the person everyone turns to, and you know it backwards and forwards, and you feel really competent.
Lisa Calhoun
You’ve been in steel, in aluminum, for a long time.
Christy Johnson
Yeah, exactly. Then I came here, and I went home and told my husband, I have to tell you, I have no idea what was said today. It was like in a conference room with all these acronyms, and I would just write everything down and then Google it. Thank goodness for Google—it really helped.
Lisa Calhoun
Right there with you. When I got into financial management, even though I have an MBA in statistics and I know a lot of the math, the industry itself—going for the Series 65—there’s just so much to learn. The laws are all abbreviated, the types of people are all… It’s like the military; there’s an acronym for everything.
Christy Johnson
Exactly. And you’re sitting with people who have done this their whole careers. It’s just rolling off their tongues, and they all understand. It was very uncomfortable for probably six months until I could get enough knowledge to follow what was happening. It wasn’t on par with them, but enough to keep up. But I’ve always had an operational bent, and that’s what I was there for—to help put the infrastructure in place. I was actually quite fortunate because at that time, the SEC was requiring a plain-language policy manual. And I thought-
Perfect! That’s when I thought, “Google is my friend.”
Lisa Calhoun
And I’ll be the judge of whether or not that’s plain language.
Christy Johnson
Exactly! And that was easy for me to test. The other thing is that the whole exercise was about making sure you’re protecting against certain outcomes—what are your processes and procedures to ensure that you’re in compliance? They didn’t prescribe the way you did things, just the outcome. That was very easy for me to reverse-engineer, so we put in all the policies. Essentially, I was building the infrastructure for the company. Now, things I didn’t know anything about became my expertise, and I became the person who knew all the policies and procedures. And so very quickly, it became a dynamic where I was really comfortable, because that was something I could do in my sleep. So we did that, and at that time there was no fund. Mark was just passing the hat around, doing single-purpose vehicles, and did that a couple of times. He had early success and then decided he was going to launch a fund and asked if I could go do the same thing on that side.
Lisa Calhoun
Awesome. And so that’s how you found yourself sitting in the CEO chair.
Christy Johnson
Well, yes, because, as you know, when you have just a few people at the fund, everyone is working with the portfolio companies. It was one of those things, and I actually really enjoyed it. It was… Hey, can you go work with them on a pricing model? Can you help them build their tech stack? Quite honestly, a lot of those things I didn’t necessarily know really well, but I love nothing more than a good whiteboard session. And that’s where you really understand that 90% of the solution is in their heads. Your job is to help them build a framework, a construct, to help them think through it and get it out in a form that’s actionable for them.
That’s very different than having to know everything about a lot, you know? Or a little bit a lot about a lot of things.
Lisa Calhoun
One of the things… So, we’re not a thesis investor. We are a general seed, B2B investor. But we do have some theses and thoughts we’re following, things we believe, and things we’re very convicted about. One of the things we’re very convicted about at Valor is that type of design engineering is the key skill that will differentiate, we believe, the big winners from the mediocre ones, and the shutdowns. In this age of AI that we’re all living in, no one is going to have all of the execution bias that AI will increasingly be responsible for. But if you don’t frame it properly with that kind of thinking—someone who legitimately has a whiteboard-session mentality and dependencies mentality—we’re really going to focus on those types of thinkers as we make new investments in Fund 3. That type of approach to solving problems. Because, to some extent, I feel like AI is accelerating execution so much that if you don’t think through it well, you can succeed much faster, but you can also fail much faster. And we’re seeing that.
Christy Johnson
Because you’re executing against the wrong strategy.
Lisa Calhoun
Exactly. We’re seeing everything shrink in terms of time to know if it’s going to work or not. And so, the core resource or the constrained resource becomes the ability of the humans in the room to take…
Christy Johnson
The information pivot or adjust to the new data
— design a process that accelerates not just information gathering, like in the search world, but knowledge. Yeah, it’s really such an interesting new world.
Christy Johnson
Well, I mean just if you think exponentially about where we’ll be.
Lisa Calhoun
This is Andrew Samoza. He works at, you know, VIP Capital too. Okay. Thanks for stopping by.
