Are you accelerator-ready?
Waste of time or most important three months ever?
Getting a company off the ground is tough. Among grant funding, incubators and other types of early stage support you can find accelerator programs. While the science supports accelerators over incubators, the wildly varying degree of quality and scope among accelerators make it difficult to judge and have given them a debatable reputation among some - at least a concept to be approached with care. The fact that many accelerators take equity from founders and offer ambiguous value in return does naturally instil some scepticism. Due diligence from founders is as important as clear communication from the accelerator itself. But how close can you ever really get before committing? And is it worth taking the risk? Let’s see if I can help with that just a little.
Choose the program that works for YOU
There are a lot of different focus areas among accelerators. Take a good hard look at your business and what industry you are truly in before applying to one. Most accelerators offer some cash, but $100k is not what will get you over the line and also not where the big value lies. It is the in-kind portion that can give you access to heavily discounted R&D opportunities, investor access and the network expertise that will potentially transform your business. If you do it right, you will have meetings within weeks that would have taken you years to get and industry insight that is practically impossible to assemble on your own at any relevant speed. IF you join the right program. Focusing on who your customer is very early will help you determine which program you should join. Pick the one that gives you insight and access to the leaders of the industry you are trying to sell to. If they don’t have that, keep looking.
Make sure you a ready
Joining an accelerator program requires some prep — getting accepted is just the first step. Ahead of time, make it clear to yourself what the program entails. Is there travel involved? Where to, how long, who’s coming, how much does that cost, is that an effective location for me? Mentally, a program abroad can also be very challenging. Make sure to prep your social circle and loved ones for your absence, really dig deep into yourself to determine how you will feel if you don’t see your partner/kids/siblings/parents/friends for a few months. This is a commitment question. If you have started a business that requires travel or potentially moving continents, yet you are emotionally very dependent on home, reconsider your career or at least role within the company to adapt to your needs. Mental health should be your number one priority. Always push yourself, never break yourself.
When joining a program, you should make sure that your founders are the ones attending it. At this stage you are unlikely to have a non-founding team anyways. But just in case, the founders/decision makers need to go, at least one of them (with someone else). Anything else defeats the purpose. If you send a non-executive member, you are adding another level of complexity and you will not be able to generate the value out of the network that you would want. If you can avoid it, do not be alone. Bring your co-founder/first employee/key consultant along for the ride. You will work better, faster, be happier and generally enjoy the experience more while having someone you trust at your side.
Be clear about what your goals are
This will immensely help generate value for you and focus your work. In a good accelerator program, there will be a constant exchange of information with the team leading it. Weekly meetings, setting of milestones, KPIs, OKRs, that’s what you are looking for. Set your goals, develop realistic milestones with the accelerator team and track your progress. This also creates transparency as well as avoids frustration through misunderstandings. Communicate very clearly where you want to go, take advice on that, reconsider and set a clear trajectory, then adjust along the way.
Bring an open mind
Chances are, you’ll meet people with different experiences than your own. Joining an accelerator is not supposed to be a competitive but a synergetic environment in which you learn from each other. Just try and assume everything you believe you know about your business is wrong or only a small part of the truth — just for one day. It can be incredibly freeing to not constantly have to demonstrate competency. Let’s be honest, the more we learn the more we realise that we are pretty clueless. You might be an expert in one topic, that’s already fantastic. Share your knowledge when asked, otherwise you should be the one asking questions. Learn, un-learn, re-learn. Kick down doors in your head, elevate your perspective. There is no environment like a good accelerator program that can do this for you.
This also goes for your personal beliefs. Assume the best about the people around you. Assume all criticism you pick up (outspoken and non-verbal) is directed towards helping you, making you better, improving how you deal with pressure and critics. Some is skill-directed, some will help to build your emotional resilience to other people’s opinion (that one is the gift). Nobody is out to get you, to tear you down or mock you. If you ever feel like that is the case anyways, take it as a challenge to improve your interpersonal communication, confront in the kindest way possible. Be straightforward, be firm but assume you are clearing up a misunderstanding, not putting others in their place. Leave the pride at the door and you will only benefit. Learning only happens when you admit to yourself that you might not yet know it all.
