'R'factors of your Startup

As a community, we are witnessing more unicorns than ever before. It's awesome to see many first-time entrepreneurs scaling their startups and achieving extremely successful exits. Today world over there are more IPOs coming from the first-generation startups than the conventional second or third generation entrepreneur-led companies. However, if there are more first-time founders scaling such phenomenal success, why has one metric in the startup world not changed for over 2 decades, even today, over 95% of startups fail? So what is it that a few are doing differently that others are not? 

There are many factors that has led to this phenomenon of mega successful first time founders, and some of the factors I am going to talk about today are the R factors, pretty much basics, but most first time founders still end up ignoring or just don't pay enough attention to. Before we talk about these 'R' factors, let us agree that success is always a result of collective force and not of one person and hence each of the 'R's here are essential to have for a founder if she wants their startup to be successful and the metrics we spoke about tilts the balance in favour of a higher percentage of successful startups. So let us understand each of these 'R' factors, pretty much the assets every founder must possess.

First and foremost in our startup, we need to have an ideatoR. This is where it all begins. Look closely within yourself as a founder and around you within your startup. There is surely an idea, but is it being validated enough scientifically? Idea validation is a serious business and deserves the attention of the founder and the core team. This is the first stepping stone towards what we call a marathon to a successful exit. Having a brilliant idea is usually a huge misconception amongst the founders, as they believe the idea is brilliant without validating whether their market thinks alike. There are various methods and tools available for scientifically carrying out the idea validation, which include customer validation, market validation, value proposition assessment, etc. See if you can get hold of these tools and methods to carry out the idea validation and market assessment, if not then seek professional support from an incubator or a mentor who can help your startup, start up right.

Once your idea is validated and you are ready to begin your trek. At this stage, what your startup needs the most is a believeR, search within. The believer needs to come from not just the founding team or the core team, but each and every member of the team. This is the time when the founders are forming the core team. The core team needs to have a strong belief in the proposition of being able to make their startup idea a huge success. Once the believer in the team is uniformly imbued in each and every DNA strain of the startup team, the founder has ensured that she is on the right track as envisaged. At this stage, the founder also needs a mentor who guides her at each and every step and ensures necessary course correction, as it is extremely likely for distractions, obstacles, and diversions to happen. It is never a bad idea to get an advisor or try to form an advisory board early in your startup, either through your own network or through an enabler to get that additional cementing on the foundation. 

The core is now in place, and it's time to create a body around this core. The product or the service is the cornerstone of your startup, and the founder must not compromise at all in creating a well-crafted body of her startup. The founder now needs a creatoR to start putting together the nuts and bolts and create that MWP (minimum winnable product) to start testing the markets and be out there. Now is the time when everyone is closely watching you, aware or unaware, and this is the crucial time when the founder needs to do a lot beyond just MVP. Things like financial model, business model, execution model, or go-to-market need to be put in place while keeping a firm eye on milestones and goals. It's ideal to be able to build the entire creator unit in-house; however, many founders find it too time-consuming, unmanageable, and thus frustrating to build the creator unit. Time and perfection are the two most valuable currencies at this stage, and hence, it is always a good idea to take external professional help to get some of these jobs done. During the MVP stage, even outsourcing product development isn't a bad idea, as you are only rolling out the proof of concept or a level up. 

The next R's are all external interventions and supports that a founder needs for her startup to take off on the right trajectory of growth and build traction during the first 12-18 months, a typical phase within which 95% of the startups witness failure, and the remaining 5% move on a path to scale. Hence, it is critical for the founder to cross this phase with the perfect foundation that her startup needs. It is ironic that founders often do not focus much on their title itself, and I quote - founder is not just about founding but also about the foundation. For a strong foundation of her business, the founder also needs to have strong fundamentals and nuances of a startup business in place. Even while you, as a founder, end up delegating or outsourcing a lot of tasks, it is imperative for the founder to be on top of understanding each and every aspect. It is a great idea for a founder to join a good acceleratoR. Look for an accelerator program that provides holistic and in-depth coaching, has the required resources to mentor, develop products, provide subject matter expertise, and is able to help you create a board. In some cases, you may also be able to find the accelerator with the support systems to soft land you in global markets. It is typically a competitive assessment-based intake in most accelerators that work only on an equity model and are unable to support a large number of startups, however you may look for accelerator programs that focus on a curriculum/framework-based structured coaching and also enable your startup through services they provide. 

As a startup founder, your biggest investment is in yourself, building your knowledge and capabilities. Once you have all the above R's checked on your list, the next two R's (we are not going to talk about these in this discussion), i.e., investoR and customeR, will be a certainty for your startup.