Christy Johnson
That’s okay. We might have been a little short-sighted on our location.
Lisa Calhoun
I want people to have the real experience. This is also the real black coffee from that machine. Really people working here—super cool. So I think people like authentic, you know what? So let’s.
Lisa Calhoun
That’s right. It’s always kind of like a Zoom. We’re like, yeah, it’s always. And work. So you’ve seen two of the classic individuals.
Lisa Calhoun
Absolutely. A couple quick things on Achieve It. Is there anything you can share about what it’s like to become the CEO of a startup from the VC side? Because I know a lot of people find that to be a difficult transition, a very challenging one. And I’m just wondering if there’s any insights or a key lesson learned—something you carry with you now.
Christy Johnson
Yeah, oh, a thousand of them. But I think the main overarching thing, first of all, was super humbling because I thought, Oh, I’ll get in there and we’ll just execute our way out of it. And Achieve It had many challenges. So, you know, when your product has had, you know, 10 different developers who had different thoughts, different ideas, and no one’s using the right documentation, and there’s been so many hands in it, you have all this technical debt. You don’t even know where to start. So it was glitchy. We had a thousand bugs. We had no systems. We didn’t have a good team around it. And that was not my strong suit.
Lisa Calhoun
Just full pause for CEOs. If this is you and you have a VC…
Christy Johnson
I mean, and then, you know, you’re… this was not things that I knew how to go fix, right?
Lisa Calhoun
So, they’re not easy to fix.
Christy Johnson
Those go-to-market. So, that was actually the first time, and Mark and I talk about it all the time, that was one time I got a good nudge. Because you can be COO many, many times. But it’s not the same. There’s nothing that prepares you for being COO like being CEO. And for the first time, everything’s on you. And so it doesn’t matter if you have the context, it doesn’t matter if you have the experience. It’s your job to solve it. And so clearly, some things are through yourself and some things are through other people, but that is your job—to get everything solved.
Lisa Calhoun
And so in a fast-growing startup, or one that is supposed to grow…
Christy Johnson
Fast or when you’re burning money, you…
Lisa Calhoun
Know, you’re in an entirely… You are on the frontier of your industry, and there is no rest from that.
Christy Johnson
Exactly.
Lisa Calhoun
Not rest. You are on the front line of your industry and your company. That’s where you sleep.
Christy Johnson
Yep. Well, and that is another thing—that it’s all encompassing. So there are no lines like you leave at 5:00 and, you know, no. Yes, you’re 24/7, and so it really is. But I remember telling Mark, “Yeah, this, we have this latency problem, and man, I am stumped.” And he’s like, “Well, it’s your job to solve it, so you better figure it out.” So, and then serendipity—I was on a flight, and I was next to somebody who was the CTO, had just left Cabg, and I’m like, “What are you planning on doing next?” And he was like, “Yeah, I don’t know. I’m going to take some time to figure it out.” And I said, “Well, while you’re figuring it out, want a little side gig? We can work together, and you can help me understand.”
Christy Johnson
And I mean, it was talk about this latency problem.
Lisa Calhoun
Exactly.
Christy Johnson
Like, you want to take a little rest, but how about this? So it didn’t actually end up working out perfect because I was like, “You know, the engagement looks like this. I need you to go in, I need you to assess all the normal things—people, process, and tools, and then I need you to keep me educated along the way. So, I need you to teach me what I don’t know, help me fill in the gaps. What are you thinking? The things that are concerns, why are they concerns? And then your thought process on how you would go about solving it. And then I need you to work yourself out of a job by helping me build a team and finding a leader that’s the right fit for this organization if the person we have in place is not that person.”
Lisa Calhoun
So, I just want to say that’s a snapshot of your recipe for scaling, and it’s really interesting. And to give a leader—even a contract leader—the view not just of current day, but where we’re going with this, I think is a key skill a lot of leaders miss. Is that the team, even contractees, they need to know the road we’re on. They need to know where we’re headed. Because it’s not even just about fixing this latency problem. It’s this latency problem that has to also be visible to the next person in the seat, with the right documentation or the right infrastructure, so it never happens again. That, with their KPI, and that context is so critical, and it’s just so clear that you do a beautiful job setting the context well.
