Plan my next 18 months

post-raise (n.) the months between closing your round and earning the next one.

You raised. Now hit the numbers you pitched.

Your round buys you about 18 months. Build your Post-Raise Plan with your team in 3 weeks, so every month goes to the numbers your next round needs.

Plan my next 18 months

For Series A founders. In 30 minutes, you’ll know if this will move your numbers.

Sample page. Illustrative numbers.

round: Series A, closed the numbers you pitched: on the clock team: waiting on your call plan: not yet
“We’d raised the money to triple our locations in one season, but had no clear plan for where to start. Jasper worked out what came first and what could wait, then rebuilt our playbook around it. We went from 10 to 30+ locations within a year.”
Christian Traeland · Founder and CEO · LICC

Every promise you made investors now has a deadline.

The celebration lasts about a week. Then payroll goes out, and burn stops being a line in the model.

first-90-days.logas it often goes
  1. day 001Round announced. Congratulations everywhere.
  2. day 007"Now we actually have to deliver."
  3. day 021Nine open roles. Nobody owns the plan.
  4. day 045Product builds one thing. Sales sells another.
  5. day 068Every decision still waits on the founder.
  6. day 090Board: "Where are we against plan?"

Without a plan, most founders default to one of three options, while every wrong guess costs runway.

Hire your way out.

An EA, a chief of staff, a full exec team. Nobody knows what to do yet, so everything still runs through you.

Run it like the startup project it was.

You still approve every $19 SaaS seat yourself, while the big decisions wait.

Make it up as you go.

Random ideas seen on 𝕏, yet another SaaS tool, or a copy of what worked at someone else’s company.

3 weeks from “now what?” to a plan your board can back.

The Post-Raise Plan. Built in three steps with the people who’ll run it.

post-raise-plan3 weeks + 90 days
designweek 1What do you need to deliver, and what work gets you there?Start from the work, before anyone talks about roles.the big decisions, on paper by day 7
sequenceweek 2What first, and what not yet?Put the work in order: now, next, not yet.a draft plan to the next round, the next 90 days in detail, money tied to each piece of work
deployweek 3Who owns what, and how do you stay on track?For each piece of work, decide who or what does it. Plan first, then hire.a planning session with your team, the final plan and a board-ready pack, an owner for every piece of work, a weekly rhythm to stay on track, which roles to hire now and which can wait
done. plan signed off by your team.next: 90 days of running it together, a call every other week and help in between.
  • 3 weeks laterWalk into your first board meeting with a plan.
  • Your team knows what to do, and what can wait.
  • Every dollar spent making progress that matters.
  • 90 days laterThe work moves without every decision going through you.
“Jasper’s been with us since before our Series A. Through every raise, deal and market swing since, he’s turned the noise into a plan, killed what wasn’t working and got the whole team executing again.”
John Patrick Mullin · President · NVNM Digital

Your part: about a day of your time over 3 weeks, plus a couple of hours from each of your key people. I do the interviews, the analysis and the drafting. Your team builds the plan with me, so they run it without you chasing.

Plan my next 18 months

For Series A founders. In 30 minutes, you’ll know if this will move your numbers.

I’ve worked with 20+ founders in the months after their raise.

Now I work with Series A founders who have 18 months to hit the numbers they pitched.

  • AdvisorTo founders from seed to Series B and beyond
  • OperatorEmbedded at a post-Series A scale-up for 3+ years
  • BackgroundAccelerator lead, transformation officer, management consultant, skier
Jasper Polak · Voss, Norway
“Jasper’s been part of Cactus from before we served our first customer. Equity, operations, hiring, restructuring: every hard call has gone past him on the way to three locations in 18 months. When I have a legal problem, I call my lawyer. When I have a business problem, I call Jasper.”
Ole Henrik Sæve · Co-founder and CEO · Cactus

Before you start.

How much of my time does this take?

About a day over 3 weeks: a kickoff, a review of the draft plan, and the planning session with your team. Everything else is drafted for you.

Why not make a senior hire instead?

Plan first, then hire. A COO without a plan waits on you. The plan tells you if you need one, when, and what they’d own, so if you do hire, they know their job from day one.

Isn’t this what a fractional COO does?

A fixed scope, and no months of diagnosis first: a finished plan in 3 weeks, built with your own team, then 90 days of running it with you. I’ve spent 3+ years in the operator seat at a funded scale-up, making these calls with investors’ money on the line, and I’ve worked with 20+ founders on the moment you’re in now.

My investors already help. Why add someone?

Good, keep them close. This gives them a plan to back, built with the people who’ll run it, so every board update starts from progress against something they’ve already seen.

I have a deck and a model. Isn’t that the plan?

The deck is the promise. The plan turns it into work, order and owners, so your team moves without waiting on you and you can show your board exactly where you stand.

We’re staying lean. Isn’t this overhead?

It’s how you stay lean. Every hire and every dollar has to earn its place against a milestone, so you skip the expensive mistakes: the senior hire you didn’t need yet, and the spend that moves nothing.

Can’t I just do this with AI?

AI will write you a plan in 5 minutes. It won’t sit with your team, find where the deck and the people disagree, or make the hard calls with you, and those decide whether the plan gets run.

I already have a coach. Do I need this too?

Keep your coach. You have to grow as fast as the company does, and that’s their work. This is about the company: a plan your team runs, with an owner and a budget on every piece of work.

What if my team doesn’t buy in?

They build it with me, so it’s their plan and you’re not the one pushing it every week. If your leadership team doesn’t sign off on the plan at the week 3 planning session, I keep working at no extra cost until they do.

What does it cost?

A fixed fee, usually less than a recruiter’s fee for one senior hire. It depends on how many people are involved, and how much help you want running it in the 90 days. You’ll have the number before anything starts.

What happens after the 90 days?

Your team runs the plan and re-plans every quarter on the way to the next round. If you want me around for that, I stay on as an advisor.

When should I start?

Before the big hires and spend lock in, ideally in the first 90 days after your Series A.

We closed months ago. Am I too late?

No. Earlier is easier. If you’ve already hired ahead of a plan, the plan shows what each of those people should own now.

Who isn’t this for?

The Post-Raise Plan starts after a Series A. Haven’t raised yours yet? Come back after the round. And if you want advice without changing how you work, this won’t help.

I’m not in Europe. Does that work?

Yes. I’ve worked with clients from San Francisco to Hong Kong. Most of the work is async, and there’s always a time that works for a call.

Your next few weeks decide the next 18 months.

Closed your Series A? In 30 minutes you’ll know if this works for you, and what your 3 weeks look like.

Plan my next 18 months