1. Organizational Design
Planning the ideal organization structure to operate under the best conditions is an important management function, more particularly in young organizations that achieve no gain in mimicking existing organization models. At each step of the development stage, fundamental shifts in roles and lines of communication are necessary to optimize the effectiveness of the organization. An incisive design must take into consideration the position of outside experts to give a true picture of the flow of information leading to decision making.
We found that too often an organization structure is the result of successive additions of new functions affixed on an existing diagram, instead of being the result of a proactive approach to execution of a vision. Because startups lack resources, it is common for any member of the team to wear many hats. It is imperative that the organization adapts to the expertise of each. Mapping this expertise in the way that best achieves corporate goals is a service J&M Lab highly recommends. A relevant organizational design should uniquely characterize a company.
2. Hiring & Training: creating an organization culture
Since the early days of venture capital, it has been a given that the priority for founders and CEOs of early-stage technology startups is to attract and retain talent. Great CEOs acknowledge that they aim at hiring first guns smarter than them. Building the core team around the founder(s) requires more than that. Founders act like directors of a movie: a great scenario and an illustrious cast can either fail or succeed. The difference, a capital one, is to gather stars that can work well together. Sometimes a second fiddle may fit the profile better. These are difficult decisions to take.
We assist management to identify needs for recruiting. We emphasize the importance of not overlooking profiles that appear too far from the a priori expectations. A startup may have more chances to shine with recruiting original personalities, as long as they can work with a team, than by hiring run-of-the mill employees with all the boxes checked.
Training is paramount to enhance the quality and productivity of the team. Following the example of the German Mittelstand, that invest in training on an ongoing basis with outstanding outcome, we advise our clients to dedicate resources to optimize the value of their most important asset, the human capital.
3. Customer Retention
Customer retention is the foundation of brand building. The cost of acquiring new customers is a metric that all entrepreneurs should master. Though this cost is likely to diminish with volume, it is too important to make customer attrition acceptable. There are ways to prevent part of the attrition, allowing for a higher customer base growth. J&M Lab introduces startups to the steps they must take to improve their revenue growth.
4. Cost Optimization
In the early stages of a startup, operating costs are always much above what they should and could be. As time is of the essence, processes are not optimized from scratch. Comes a time, when recurring revenues have reached a certain level, when a thorough review, an audit, reveals all the areas where changes need to be made. We offer our clients assessments on present situations, and an implementation plan to remediate all the imperfections.
5. Working Capital Optimization
We view a good working capital management as the best discipline to extract the maximum of cash, under a defined business model. Improving cash flow must be a top priority for startup owners. Sometimes, founders are under the illusion that their high-margin business automatically generates high cash-flow. Though there is some relationship between the two, many high-growth, high-margin businesses fail because of the lack of timely cash generation. Our purpose is to reduce the cash cycle to its acceptable minimum without creating stress with trade partners. Such actions can generally be taken quickly with a significant outcome. Discipline and common sense are required.