Christy Johnson
And I will say that just keeping the entire team aligned was something I think that innately you understand that. But when you’re moving fast, you know, you have to stop and make sure that everybody, not only knows where we’re going, but the why around it, and their role in making it happen. Because a lot of times, especially in early stage, because you’re doing a lot of shifting, right? Like you learn new information and you’re pivoting and you’re… And that can feel like whiplash.
Lisa Calhoun
What kind of cadences, or maybe there was no time for cadences, how did you get that done? The reason I’m asking is getting back to this idea of the AI-accelerated startup. Whether or not it’s an AI startup, they’re using AI in the kitchen, right? So I feel that this acceleration is putting a level of stress on leaders today. And the C-suite—that has never been. And you can, that’s been said before, but now it’s really multiplied. And some of the cadences, weekly meetings, standups, don’t even work as well as they used to because you can literally get 10 times the code out of your team of 10 devs than you could in a week this time last year. So how do you frame up as a performance engineer, reading the room and knowing the type of cadences your team needs as things grow and change?
Christy Johnson
So I think that, well, I’ll answer like, there were the cadences that I think you can do when you’re in office versus when you’re remote. I think that’s the other dynamic, aside from the fact that AI is escalating the pace at which things are moving and changing. And so the need for the frequency is higher when you are remote. That’s completely changed too. And so with Achieve It, we were in-office, and there were completely different behaviors in terms of not only how often you were meeting, but just your ability to sense when things are going well and when they’re not, with either the team or individuals. And so there’s so much to be said for being able to walk around, read people’s body language, overhear conversations, identify, you know, like areas of frustration.
Christy Johnson
And so, excuse me, I think that is one of my good skills. And so I felt very much like that I was on top of things when we were in the office. When that changed, and you have no pulse on what is happening, even though you’re doing all the team standups and you’re attending all those things, and obviously, you know, stand up with the entire team once a week or once a month, and you have all hands where you’re giving everybody the updates, and you’re setting the vision and you have everybody on board on what we’re measuring and why we’re measuring it, and you’re giving the updates on those measurements. It’s completely different, but you also lose the human element. And so in a startup, so much of like, why people are there, it’s not necessarily because of the money, because you’re always like, “I know that you’re on the low side of the scale,” but you’re like, you’re the… and of course, it’s the opportunity. But so much of it is like the bonding and the, you know, the connective tissue between that team trying to work for something.
Lisa Calhoun
Playing on a team is always fun.
Christy Johnson
And it is so much more difficult to get that team. Yes. The thread. Not necessarily their own team because I think, you know, if you work in sales, they’re on the phone enough to, like, they have that camaraderie, but it’s the connective tissue between especially if you think of go-to-market being, you know, product first, then marketing, sales, and success. All of those people have to be on the same page. And so I know it’s not exactly talking about the AI thing, but from…
Lisa Calhoun
I’m going to be curious about it and have thoughts developing about it—that maybe in-office is a competitive advantage more even than it used to be in this age of AI because it allows the human team to use all of their human skills, EQ, however you want to say that. But there’s a qualitative skill set. And every time we interact with AI, we see it’s not there. And so it’s great to have execution of certain things so simply done for us, great to have good judgment. But then in addition to that, this EQ that allows you to qualitatively sense what only a human can sense about the team. That’s an interesting thought.
Christy Johnson
And I, that’s a super interesting observation. And as you were talking, I was thinking through it because, you know, originally, everyone was like, “Oh, it’s such an advantage because now you’re not constrained to the geography on the talent.” And so if there’s a super talented engineer that you want who lives in Washington State, great, they can be on the team, and you can assimilate them, and they can start contributing just as easily as someone who lives down the street. Now, that’s changed, and everybody can come back in office. I actually, I thought, yes, it’s an advantage just because it keeps people aligned. But I think you’re absolutely right. You can pivot and get everyone up to speed on what’s changing, like so much quicker because it’s in real-time. And so as you’re learning things—like, just imagine you can pull everybody into a huddle, and all of those things just become part of that cadence of what you’re doing. Doing that on a frequent basis just becomes the norm. Whereas if you have everybody on Zoom, well, is everybody available? And, you know, how hard is it going to be to communicate to get everybody together? So, just because of the logistical challenge, you probably don’t communicate, or, you know, your reflexes are slower because it’s more daunting to actually have the communication with the full team, whereas if they were there, you could just huddle up and say, “Hey, just want to share with everybody. This is something that we learned. Should we do something different in response to it?”
