Business, Getting Started
By on

Toolkit: The Go-to Source for Tips and To-Dos Entrepreneurs – Scaling UP

Toolkit: The Go-to Source for Tips and To-Dos Entrepreneurs – Scaling UP

Rev1’s Entrepreneur Toolkit is a handy, easy-to-use collection of practical tips and tools curated especially for entrepreneurs and founding teams. Think of the Toolkit as an online extension of the company-building instruction delivered in Rev1’s investor startup studio.

Using the language of entrepreneurship, the Toolkit matches milestones, risks, and critical success factors to each stage of startup growth. These blogs teach entrepreneurs what to do and how to do it.

Scaling Up Blogs – These blogs dive deeper into specific topics that become increasingly relevant as a company continues to scale. Likely, you will return to this list time and again.

Board of Directors · Sources of Capital · Talent Attraction ·  Customers

In Pre-seed, Seed, and even early Growth stages, meeting milestones and achieving breakeven always through the filter of reducing risk. That’s because every startup has to find ways to navigate the so named “valley of death,”—achieving significant milestones that lead to growth before the resources of money, time, sheer will, and energy run out.

However, when a business begins  to scale up, it’s a different mindset. Scaling up is all about increasing risk and adding complexity. With equity investors, a Board of Directors, and additional employees, day-to-day operations are more complex. Process becomes critical.

These Toolkit blogs contain detailed information that entrepreneurs will read and re-read as they take the risks required to scale.

Board of Directors 

  1. Early Steps Toward Effective Board Relationships – Laying the foundation for effective board relationships begins before the company ever has a board. Start here.
  2. 5 Steps to Building a World-class Board of Directors…Here’s How You Start – There’s a lot of learn about building and working with a Board of Directors. Whether you believe that a Board of Directors is one of the most powerful assets that any entrepreneur or startup can have or whether you believe that a Board of Directors is an adversary, you are right. Take it from baseball great Yogi Berra.
  1. 5 Tips to Help You Build the Best Board for Your Company – The “right” Board is an asset that doesn’t show up on the balance sheet. Seek advice from trusted advisors and mentors. Talk to other entrepreneurs and company founders. Diverse Boards achieve better results.
  1. 14 Rules for Leading a Successful Board Meeting – Be organized. Avoid “show and tell.” Know the financials inside and out. Be honest. Listen. Don’t try to fake anything. Plus 10 more tips.

Sources of Capital

  1. Rules for Startups Raising Capital in the Midwest – This multi-part Toolkit series is based on Rev1 Ventures’ Capital Access Learning Lab. A complete and powerful capital-raising how-to guide. Get started now.
  2. An Overview of Capital Topics –Building and fulfilling a capital plan is at the top of every high-growth entrepreneur’s list. Assign this easy-to-read series to your founding management team. When it comes to raising scale-up capital, it pays to get everyone on the same page.
  1. Capital Access Planning – How to define a business plan, capital plan, and exit strategy. The details may shift one way or the other, but when it comes to the dance of capital, the steps don’t change. Get lessons here.
  1. 5 Tips to Prepare Your Startup to Raise Capital – Raising capital and preparing to raise capital are two different things. Preparation begins long before your first investor pitch. Learn how to match capital sources to milestones here.
Talent Attraction
  1. College Internships: A Fast Track to Talent for Entrepreneurs – Scaling startups are seeking talent in the most challenging hiring market in recent history. The Rev1 Innovation Internship Program is a fast and very cost-effective for high-growth startups to hire exceptional talent. 2023 Fall Cohort dates: September 18 to December 8. Submit your role description to get started here.
  2. Tool: 37 Sample Interview Questions to Discover Candidate’s Values, Skills, and Goals – Identify qualified, diverse candidates who fit your culture with intentional interview questions that uncover the information you need to know. Get the tool.
  3. How to Define a Sourcing Strategy for a Single Role – This guide will help you define an appropriate sourcing strategy for each different role in your scaleup plans. Get the tool.
  4. 5 Common Missteps to Avoid When Building a Team – There’s no period in the life of a company when the next new hire has more impact than when a startup is scaling up. It’s easier to reinvent a feature set than it is to untangle the adverse effects of the “wrong” first team. Avoid these mistakes.

Customers

  1. Entrepreneurship Is All About Customers – Connecting with customers takes time. Make customers the pivot point from day one by creating a prototype of the ideal customer. Use that prototype to identify early adopters and build relationships that lead to sales. Here’s how.
  2. Helping Entrepreneurs Find First Customers – The “first customer” experience is a learning curve for every new company. Customers make scaling startups do everything better. Learn how Rev1 can help scaling companies connect with corporate customers.
  3. Signing Up First Customers, the Holy Grail of Startup Success – Scaling startups use their connections and their connections’ connections to open doors. Then they build the kind of partnerships that cause their customers to tell the world.
  4. People Buy from People They Like – If you want your customers to like you, you have to like them first. Customers are human beings. They have budgets and pressures. Sometimes their well-intended decisions get reversed. Anticipate how you can help. Your fate is yoked to theirs.

Rev1 Ventures can help your company progress from growth to scale. Contact us to learn more.