High-Growth Business Development:

Start-Up Phase

Venture Management

Managing Early-Stage Ventures – an Entrepreneurial Way

 

 

"A venture is most prone to failure during its first three years of operation - the so-called 'valley of death'. A key to getting through these early years is to avoid the obvious mistakes."  

Ё from 'Devising Venture Strategies', Invest-Tech Ltd. 

 

 

Venture Management Laws

for the New Rapidly Changing Economy

Technology:

If you understand it, it's obsolete.

Strategy:

If it's static, it's obsolete.

Training:

If it's certified, it's obsolete.

LEAD Learn, Experiment, Adapt, Differentiati if you wish to win in today's hyper-competitive marketplace!

 

Balanced Business System Innovation System Sustainable Corporate Growth Fast Company Differentiation Strategies Competitive Strategies 25 Lessons from Jack Welch: Cultivate Leaders Employee Empowerment Diversification Strategies Injecting Relentless Growth Attitude High-Growth Business Development: Maturity Stage High-Growth Business Development: Expansion Stage High-Growth Business Development: Growth High-Growth Business Development: Inception Stage Retaining Customers Differentiation Strategy Venture Planning Sustainable Competitive Advantage Business Plan for High-Growth Start-ups Vadim Kotelnikov Quotes Rolling Out Brand Management Venture Management Ten3 Business e-Coach: why, what, and how Business Model Management Team Raising Venture Capital Coaching Corporate Leader Managing Business Through Different Growth Stages Venture Management - High-Growth Business development Roadmap

 

10 Commandments of Innovation

  • Take risk: Take entrepreneurial action – nothing venture, nothing win... More

12 Reasons Why Companies Fail

By Terry Collison

  1. Inadequate planning of the business

  2. Inadequate planning of the business

  3. Inadequate planning of the business

  4. Insufficient initial capital for the start-up period and development stages due to inadequate planning... More

Skills and Specific Expertise

Required for Early-Stage Venture Management

7 Characteristics of Successful Entrepreneurial Firms

By: NBIA

Estee Lauder: 15 Rules for Entrepreneurial Success

4 Entrepreneurial Strategies

By: Peter Drucker

 

Five "Key Risks" Critical to the Survival of New Companies

By Terry Collison

Development risk

– Can the product or service actually be created?

Manufacturing risk

– If the product can be developed, can it actually be produced in appropriate volume?

Marketing risk

– If the product can be made, can it be sold effectively?

Financial risk

– If the product can be sold effectively, will the resulting company be profitable and can the profits actually be realized in a form that allows investors to receive cash?

Growth risk

– If the company can achieve operating profitability at one level, can profitability be maintain as the company evolves?

Guidelines for Getting (and Keeping) Funding

Venture Financing

Key Documentation To Be Prepared by the Entrepreneur

 

10 Commandments for Building a Growing Business

  • The Customer is King. Define the business of the enterprise in terms of what is to be bought, precisely by whom, and why. Avoid disaster by testing the market prior to development of a product... More

Five Major Elements of Strategic Business Planning

By: Michael Porter

  1. an analysis of the industry in which the firm competes

  2. sources of competitive advantage... More

 

Venture Management versus Corporate Management

Management of the venture-building process is fundamentally different  from corporate management that is focused on delivering the annual operating plan.

Management of a new high-growth business is built around a  customer-driven idea or a technology. It requires entrepreneurial mindset and skills. Being first to the market is the top priority for the venture manager.

Your core competence, the ability to move quickly from idea to market, is a key enabler of business success... More

Entrepreneur: 10 Action Roles

Market Focus

What makes a venture succeed is the ability to identify emerging attractive markets and to seize on unmet, unserved customer needs. Successful business is ruled not by the founders' decisions, but by the marketplace. And the marketplace, in turn, is ruled by "fears and passions". People will only buy what they want to buy, or are afraid not to buy. And these "fears and passions" change every day.

Customer Success 360

"Selling is not about content, it is about fit."5 The analysis of the market potential and search for the right fit separates the inventor from the entrepreneur. Have the market researched, and develop an effective marketing, advertising and selling strategy. Build a prototype and test market your product or service; identify the price at what you could sell it.

Hot markets do not last forever. So, be prepared to adapt quickly to the market changes. The market focus means flexibility: watch the market dynamics, spot what has gone wrong, and move quickly to turn market changes and your errors into opportunities.

Creating customers and better servicing them is the true purpose of enterprise. In today's highly competitive world with many players, "you need to be able to articulate your competitive advantage in a matter of minutes, if not seconds. If you cannot, you will lose your prospective customer's attention, and the business4". Your effective positioning strategy will help you to get seen and heard in the overcrowded marketplace.

New Business Model

"The classic business model that has dictated the structure of every company from General Motors to Microsoft is so at odds with contemporary economic currents that is must and will disappear."2 Traditional corporations are overstructured, overcontrolled, and overmanaged, but underled. Top managers should rather concentrate of that handful of real managerial leadership tasks that will bring success in the future. Thus, a new business model is emerging, a model where "most of key missions of the organization are distributed to the myriad individual pieces and unity comes from the vigor of people and the free flow of knowledge, not a burdensome central headquarters."2... More

Management Focus

It's impossible to grow a successful business as a one-person operation. Sooner or later, you will have to share responsibility with one or more partners.