Lisa Calhoun
Yeah, well, fascinating. One of the things I wanted to touch on before I have to let you go and get back to your busy day is current reality for you here at VIP. What do you, what are you focusing on this year? What are some of the things that are top of mind for you because we’re taking this interview in February of 2025. And so there’s a little bit of a new beginning energy to the year still. Also, we’re in a new political process. Lots going on. Where’s what’s top of mind for you as you think about creating the highest possible trajectory for you and the team this year?
Christy Johnson
Great question and like you said, very timely. So we’ve put a lot of effort into thinking through, and when I say put a lot of effort, 2024 was very much focused on what is the best structure, the best framework, how do we actually make an impact. Because one thing that was for sure when I came back to sort of create performance engineering, certainly because I had been on the other side, it was we’re not going to move around deck chairs, we’re not going to, and although it’s helpful to, like, if someone says, “Hey, can you know, help me build out a sales territory or do you have a comp plan that’s a standard?” Or, you know, those types of things? Yes, certainly helpful. But if we’re going to make meaningful change, especially for early-stage companies, there’s some pretty obvious things that if we learn them because we’re on the—like they went badly and we recognized what is the handicap, then we would not be very smart if we’re not trying to instill those things early in the process. So 2025 is all about what I would say executing on the BIP Capital way. And the BIP Capital way is a set of ways not only do we that we engage with each other and our entrepreneurs and our investors and our overall ecosystem and who we are as a firm, but also our approach to investing and all. And a big part of that is how we engage with portfolio companies with performance engineering.
Lisa Calhoun
So what’s more important from your experience in performance engineering, preventing mistakes like the top three reasons startups fail in our portfolio, preventing those, or accelerating excellence?
Christy Johnson
So, and this is not a very good answer, it’s both. So I think that if it’s like the avoiding mistakes, there’s some clear things on the foundation building that if you help them prioritize the right things because again, as we were talking about, there’s so many things that they’re trying to solve for. So there is an order of operations.
Lisa Calhoun
You know, I honestly find the skill of prioritization to be one that I speak with CEOs a lot now you invest a little bit later than Ballard does. So we lead seed rounds. We’re the first professional investor in. But One of the conversations I frequently have with my CEOs, who are all people I think can change the freaking world, is prioritize your battle, because you can’t win all of them. And really focusing one at a time today will really.
Christy Johnson
I think that will serve you later.
Lisa Calhoun
CEOs get further at my stage of engagement, killing it one thing today and killing it on something else tomorrow and then handling the rest as best their energy can, rather than feeling like there’s death by a thousand cuts. Because there are definitely a thousand cuts in the air for them.
Christy Johnson
Yep, no doubt. And they’re always coming at it like there’s typically one of two strengths. So they’re either coming at it because they’re, like, from the engineering perspective and they have this great vision around the product and that’s where their strength lies, or they’re coming at it from a sales perspective, and they, you know, are very charismatic and they are very dedicated to the cause and they want to solve something. But then the other side is almost always lacking because they’re going to… Your natural inclination is to lean into the things that you feel most comfortable with. And so I think helping them see that, okay, there’s an order across the organization, and putting in these foundational building blocks are super important. And I promise that if you slow down just a little bit and we get these things in place before you start spending in these certain areas that, you know, you retain more of your company.
Lisa Calhoun
Let’s ground that plane. Don’t… Obviously, I’m not asking for a startup’s name, but if you could share a story of a real company where you put something like this in place so that the founders listening to us really understand what you mean. Because one of the things that’s happening in the startup world is we’re not trying to talk in any code, and we’re not as bad as pure finance.
Christy Johnson
Right, right. For sure.
Lisa Calhoun
But we are when we talk about a system and they’ve never seen one.
