Start-Ups

A significant portion of my practice focuses on supporting start up entrepreneurs. 

Why Start-ups Fail
  • Inadequate skills on management team - this is mostly general management skills not technical
  • Lack of overall strategy or shifting strategies
  • Poor or conflicting buy-in to business goals and strategies
  • Poor planning, especially finances
  • Do not understand markets and customer requirements
  • No customers, just ideas for products or services
  • Lack of capital - poor cashflow and cash management
  • Inadequate partner/vendor development and management
Typical Work with Start-Ups
  • value proposition(s), market definition, money making model
  • product/service definition(s) - customer driven and validated
  • business plans for equity or loan funding
  • financial modeling
  • team formation
  • partner/supplier strategy
  • product development
  • focus, priorities, resource management
  • human resources- select, develop, prune
  • management skills
    • especially making meetings work and not just consume time
    • delegation
    • project and task management
    • financial management
My Background
  • Co-founder software company 
  • 12 years business coaching/management consulting to start-ups and small businesses
  • Fortune 500 - electronics - Augat Inc.
    • VP Marketing
    • Plant Manager
    • VP Customer Services
    • Product Manager
    • Engineer
  • Consulting lean manufacturing & supply chain business coaching
  • Director public-private consulting services to small manufacturers 

We focus on the most important steps for a start up business:

  • Build a strong sustainable business model that will make money from a specific set of customers through products or services that meet their needs.
  • Construct a team and partnerships that can sustain the business.
  • Understand the numbers: how much money is required to start and how much money will flow out before positive cashflow brings it back in?
  • What is the marketing strategy and sales process to find and land customers – typically this is the hardest step.

My start up business coaching uses strong, interactive, supportive methods that produces real results for you at both the business and personal levels.

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