Thomas Alva Edison, an inventive genius who took out more than 1000 patents, started several great companies. However, every one of them collapsed once it got to middle size, and was saved only by booting Edison himself out and replacing him with professional management.

 

You cannot achieve success with a Class A idea and Class B management. Turning a great idea into a great business requires professional managers and market experts. In case you cannot afford top management, you would need to build your management team from within, developing their own management skills.

The core team should be picked very carefully because its business and interpersonal style becomes the foundation of the company's culture and grows the value system. They should have an impressive track record, skills, and depth of experience in the areas most important to the sustainable competitive advantage of the company.  Don't settle for a few average employees - "if you want a track team to win the high jump, you find one person who can jump seven feet, not seven people who can jump one foot."

When building your management team, remember also that top-quality people often emerge from bankruptcies. Prior bankruptcy experience is valuable - failure has its rewards. It is often better to hire a leader who learned from mistakes than it is to hire someone who was just lucky.

Strategic Focus

There are several types of strategies followed by successful companies. A careful study in this area will help you to sort out the kind of your enterprise strategy that could be used best. Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats (SWOT) analysis is to be carried out to define your company's sustainable competitive advantage areas and develop an appropriate business strategy to capitalize on it.

Strengths and weaknesses of the venture's major competitors need also to be assessed. Having that exercise completed, you must position your company and its first products against its prime competitors. Positioning is very hard work, and you may need to call for help from a start-up consultant, a marketing expert, or an experienced business executive.

Your strategic thinking, vision, and business strategy development exercise need to be supported by a set of analytical techniques.

The currently dominant view of business strategy – resource-based theory – is based on the concept of economic rent and the view of the company as a collection of capabilities. This view of strategy has a coherence and integrative role that places it well ahead of other mechanisms of strategic decision making.7

Financial Focus

Many ventures fail because they fail to understand capital requirements of their growing business. Focus on your cash flow and start preparing for the next stage of venture financing well in advance.

Venture Financing Process

Make the Best of the Venture Capital Obtained

Obtaining venture funding is really only the beginning. Along with your funding, your level of accountability just shot up dramatically. If you received your capital from investors, someone else now owns a part of your business. And they will want to be reassured that they're getting their money's worth... More

 

 Discover much more in the

FULL VERSION of e-Coach

Building a High-Growth Firm...

The Five Critical Success Factors for New Ventures...

Venture Planning...

DOs and DON'Ts of a Successful Innovator...

Managing Radical Innovation Projects...

How To Succeed in Business...

Manage Less, Lead More...

Building a Management Team...

Opportunity-driven Business Development...

Discovering Opportunities...

Pursuing Opportunities...

The Seven Skills of Competing...

Volatility Leadership...

Fast Company...

Competing Focus...

e-Ventures...

 Case in Point  Michael Dell...

 Case in Point  Steve Jobs...

 Case in Point  Infosys...

 Case in Point  Compaq...

 

 

 

References:

  1. Venture Catalyst, Donald L. Laurie

  2. Project Manager's MBA, Cohen E. Graham

  3. High Tech Start Up, John L. Nesheim

  4. Money Hunting, Miles Spenser and Cliff Ennico

  5. Entrepreneur's Primer on Marketing, Advertising, and Selling, Terry Collison

  6. The Seven Deadly Skills of Competing, James Essinger and Helen Wylie

  7. Strategic Management - Competitiveness and Globalization, M.A. Hint et al

  8. Leading on the Edge off Chaos, Emmet C. Murphy and Mark A. Murphy

  9. Direct from Dell, Michael Dell with Catherine Fredman

  10. How to Write a Great Business Plan, by William A. Sahlman

  11. E-Myth, Michael Gerber

  12. Angel Investing, Osnabrugge, M.V., and Robinson, R.J.,

  13. Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Peter Drucker

Venturepreneur

5 Critical Success Factors for New Ventures

Finding a New Business Idea

Business e-Coach for Start-Ups

Growth Categories of Small Firms

Milestone Chart

Venture Management vs Corporate Management

How To Succeed In Business

2 Rules for Business Start-Ups

7 Simple Steps to Small Business Success

10 Commandments for Building a Growing Business

Management Team

New Product Development

Why New Products Fail?

New-To-The-World Product Development

Business Model

New Business Models

Venture Financing

Step-by-Step Guide to Obtaining Venture Capital

What Are the Venture Capitalists' Investment Criteria?

Key Documentation To Be Prepared By the Entrepreneur

Venture Presentation: 8 Issues in 8 Minutes

Business Plan DOs and DON"Ts

Making the Best of the Venture Capital Obtained

Competitive Strategies

Sustainable Competitive Advantage

3 Strategies of Market Leaders

Venture Strategies

Radical Innovation

Fast Company

Inspirational Leadership: 10 Roles