Christy Johnson
Yeah. So I’ll be happy to sort of expand. So one of the things that I think is really important, and it’s certainly important to us, is that the entrepreneurs that we invest in understand what partnership means on both sides. And so part of that is sort of experiencing that partnership earlier before they actually take the funding, and that we are very clear about what an onboarding plan involves, the why behind why these things are being prioritized. And so we get involved with the performance engineering team in the diligence phase. And so it’s not… You know, again, if something’s totally nascent, that doesn’t mean we’re not going to invest. It’s just trying to understand where they’re at. So that we mostly inform—yes, we’re informing the risks decision on the investment, but we’re also informing the onboarding plan.
And the other is that clearly the infrastructure and the development that you’d expect at a $500,000 company is very different than a $5 million one. So building out an assessment that’s on the curve. And so like, we call them the four pillars of growth. But so there’s visibility, getting that visibility, the foundation building. Then you can be targeted and have the greatest value prop. But if you don’t execute, you can’t really do that. And then sort of, there’s all sorts of the… How do we make sure that entire revenue model comes together?
On sales funnel analytics
There’s definitely a ton. Well, there’s talent and finance. So we don’t spend a lot on looking at the technology and trying to understand if, like, all those lines of code are great.
They’ll be rewritten.
Christy Johnson
Exactly. Well, the other thing is if you can prove out that, you know, customers like what they’re using and that you’re solving a unique and very acute problem. Yeah, then probably something’s working enough. But where we see them bogged down, especially in the beginning, prioritizing a talent plan and making sure you have the right people around the table and helping them think through. Not like, “Oh, we’re going to do this massive org design,” but let’s talk through it. Like, what if you had a blank sheet of paper and you were starting, you know, and you had the… you could sketch out the perfect organization, and you had everything you needed to get to the moon and back. What does that look like? Okay, now let’s reverse engineer. What’s the most critical component? And, you know, what, where are you spending your time today?
And if you could repurpose that and, you know, doing the exercise where you said, “Where did you spend it exactly? What are the things that you can do that nobody else can do? What are the things that, you know, you do now but other people could probably do as good, but maybe not better? And what are the things that you’re doing that someone else could clearly do better?” You know, helping them prioritize their own time and thinking through what talent do we need around the table, making sure that they have financial acumen and, you know, a lot of times—I’m sure you see it all the time—that, you know, they’ve used maybe the person that was submitting their tax return, and now all of a sudden they have a revenue model that’s SaaS.
Lisa Calhoun
And often a family member.
Christy Johnson
Often. Yeah, I was actually going to say, like, Uncle Bob down the street.
Lisa Calhoun
Other fathers. Yes. Like there’s a lot of family member engagement because they can access that resource.
Christy Johnson
Right. And it’s, and they’re, you know, they’re trying to save money and they don’t see the, like, the long term.
Lisa Calhoun
I was literally reviewing the sales contracts in the diligence room of a startup that, you know, we meet 20 to 30 every week. So this is pretty frequent. But this one really got to me because it was very cool technology and I really loved what they were doing and I loved the acceleration of the sales. And so I dug into the few contracts that they had and they were all services contracts because a family member was a certain type of attorney and had written a sales contract and did the best they knew. But I was like, this is not SaaS (Software as a Service).
Christy Johnson
Yep.
Lisa Calhoun
And you are trying to. And you’re presenting your pitch deck like.
Christy Johnson
You think this is recurring revenue, but.
Lisa Calhoun
Yeah, recurring revenue, but you’re actually not. And there’s a pull line there that you have to have proven successful experience in the things that you’re not expert in yourself.
Christy Johnson
Exactly. Well, and I find also is at least as it recon, you know, as it relates to recognizing revenue and other things, it’s always innocent. Like they, it’s not rational
Lisa Calhoun
And it’s not irresponsible. It’s the best they know at the time.
Christy Johnson
Well, you would think like often the example I was using earlier that, “Oh, we got it renewed. So that’s more revenue. Like we, this is the revenue that we have this month.” That’s not an irrational way of viewing the world. It’s just.
Lisa Calhoun
No.
Christy Johnson
Just not the way that is recognized. And so, you know, I think that if you, to me those three pillars, if you can get the talent. And again, we’re not talking all the way down to SDRs (Sales Development Representatives). If you get the right leadership in all the rest, they’ll handle the SDRs.
