Learning from start-ups

Leading your company through business innovation has many similarities with managing a start-up. You need to be able to identify market opportunities, create what’s not yet and pivot quickly when needed. This is harder to do in practice than it sounds, since 90% of all start-ups fail. The main reason for failure (according to research done by CB insight) is a lack of market need for the new offer (42%). However, not having the right team in place accounts for 23% of the failures.

But what is ‘the right team’? Jeroen Bertrams, a serial entrepreneur, shared the criteria he uses for investing in start-ups in his book on this topic. Interesting enough, the characteristics he describes are very close to what we see as prerequisites for successful business innovation. Diversity of the team, entrepreneurial experience and the quality of the teams’ network are on his list, but also personal traits like self-awareness (knowing your limits) and coachability. 

Have you ever considered evaluating your team to see how well-suited they are for business innovation, so you can design a leadership journey to fill the gaps?