Templates Archives - Malloy Industries

The Science Behind Winning Pitch Decks

Most CEOs treat a pitch deck as pure art: tell your story, and hope. But there's a proven structure to the decks that get funded. After DocSend analyzed thousands of fundraising decks, clear patterns emerged in slide order, content, and where investors actually spend their attention. Pair that structure with your story, and you get a deck that works. What the Data Shows DocSend's research found that investors spend an average of about 3.5 minutes on an entire deck, and the most successful decks run roughly 12 sections across about 19 slides, in an order that tells one cohesive story:

Two business professionals reviewing documents together

When Good Hires Go Off Track: Your Performance Improvement Plan Guide

Have you ever found yourself in that uncomfortable position where a key leader or team member just isn’t measuring up? You’ve had the conversations, provided informal feedback, nothing changed, and now you’re considering that dreaded next step: the Performance Improvement Plan (PIP). PIPs can sometimes turn things around, but they often signal the beginning of the end for that working relationship. In fact, studies show that approximately 70% of employees placed on PIPs eventually leave the organization, either voluntarily or involuntarily. We’re here to help you with a template for your PIP and guidance for the 70% that don’t turn

Why Investor Updates Matter More Than You Think

A monthly investor update is one of the highest-return habits a fundraising CEO has, and most either skip it or do it badly. Done well, it builds trust, keeps supporters engaged, and turns a "no, not yet" into a future "yes." Here's what to send, who to send it to, and why timing matters. (The complete playbook is in Your Guide for Fundraising.) What to Say in Your Update Keep a consistent structure (a tool like Paperstreet.vc makes it easy). Open with a one-sentence reminder of your company name (linked) and what you do; busy supporters back many startups and

Crowdfunding Toolkit

The Crowdfunding Toolkit will equip you with all the templates and guidance you need to prepare to launch a successful crowdfunding campaign. Malloy Industries has helped dozens of companies raise several hundred thousand dollars using this crowdfunding toolkit. You can make copies of everything in the crowdfunding toolkit to set yourself up for success. Crowdfunding Toolkit from Malloy Industries Master Contact List Template START HERE by making a copy and filling in the contact info of everyone you’ve ever met broken up into 3 tiers (more info below) to reach out before the campaign launches for pre-commits Tim Ferris Blog:

A manager welcoming a new team member on their first day

Onboarding Plan for New Team Members

A new hire's first week sets the tone for their whole tenure, and "show up and figure it out" is how you lose good people early. A real onboarding plan starts the moment they accept the offer and carries through their first day, week, and month. Below is what a strong plan covers, plus the templates to build yours fast. Get the Templates Onboarding Plan for New Team Member Template: start here for a cohesive first-day, first-week, and first-month experience. Checklists for Internship Host Companies: before, during, and after the internship. Start, During, and Close-of-Business Checklists for setting communication and

Grant Writing: Tips, a Proposal Format, and Where to Find Funders

A strong grant application is part storytelling and part discipline: you have to make a funder believe in your mission and prove you'll spend their money exactly as promised. This guide gives you the practical tips, a proposal format many institutional funders accept, and a starting list of funders to research. Tips That Win Grants Start early, and read the guidelines, then follow them exactly. Know the funder: match your project to their published priorities before you write a word. Make the summary stellar; many reviewers decide there. State plainly why this funder should support this request, ask for a

Accounting 101 for CEOs: The Three Statements You Need to Read

You don't have to be an accountant, but you do need to read three documents: the balance sheet, the income statement, and the cash flow statement. Together they tell you what you own, whether you're making money, and whether you'll have cash to cover next month. This guide explains each, and the free templates below let you build your own. Why Should a CEO Care About Accounting? Because the numbers are how you see the business clearly. They tell you when to hire, whether a price change worked, and how long your cash will last. CEOs who can read their

Illustration of a person fitting puzzle pieces together among charts and a stopwatch, representing scoping a technology project

Technology Project Brief: How to Tell Developers What You Want

The fastest way to waste money on software is to hand a developer a vague idea and hope. A good technology project brief fixes that: it lets you explain, in plain English, exactly what you want built and why, so a developer or agency can scope it accurately and you get what you pictured. Why a Brief Saves You Time and Money Most founder-developer friction comes from a fuzzy starting point. Without a brief, you get guesses, scope creep, and a build that misses the point, then you pay to redo it. Twenty minutes spent writing a clear brief up

Laptop with colorful app icons flying out of the screen, representing a company's software subscriptions

Software Subscriptions Audit: Stop Paying for Tools You Don’t Use

Every growing company quietly bleeds cash through software it forgot it's paying for: the tool one person trialed, the seats you stopped using, the annual plan that auto-renewed. A subscription audit finds that money, and it's one of the fastest ways to cut burn without touching anything that matters. Why Audit Your Subscriptions New tools get added constantly, old ones rarely get cancelled, and no one owns the total. Left alone, it inflates your monthly burn rate, the number that determines your runway. Cutting unused software is pure margin: it drops straight to the bottom line with zero downside. The

The $10K matrix: skill against leverage, from $10 work to $10K work

The $10K Productivity Framework: How to Spend Your Time on What Matters Most

Not all work is worth the same effort and time. The $10K framework, created by Khe Hy of RadReads, sorts your tasks by how much long-term value they create, so you can spend more time on the few things that move your business and less on the busywork that feels productive but isn't. What Is "$10k Work"? Khe Hy scores tasks on two axes: how much skill they take and how much leverage they create. That gives four buckets, from $10 work (low skill, low leverage, like manual data entry) up to $10K work (high skill, high leverage, like setting