Lisa Calhoun
They’ll fire the right.
Christy Johnson
Which is likely often, you know, oftentimes the case because again, you are asking people that probably have to do a job with limited resources, limited infrastructure,
—and a lot of pressure
—doing a ton of experimentation. And you know, there’s nothing that’s repeatable. And so that takes a special person, especially in the SDR role. But anyway, those three things—looking at making sure that they have financial integrity and helping them get that so that they have real visibility to what’s happening there, certainly the talent and helping them think through as an organization what do we want to be when we grow up—and then certainly the go-to-market fundamental pieces so that they’re best set up for success before we start investing in sales and marketing dollars. Like to me, those are the essential things to help them get right. And so we talk through the assessment, like where they are because oftentimes they actually may be above where I would expect for where they’re at on certain things..
Lisa Calhoun
And that’s always so good to see.
Christy Johnson
Exactly. Well, and they almost always are, you know, and they, but help them understand the rationale and why we’re doing these things and how that’s going to help them and then get on that same, you know, get alignment on that, the milestones, the timing and sometimes it’s asking them to spend some of the new money that they’re getting because, you know, but prioritizing those things, but not telling them that after they accept the funding, but getting on the same page about what collaboration looks like and what a partnership with us looks like on the front end. So there’s no surprises, ensuring that we’re in alignment about what we’re going to do and then just, you know, executing to make sure that they have the.
Lisa Calhoun
The plan you created, really co-created with their input and their feedback, to what you had to say
Christy Johnson
— and their priorities too, because there are obviously things that are, as a CEO, bothering them that they want to make sure they get solved. And so oftentimes, you know, you’re always asking them, “What’s keeping you up at night?” and “What are the priorities for you?” Oftentimes, they’re not going to prioritize the same things because they don’t see them as important.
Lisa Calhoun
The same picture the investor does, which is part of the strength of the investor-founder partnership. But I love that collaboration when it comes on both sides.
Christy Johnson
Well, otherwise, you know, they’re just going through the motions and it’s not going to really work. They’re not going to earnestly try to get the most they can out of the process. And so that doesn’t help anyone.
Lisa Calhoun
You know, I’m going to paint a picture and I’m going to ask your opinion, and I’ll certainly share mine, but I don’t want to condition your answer either way. So, I’ve had the honor of working with well over 100 CEOs, helping them scale and grow. And I would say broadly, you can put them into two buckets. One bucket is: I am curious about myself as a person. I want to uncover my strengths and weaknesses, and I will work on those weaknesses until I am a polished being. And then the other perspective would be: I’m a curious person. I want to work on myself as a human being. I’m going to really understand my strengths so that I can optimize them, and I’m going to get insight into my weaknesses so that I can shore them up in some way—whether with a system, a person, or a process. So, in those two camps, which one do you think is the most successful?
Christy Johnson
I personally think it’s the second, because of the fact that…
Lisa Calhoun
Me too, okay, 100%. I admire them both. I admire them both.
Christy Johnson
This is really hard to get to. Those individuals don’t end up utilizing their team and the strengths of others to get to where they need to be.
Lisa Calhoun
Exactly. So well said. I think the fact that one is incentivized to build trusted relationships creates the team
Christy Johnson
— and sees them as valuable.
Lisa Calhoun
Right. And teamwork does make the dream work. You know, no matter how much AI you put on it. If the team is smaller, that’s wonderful and very optimized. But you still need that team. No, I really agree, and it’s an interesting thing because, of course, they’re both very admirable human beings, but I think only one has the genes to scale.
Christy Johnson
Well, I certainly think that in times when things aren’t going well, that person is a lot better informed and can pivot a lot quicker than the person who’s relying exclusively on their ability to fine-tune their own personal skills. That’s a journey of a lifetime. We’re all constantly working.
Lisa Calhoun
I’ve abandoned my weaknesses. I have other people for that.
