12 simple questions to ask to quickly understand any business.

A screenshot essay pulled from the excellent meta question posed by @patrick_oshag.

As a thread, below.

The following questions will help to deeply understand a company as quickly as possible. But how you ask these questions is critical; stay simple, seek understanding, be brief. https://twitter.com/JimRaymount/status/1326228403536728066

To open the conversation:
1. What problem does the company solve? Why does this problem persist? - @jlowin

2. What’s the most important thing to understand about this business? - @JimRaymount

3. What is your special insight or edge? - @lpolovets

4. What is difficult about the business that someone inexperienced would find surprising? - @BrentBeshore

To dig into value creation:
5. Who loves your product? Who hates it? Why? - @vijaygoel

6. What is a feature request that you get a lot, but that you will never build? - @AliBHamed

To understand competition:
7. What are you doing that your competitors aren’t doing yet? - @FiveAcesCapital

8. Which current or potential competitors are you most worried about and how will you keep them at bay? - @lpolovets

9. If you had one bullet, which competitor would you shoot with it? - @Post_Market / @joshk

To understand operations:
10. Where's the mess? - @researchpuzzler

11. What are the 2-3 key metrics that management looks at to drive the business? - @matthuang

To close the conversation:
12. What is one thing we didn’t ask of bring up that you feel is important to properly understand the true potential here? - @asenkut / @felicis

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