The blog

Every post answers one diligence question.

One diligence question per post, answered with the method and its sources. No listicles, no news reactions. Checklists, the glossary, and the working tools live in the resource library.

LatestDiligence practiceOct 2026What the Four P's of Due Diligence Cover and What They MissThe Four P's come from picking fund managers, not companies. Here is what each P asks of an operating business, the evidence that answers it, and the gaps.Read the post →

Diligence practiceOct 2026
How to Judge the Evidence Behind a Diligence Red Flag
A red flag is a claim about risk, not proof of it. How to trace a flag to its source evidence, weigh that evidence, and decide what it changes.
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Diligence practiceOct 2026
What Culture Diligence Can Observe Before the Term Sheet
What a culture review can see before the term sheet with limited access, what it cannot conclude, and which people evidence to request before exclusivity.
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Diligence practiceOct 2026
How Long Operational Due Diligence Takes and What Speed Gives Up
Operational due diligence has no standard duration. Learn what sets the timeline, how to shorten it without losing depth, and what cutting scope costs.
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Diligence practiceSept 2026
A Pre-Investment Operating Review for Venture Investors
What an operating review covers before a venture round, what evidence an early-stage company can produce, and how it differs from private equity diligence.
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What the data showsSept 2026
Operating Data Versus the Management Presentation
How a diligence team traces each claim in a management presentation back to the systems that recorded it, and how to read the gaps it finds.
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Apr 2026
Your Company Has a Meeting Problem. Here's the Data to Prove It.
The average manager spends 23 hours per week in meetings. The average IC spends 14. At some point, meetings stopped being a tool and became the entire job.
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Apr 2026
What Breaks When You Scale from 50 to 200 People
The journey from 50 to 200 employees is where startups become companies, or fall apart trying. The informal patterns that worked brilliantly at 50 become the exact things that break at 200.
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Apr 2026
The Org Chart Is Fiction. Here's What the Real Organization Looks Like.
Every company has two organizational structures: the one on the slide deck and the one that actually governs how work gets done. The gap between them is where operational risk hides.
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Every post answers one diligence question.

How to Judge the Evidence Behind a Diligence Red Flag

What Culture Diligence Can Observe Before the Term Sheet

How Long Operational Due Diligence Takes and What Speed Gives Up

A Pre-Investment Operating Review for Venture Investors

Operating Data Versus the Management Presentation

Your Company Has a Meeting Problem. Here's the Data to Prove It.

What Breaks When You Scale from 50 to 200 People

The Org Chart Is Fiction. Here's What the Real Organization Looks Like.

Notes from the work.

Ask for the evidence, not another pitch.