Christy Johnson
I’m too shy. That is actually what we’re talking about. And the fact of the matter is that you can’t be great at everything. I mean, you might be, you know, there are lots of people who are both right- and left-brained but for sure, you know, eventually, you’re just not going to have your strengths holistically across the board, and you have to… And there’s just something very freeing about having, you know, there’s nothing better than going into a room, having a session where you’re trying to problem-solve and like people come up with solutions that you never would have even thought of. And then you’re like, “I have a rush!” You know, like, “This is what my job is.” So, like, my job is simply to help orchestrate these super talented people and give them everything they need to be successful. And like, if that’s all you have to do, what a wonderful job, right? So that is kind of the promised land.
Lisa Calhoun
So it’s clear you’re a master teaching other masters in this area. Before I let you go, is there something, (doesn’t have to be building companies) that you’d like to share with our audience? And I’ll let you know that our audience, I mean, there will be hundreds of founders listening to you the week we put this out. And over the long term, in the first year, thousands of founders will hear your voice. And some VCs, we love y’all, but you know how to get to us. Okay, so for the founders, is there anything you’d like to share with them about what you’ve learned?
Christy Johnson
Yeah, I think that, first of all, you often get in your own head that everybody else is getting massive success and that you’re the only one that’s struggling or that, you know, everybody’s up and to the right, and why is it so hard for you? You’re in a difficult situation because it is very lonely. And Mark always says it’s the loneliest job. And it’s true because you can’t… I mean, you probably leveraged pretty much all your savings and your family. You’ve asked people for, you know, their investment, more than they could give. You feel a tremendous amount of pressure. So obviously, you can’t complain to your family. That would spook them. You’re in the same situation with your team. Probably 99% of them are there because you have the vision and you are confident, and they’re teeing off your confidence to gain their own. And so, the last thing that you can do is show any weakness, you know, get scared. But everybody that is in your shoes is feeling that same way. It’s totally expected, it’s totally normal. And, you know, I often say people are hesitant to spend money on like having a coach or putting in infrastructure with trusted advisors outside of, even if that’s somebody that you have to pay so that you can bounce things off of and be okay mentally yourself and get some reassurance that what you’re expecting, you’re experiencing is normal. Because you’re going to have many sleepless nights. You’re going to have a lot of self-doubt, like “Am I the right person for this job?” and “Could somebody else do this better?” Get that out of your head.
You know, and whatever it takes to get there and whatever support system you need to build, it’s going to be critical because not every day is going to be good. And recognize that, but also figure out ways to protect your own mental health around that because it’s real.
Lisa Calhoun
That is such incredible advice and perspective. Thank you for sharing that. And I just have to respond back to you and say we see so much the same thing that in building Valor, we do three things to try to help with that very specific piece. When we lead a seed round, we introduce our founders to masterclass peer sessions with other CEOs. They’re led by a founder that has expertise in the thing they’re really great at. Like Sean Cook just did one on the partnerships playbook that he used at Mailchimp to build out their partnerships and that he used at Shop Visible selling to Epicor. But the leadership’s great, but the peers in the room are other founders. And so we try to really help our founders bond with each other.
Christy Johnson
So they have an ecosystem too.
Lisa Calhoun
They have an ecosystem. And it’s not just about asking about what’s your marketing stack; it’s like, how are you sleeping? You know, or who’s your coach? And then we also, in the first year for sure, and longer if that’s desired and helpful, our board member does weekly emotional check-in calls. That’s not a board meeting with our founder. And so, I have a few of those. Everyone who’s a board leader with us has a few of those. And they’re specifically not asking about KPIs but how are you doing? So VCs, we have failed companies, mediocre companies, and successful companies. So we can be, if we choose to, a safe space to talk about that. And yeah, I mean, it’s really interesting. It’s hard. And so now, I’ve also learned I need to coach the coaches. It’s a developing process. And then the third thing is we always recommend that they join a group like EO (Entrepreneurs’ Organization), YPO (Young Presidents’ Organization), whatever it is for Vistage (Vistage). You know, it’s not about we have a favorite group, but the value of having a community
Christy Johnson
You just want them to have community, like what you said.
Lisa Calhoun
I mean, they need their own team where they can safely express all the things they can express in their zone of genius. This was such a great conversation.
Christy Johnson
Yeah, it’s super enjoyable. And as always, Lisa, thank you.
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