Coaching

Focus on what matters.

Tackle your challenges. Erase procrastination and
become a Rested, Exceptional founder.
All possible with Melissa.

Testimonials

Founder 281

“She was very intentional about how to help. She gave me guidelines for how much to fundraise. She also gave me an idea of how to get introductions from other founders. She was overall extremely helpful and I would recommend her to anyone that needs help for fundraising.”

Founder 79

“No vanity or general advice. She was extremely specific about how I should get the warm intro and how I should write the intro blurb. That is super helpful.”

Founder 13

“She was very tactical and had done it before, I found her insightful and motivating. She also offered to introduce me to someone I’ve been looking to speak to”

Founder 168

“Melissa gave me a textbook’s worth of information related to fundraising strategy. She gave clear and direct guidance for not only how I should prepare for my fundraise but also how I should position myself.”

What Melissa does

Melissa offers executive coaching to top tier founders. You choose the agenda. Her top 4 areas of expertise are

Fundraising Traction / PMF / GTM Operational Excellence (OKRs / KPIs) Confident & authentic B2B sales

Fundraising Bootcamp

1:1 Coaching

Intro Call to Learn More

Factors to consider when picking a coach

What does it look like to work with Melissa?

	Fundraising Coaching	Traction Coaching	Ops & Sales Coaching
What is it?	1:1 bi-weekly 50-min coaching sessions Best if only for the cofounder who is raising Preparation Prospecting Pipeline Payoff	1:1 bi-weekly 50-min coaching sessions Can include 1 other co-founder for extra fee 2-week sprints to drive growth Accountability partner to hit key metrics Preparation for full fundraising round	1:1 bi-weekly 50-min coaching sessions Can include co-founder(s) for extra fee(s) Focus areas tend to include: team composition & expansion, managing your team, measuring your success, maximizing your success, growth toward next targets / fundraising round, etc.
Who is it for?	Pre-seed & Seed Pre-seed & Seed Founders raising $1M $5M USD especially from Bay Area VCs Have raised min. $500k USD before Still have >4 months of runway left Have some idea about first target market with clear traction and some level of predictable, consistent growth	Founders looking to raise a pre-seed or seed within the next 6-8 months Have raised min. $500k USD beforev Still have >6 months of runway left Have an MVP (ok even if unscalable human-based MVP) Have some hypotheses about first target market that need to be tested	At a clear inflection point in the business: growing headcount, growing sales, just closed a fundraising round Have raised min. $2M USD before Usually Seed or Series A funded founders Founders looking for a trusted, knowledge- able, and experienced advisor for all the sensitive topics you aren’t ready to go to your investors about yet
How do I get started?	Book an intro call here to discuss your needs, pricing, and fit. Apply to Fundraising Bootcamp	Book an intro call here to discuss your needs, pricing, and fit.	Book an intro call here to discuss your needs, pricing, and fit.
Why	Fundraising is hard, especially right now. There are certain processes & systems you can use to speed up your process and keep it streamlined. Having a trusted, knowledgeable, experienced advisor to be a sounding board along the way can be hugely helpful. Will get into the details of everything: from language in emails to content in supplementary documents, and more.	Because you cannot fundraise until you have solid traction, especially in these times. This area of focus came about from founders who originally wanted fundraising coaching, but Melissa felt that they needed to strengthen their traction first. Having a trusted, knowledgeable, experienced advisor to prioritize your KPIs will keep you focussed on what actually moves the needle. Melissa is also an accountability partner to ensure everything you do is in service of these metrics.	This is for founders who’ve had some success with traction & fundraising, and now need to step-up their executive leadership game. You bring your most pressing and sensitive issues to Melissa for confidential, savvy advice. Melissa will help you think through your biggest challenges and come up with a plan on how to disseminate that information to relevant stakeholders (aka tell your investors in the right way at the right time). Often includes: sales funnel analysis, sales funnel optimization, calendar audit, team performance metrics, managing rapidly growing teams, executive presence, leadership growth, etc.

Meet Melissa

Melissa Kargiannakis is an executive coach to world-class founders. Her 4 core areas of expertise are: (1) fundraising, (2) traction / GTM / PMF, (3) operational excellence (OKRs/KPIs), and (4) confident & authentic B2B sales.

Over the years, she’s coached 302 founders, who awarded her an NPS of 96. With 76% of founders giving her a perfect 10/10. Founders say: “very tactical and had done it before,” “no vanity or generic advice,” “a textbook’s worth of information,” “clear and direct guidance”.

Beyond coaching, Melissa has won awards from The Queen of England, the Top 100 Most Powerful Women in Canada, and Top 20 Most Innovative Companies in Canada. All before 30. People say that she exemplifies tenacity, grit, and impressive intellectual horsepower. Melissa has also worked in public health, at the largest innovation centre in Canada, published her Master’s science research, and sits on various nonprofit boards in the USA, UK, and Canada since 2015.

All of these achievements are built on a foundation of an insatiable work ethic, sense of excellence, and clear life purpose is to rebalance power in society.

As a former founder herself, Melissa knows what it takes to raise multiple rounds in the Bay Area for an AI / NLP start-up and grow to a team of 23 with large banks and insurance companies as paying customers.

Lately, she keeps a limited roster of high caliber coaching clients which you can apply to join here.