Profit, Burn, and Focus: What Founders Need to Know About Metrics That Matter

When asked how startups should think about metrics, Co-Founder and CEO of 512 Financial, Bart Davis, has a refreshingly simple answer: pick the handful that keep you up at night and build systems around those first.

In this episode, recorded live at Austin Tech Week 2025, Bart explains the dangers of “metric bloat,” where companies track everything and understand nothing. He outlines how founders should evaluate their stage, identify the KPIs that truly drive outcomes, and avoid falling for shiny software tools that create reporting for reporting’s sake.

Host Nick Spiller and Bart also discuss the shift in the funding environment: why the “growth at all costs” era collapsed, how rising interest rates changed investor expectations, and why profitability and discipline matter more now than ever.

If you’re building a company and struggling to separate signal from noise, this episode offers a clean, concise roadmap for getting back to operational basics.

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