Entrepreneur Agony Aunt Podcast

Silicon Valley entrepreneur and angel investor, Chris Neumann, shares his insights on what founders need to know about raising VC investment, and why equity investment is not right for every startup. Chris joined Vicky Brock in Edinburgh while on a whistle-stop tour of the UK, where he was giving a series of fireside chats with Barclays Eagle Labs, to help early stage founders separate fact from fiction when it comes to Silicon Valley myths and the reality of startup fundraising. A short and sweet episode, as Chris had less than 30 minutes before he was due on stage, he makes the critical point that VC money comes with very specific expectations around growth, and that founders pursuing that path - especially those in small countries or regions - need to broaden their perspective and map their development and progress to a suitably ambition baseline: "Founders who want to go down the path of creating a globally changing company, it is important to get outside your own country fast. Most founders think of being the best, most successful company in their country. Silicon Valley founders think about winning the world."

It was fantastically energising to give a talk at TEDx Glasgow Caledonian University yesterday about how I found my purpose again when I found my next startup problem worth solving. "I’m back with Vistalworks, doing the doing of entrepreneurship, because I have found my next problem worth solving. I have found the people I want to solve it with. And I know how we will recognise when we are making a sufficiently meaningful difference." Running at 15 minutes, I have shared the talk on the podcast because I think it is relevant. The normal episode type will resume next week. In this talk I share the 6 questions I ask myself to get from idea to startup, and the quick, cheap validation process I use to de-risk business ideas before I jump in. I bust some common startup myths and talk frankly about how the actual experience of failing, of losing the company I had worked so hard for, was nowhere near as toxic to my mental and physical health as the fear that it might happen. The script for the talk, first given at TEDx Glasgow Caledonian University, October 12 2019 is at my Entrepreneur Agony Aunt blog - the video will be added to the same page once available.

Startup founder Sam Pettipher of Ebar joins Vicky Brock to explore the details of his recent equity crowdfund investment and shares his advice for other early stage founders planning a raise. Joining the podcast just six weeks after his crowd fund campaign beat its target by £100k, injecting a transformational amount of cash into EBar Initiatives, a start-up with a mission to change the way the world is served its beer, Sam shares the learnings, execution process, and highs and lows of his successful crowdfund. He explains how much planning time is required before the fundraising campaign even begins, and the ongoing time commitment required to market the campaign and respond to questions from potential investors. He details how much money founders already need to have committed by investors before the fund-raise goes live on the crowdfunding platform. And he talks about those heart-stopping moments when the investment moved backwards, away from its target, then picked up last minute momentum to beat its target by £100k. Sam and Vicky contrast bootstrapping, angel investment and equity crowdfunding as options for startups to consider, and find that despite its many upsides, running a successful crowdfund takes time, planning and effort and is certainly not a "quick fix" route to investment.

Danae Shell and Vicky Brock discuss startup culture, why startup founders have to take responsibility for deliberately creating the culture in their business, and how building balanced, consistent teams can enable startups to thrive in an uncertain, complex environment. Danae explains why setting context is a far more useful employee skill to seek than vision-setting, and why there'll be no room for rockstars or genius a***holes in her new startup. We cover commercial validation and product market fit and why this time round neither of us will be raising angel or VC investment for our new startups until we're certain that we have it: "One of the key lessons I have learned so far is... for the love of God do not take scale up money until you are ready to actually scale, and you know in your bones that you are actually ready to scale. Because as soon as that scale up pressure comes, if you are still trying to iterate through anything that comes before scaling, you are just creating an ulcer or worse." Danae Shell, is a veteran startup employee about to become a founder for the first time. A native Tennessean, she is a programmer-turned-marketer who has been part of the Scottish tech scene for 15 years, working at scale-ups Barrie & Hibbert and FreeAgent before their successful exits. Most recently was Chief Marketing Officer at Care Sourcer, scaling their marketing strategy and teams. In this episode we discuss the lessons we have both learned across multiple tech startups, and what we will and won't be doing in our latest ventures as a result. We dive into the ways we'll be flexible, keep costs to a minimum, create a very deliberate startup culture, and build teams of consistent "doers" in order to get something in front of users as quickly as possible. The blog post mentioned is the episode is: "Startup founders. You don't need adult supervision"

It’s been a while! I have been busy getting Vistalworks - my startup number 5 - off the ground and I know you know how all consuming that job is. But we’re 9 months in, the first version of the technology is live, I have an amazing team - and you’re questions keep coming (as do mine!) So it felt like the right time to record another 10 Entrepreneur Agony Aunt episodes, the first of 2019, starting with this one. Building successful teams, and attracting, rewarding and retaining talent is the most requested topic on this podcast - even more so than funding - and in this episode we explore hiring interns and your first junior staff. My guest is Joy Lewis, CEO of Adopt An Intern. AAI has just placed their 1500th candidate into paid work and in Scotland is the go-to choice for startups making their first hires. Supporting startups and socially-driven organisations to find the right candidates is in their DNA - I use them for my junior hires and I can’t recommend them and the talent they have helped us find highly enough. Joy Lewis founded Adopt An Intern in 2009 and ran it as a programme within the Centre for Scottish Public Policy until 2012 when she it spun out to become a not-for-profit company. Since then AAI has widened their message of inclusive employment beyond internships to permanent positions and various social impact projects, including breaking down barriers for disabled graduates, women returners and Scotland’s growing minority ethnic population, promoting equality of opportunity in the UK job market. In the episode we discuss: - How to think about and prepare for your first hires- What a good brief of candidate requirements looks like - Why pay matters and what fair looks like in a cash strapped startup- What does diversity and equality of opportunity mean, how do you create it, and why does diversity matter so much in a startup?- Interviewing inexperienced staff, when you’re not necessarily that experienced yourself- What next once you've found your intern/hire if you've never managed people before- Tips to help more experienced founders build productive teams  

