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In the seventh week of Summer Launchpad (SLP), founders learned how to build financial models that provide a strong foundation for scaling their startups.
Week 7 Recap:
Workshop: Accounting
Johnnie Walker
Johnnie Walker, director at Rooled, led a workshop on startup financial management. He drew on his experience in fast-growing tech companies and stressed the importance of opening a separate business bank account from day one, even when starting with personal funds.
Walker said that founders have a responsibility to pick the right tools and meet tax deadlines. He compared platforms such as QuickBooks, Puzzle, and Pilot, advising teams not to use closed-ledger systems that can trap their data and make switching providers more difficult.
Johnnie Walker on Filing Obligations:
“Even if you’re operating at a loss, you’re still required to file. Filing obligations aren't dependent on profitability.”
Workshop: Financial Models
Darren Yee (Tandon '16)
Later that day, the NYU Entrepreneurial Institute’s Senior Venture Associate Darren Yee (Tandon ’16) hosted a workshop on building financial models that actually reflect how a business will grow (or fail).
Yee walked the cohort through a three-part model: assumptions and financial projections; payroll and hiring plans; and financials and revenue. Within the revenue model, he recommended starting with customer numbers as the primary driver, then working backward through the acquisition funnel to estimate conversion rates at each stage.
On the cost side, Yee pointed out that payroll is almost always the largest expense. The most important rule is to never let the closing cash balance hit zero.
Darren Yee on Building Models That Make Sense:
“The financial model is like a clinician. It takes all the assumptions we’ve been making — your acquisition funnel, how much it costs to get a customer, your revenue model, hiring plan, go-to-market — and puts them into numbers so you can see if it actually makes sense.”
Stay tuned for more insights from SLP!