Be ready to generate your own value. Eat, don’t be fed
Chances are, you will join a program with approx. 10 other companies, meaning there will be approx. 20 participants. It is virtually impossible for an accelerator team to deliver tailor-made value for everyone without you telling them as best as you can what you are looking for. Go through the mentor list (ask ahead of time if it’s up to date/if there are more, normally networks are much bigger than communicated on websites) and give the team your top ten to talk to. If you are presented with statistics that back up your point and give you new information, inquire actively for that presentation. Make sure you get exactly what you need to advance your business, and do it in such a way that does not alienate your peers. Accelerators are a social experience, share what you acquire, elevate each other. Even if you have conflicting personal viewpoints, you can always respect others for their bravery and commitment to entrepreneurship.
Connect the dots on your side, take your plans to the team, ask them to poke holes in them, ask them to connect you with someone you really need to talk to and honour ALL those introductions. If you miss ONE follow-up, chances are people will be hesitant to burn their network further for you.
Expose yourself relentlessly to new information, go to all talks you can possibly attend, even if it seems to be outside your scope. Sometimes work comes first, but you never know what you will learn and who you will meet.
Leverage the network access you are given
Build lasting relationships and don’t be greedy with access. Like all things in life, this is a quid-pro-quo. People will not open up their network/give up their most valuable contacts if you
- Have ever burnt one of their intros (not followed up, alienated the person, not kept your promises, etc.)
- Are not listening to their verbal and non-verbal cues that say “not yet”, “not that one” and/or “not for you”. (Find out which one it is and then figure out why. Then fix it.)
- Don’t understand when to aggressively pitch your “perfect” business and when to lay the cards on the table and be perfectly honest about what you are lacking. No one likes a pretender and every high-profile contact will see straight through you and not take you seriously. Listen more than you talk, be humble and assume you probably don’t have all the info. (If you did, you would not be there, right?)
- Constantly overpromise and underdeliver
(On a personal note, I have been guilty of pretty much all of these in the past. It’s the perfect way to ensure that you are not going anywhere, ever. The concept of “beginners mind” was the most freeing I have encountered. If you feel like one of these things even remotely resonates with your current situation — change it, hard. Only good will follow.)
Most things in life come down to “Do I like that person?”. We don’t like to admit it and think of ourselves as rational beings but the science tells us we are clearly not (If you’re interested, I recommend Malcom Gladwell’s “Blink” on this topic).
We are social creatures and make impulsive, emotional decisions. Consider this when interacting with anyone’s network. Should you be able to appear genuine, humble and hard-working while also having an interesting value proposition, the network access you can gain through an accelerator will skyrocket your business’s development as well as personal learning.
Communicate what you need specifically
This is especially true when you are looking for R&D facilities of any sort and require specific equipment. A good accelerator should be able to create at least access to testing grounds for you, however lab-time and machinery access often needs planning and lead time, while being expensive. As early as possible, communicate what exactly you need to develop further and see if that is doable for the program you are applying to. What is being advertised will always only be a fraction of what can be done. If a good accelerator believes in your business enough to make an investment and invite you on the program, they are most likely also able to create the right testing environment for you or at least introduce you to someone close who can at heavily discounted rates.
In conclusion, transparency will get you further than your instinct might tell you. An accelerator program is not about “winning” but rather building connections for live within your ecosystem that trust and support you because they worked closely with you under extreme conditions for months. It’s a trial by fire when it comes to your personality and also your business. If you commit to it fully, it is your very best chance to either rapidly succeed or fail forward and learn.
The 2020 HATCH accelerator program is taking applications now! Check out the details.
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