Leadership

Why Founders Need Coaches, Not Consultants

Engaging founders is an art. In 10 years of working with startups, I’ve learned that some approaches work better than others.

I’ve worked with startups in a variety of professional formats: in Venture Capital, Google LaunchPad, Techstars and other accelerator and alumni networks. But I’ve always found consulting to startups an uphill struggle.

As a founder, I hired consultants on a handful of occasions, and it never went particularly well. Don’t get me wrong — the consultants I hired were very talented people. But startups simply aren’t equipped to work with them.

Why consulting doesn’t work for early-stage startups

Consulting typically involves the consultant handing over new ideas for the startup to implement. In truth, startups rarely need new ideas — they already have more than they know what to do with. So adding yet more ideas to the backlog is stressful, especially without the resources to execute them.

Moreover, consulting is an extremely expensive way to execute ideas. Consultants charge anything from £350 to £1500 per day. Considering it’s in a startup’s DNA not to spend money, fees like this are out…