Know your runway without a $10k/month CFO

Six months ago I had no idea how much runway I had left.

Not roughly. Not "somewhere between 8 and 12 months." I genuinely didn't know. Revenue was coming in, expenses were going out, and I was too deep in product to sit down with a spreadsheet and figure it out properly.

I told myself I'd do it next week. Every week.

The thing about not knowing your runway is that it doesn't feel urgent until it suddenly is.

When I finally ran the numbers, I had 4.5 months left. Not the 8+ I'd been assuming. I'd been making hiring decisions, signing annual contracts, and spinning up paid acquisition - all based on vibes.

The "obvious" solution people kept suggesting was a fractional CFO. Starts at $5k/month. The decent ones want $10k+. That's more than my MRR at the time.

So I started poking around for what founders actually do instead.

Here's what I found works for the pre-revenue or early-revenue stage:

1. Separate your known burn from your variable burn: Fixed costs (salaries, subscriptions, rent) are easy. The chaos is in the variable stuff - contractors, ads, tools you forgot you signed up for. List them separately.

2. Build one number you check weekly: Not a full P&L. Just the cash in bank ÷ monthly burn = months left. Put it in a Notion widget or a phone shortcut. Make it impossible to avoid.

3. Model two scenarios, not one: "If nothing changes" and "if we sign the deal we're chasing." Most founders only model the optimistic case.

4. Set a trigger, not a goal. "If runway drops below 6 months, I start fundraising / cut X / do Y." Having the rule in advance means you don't freeze when it happens.

None of this is revolutionary. But actually doing it consistently is what most of us avoid.

I'm building a tool around this problem — basically the financial visibility layer that sits between "I have a bookkeeper" and "I can afford a fractional CFO." Early days and would love feedback from anyone who's felt this pain.

What did you do to get your head around finances in the early days? Spreadsheet? Tool? Just vibes and prayer?
#finance, #runway, #bootstrapped, #early-stage, #lessons-learned