Startup Finance & Runway

How it works

The mechanics of this kit, plainly — what runs and when, where the data lands, and what you look at.

• Monthly close runs the 1st of each month · 8am and keeps the Runway dashboard fresh. The 1st of each month — recomputes the burn and the runway, weights the pipeline, and writes the note saying what it all rests on.
• Invoice cross-check runs mondays · 9am. Mondays — checks the money you have been told arrived against the money the ledger shows arriving.
• What is captured lands in the Finance ledger record, which lives at Data/Finance Ledger in your vault — yours to open, search, and edit like any other file.
• What is captured lands in the Company balance snapshots record, which lives at Data/Company Balance Snapshots in your vault — yours to open, search, and edit like any other file.
• The Runway dashboard reads from the record and shows, at a glance: in the bank · net burn, last full month · gross burn, last full month · months left · where the cash is heading · what went out, month by month · net, month by month · cash, as recorded · weighted pipeline — value x your own odds · what you hold, snapshot by snapshot · the scenario note · the ledger — every line · how this board works.

The wiring, in one breath: Export ingest writes to Finance ledger · Finance capture writes to Finance ledger · Monthly close writes to Finance ledger · Export ingest records Company balance snapshots · Finance capture records Company balance snapshots · Finance ledger shown by Runway · Company balance snapshots shown by Runway · Runway kept fresh by Monthly close · Finance ledger checked by Invoice cross-check · Monthly close run by Cairn · Invoice cross-check run by Cairn · Cairn holds Export ingest · Cairn holds Finance capture.

Getting the most from it

A kit earns its place when it changes what you look at and what you say, not when it is installed. This is the rhythm that makes it pay.

• Look at Runway on the first of the month, after the Monthly close has run. In the bank and Months left are the two figures — and Months left always carries its basis beside it, so read that clause before you repeat the number to anyone.
• Drop the export in as soon as it exists. An accounting export, a bookkeeping report or a bank statement anywhere in your vault is all Export ingest needs; it reads the columns back to you before it files anything, so a misread never becomes a month of wrong burn.
• Say the cash position whenever you know it — “we’re at 176k this morning” — and Finance capture puts a snapshot on the record. That single line is what keeps Cash, as recorded honest between exports, and it is the one thing no file can tell you on a Tuesday.
• Read the two bars as a pair: What went out is spending alone, Net is spending less what came in. A month above the line on Net and a big bar on What went out together mean a heavy month that still paid for itself — which is a different decision from a heavy month that did not.
• Give your deals a probability you actually believe, on your deal book. Cairn never sets one, and a deal with no probability is simply left out of the weighted figure — so an unfilled column quietly shrinks the runway rather than inflating it.
• Ask Cairn the what-ifs rather than doing them on paper: “what happens to the runway if that hire starts in November”. You get the arithmetic and every assumption it used, and never a recommendation — the decision stays yours, and nothing here is financial advice.

Make it yours

Nothing here is fixed. The pieces are ordinary agents, routines, records and dashboards, so anything you know about shaping those applies. Retire whatever earns nothing.

Things people usually change first

Say any of these in chat, or edit them on the kit’s page in the app.

• Where the numbers come from — which tool or bank, and whether a statement arrives by email at all. Said once, that line is the close’s entire outside reach; without it the Kit reads nothing beyond 1Presence.
• The column layout of your export, agreed once, so the next file reads itself without a question.
• The stated monthly burn, updated whenever it changes — it is only used until the ledger has real months to measure, and the board says which it is using.
• When the close runs, and whether the Monday cross-check runs at all — both can be retimed, paused or removed, and the records stay yours either way.

Your first run

Installing starts a short setup conversation — not a form. Answer roughly, correct later.

1. Adding the Kit ends in a conversation with Cairn, not a run — because the first figures live in your head, not in an account anything can read. It asks three things: roughly what is in the bank today, what a normal month costs and what makes it up, and where your numbers usually come from — an accounting tool, a bank, your accountant’s email.
2. The cash figure is written to your balance snapshots as you say it, and that single row is what draws the board. The monthly costs are recorded as your own stated figure rather than turned into transactions nobody made — so until a real export lands, the runway rests on what you said, and every panel that uses it says so.
3. Near the end Cairn mentions once that the books close on the 1st, and that the close will ask at its first run whether it may look in your email for the newest statement or export. Nothing in the setup conversation asks for access to anything; that answer is yours to give later, and the whole Kit works by hand if it is no.
4. Stop whenever you like. One balance figure already draws a board, and while the record is still empty the way back in stays offered — quietly, on Cairn’s chat entry, the Kit page and the board itself. Cairn never raises it.
5. After that: drop an export or a statement into your vault and Export ingest reads it into the ledger. On the 1st the Monthly close measures the burn from those real months, redraws the runway with your pipeline weighted in, writes the scenario note and leaves one card. On Mondays the Invoice cross-check puts your invoice book beside the ledger — and stays completely quiet if there is nothing that does not line up, or if you do not keep an invoice book at all.

Watch the first pass, then tell it what you would have done differently — that correction teaches it more than any setup could.

The essentials

Learning, preferences and run costs work the same in every kit — so they are covered once, in the Kits guide.

Living with a Kit — the Kits guide →

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