There isn't time to do everything and hard work alone is no guarantee of success, so how do you make sure that the efforts you do make have the most impact on your career and personal and professional visibility? Work smarter not harder, learn fast not perfectly, don't wait for permission and when you fail - as you will - fail fabulously. Just part of the advice to my 22 year old self, after a colourful career as a CEO, entrepreneur and child chimney sweep. (You need to view the slides for that joke to make sense!) This was recorded at Edinburgh University Business School as part of my talk to #IWScot and #BCSWomen on 30th May 2019. I am deep in startup CEO mode right now, with my new company Vistalworks. But I do intend to resume the interview format episodes as soon as my schedule allows!

Recorded in front of a live audience of Scottish business owners, Vicky Brock is interviewed by journalist David Ferguson about how and why - after the lowest point of her business career - she is now back with startup number five. Vicky shares her process on how to start and grow a business, what she has learned across her very different companies and the 9 reasons she has discovered for why your startup may not be growing like you planned. She explains why the first idea you have almost certainly is not the one that will become your business, why she prefers pain to delight and how her latest startup will achieve more in four months than her previous company achieved in 18 months. Because while it is relatively easy to create a product, and even fairly easy to build a product people will by once, it is actually very, very difficult to create something people will buy again and again. But that is what you need to achieve if you are going to build a business."I'm pleased I'm back here doing it all over again - I tried to start a bit too fast last time and we skipped over some important early steps in really finding product and solution fit. I'm not going to make that same mistake again. My whole team are focused on doing the on-paper work that means we test and validate our assumptions up front. And because we're starting in response to very specific challenges laid down by our initial paying customers, I'm starting my this new business with my customer as a full-time lodger, which is great!"

Multi award-winning fintech startup co-founders, Loral and Eishel Quinn of Sustainably, join the Vicky Brock to discuss fundraising and investment challenges with the Entrepreneur Agony Aunt. We talk frankly from the founder's perspective on finding a lead investor, angels, VCs, corporate venturing, the importance in doing your due diligence on potential investors and the challenges of getting investment over the line in a time frame that that doesn't harm your business, when you're the only ones feeling the urgency.

Entrepreneur Pheona Matovu had her family's life turned upside down when a paperwork error meant she was no longer eligible to work in the UK. When, after 5 long years, she and husband were finally able to work again, the couple founded Radiant and Brighter to provide employment pathways and enterprise support for the Black & Ethnic Minority Communities living in Scotland. The company also provides training and education that challenge and inspire groups and individuals to explore perceptions of culture & diversity. For those of you in Scotland, their Bright Futures Women’s Leadership and Enterprise Conference is on Thursday 27th September 2018 at the RBS Headquarters in Gogarburn - there are still free tickets available. In one of the most inspiring podcast conversations to date, Pheona explains: "The one thing that connects us is that we are all different. It does not matter what ethnicity or whoever you are, we are all different. Let's not have the tokenism, let's look at the importance of bringing together ethnicity and diversity of culture. Let's have that conversation and create the spaces where we can have that conversation. Because when you open up to a different world you learn so much more." Read the full episode transcript here

Alex Feechan, founder and CEO of outdoor clothing brand Findra, gives a masterclass on starting your own product or clothing business.  From research, market validation, to knowing your customer and shrewd proto-typing of a capsule product range, she gets into the detail of how she spent a year de-risking and building customer and industry validation for her new clothing brand in its "pre-start" phase - all before spending any money. She explains why slowing down was so critical to success, because it let her really understand her customer needs, how she has learned to listen to and trust her gut instincts - and why fours years in and significant growth later, she might just be at the start line.

Alison Grieve, founder and CEO of G-Hold - a multi-purpose ergonomic handhold that can be placed onto any type of tablet or reader - sells her product worldwide through partners like Microsoft Surface, Amazon, Apple and Home Shopping Network. Having successfully cracked delivering sales volume, unit profitability, international IP protection, managing a complex export business and moving back to onshore manufacturing, she joins me to advise a founder looking for advice on how to internationalise their startup business and sales channels.

Building a successful startup and product or service is all about execution, but execution shouldn't be blind. This episode looks at the research and validation questions to ask, customer feedback at the product development stage, how to prioritise features and ideas in or out of scope, and what 'good enough' looks like at the early stage. Guest Stephen Budd has an unusual mix of research, data analytics, and product management skills and has brought software products to market in multiple countries, and led the product management of solutions that have been named eCommerce Innovation of the Year and Best New Product. His customer and market validation work for private and public sector clients has ensured some truly terrible product ideas have gone back to the drawing board, saving heartache and money for all involved, and has helped refine ideas with an inkling of potential into solutions with a robust market opportunity and clear value proposition.

Organic farmer and premium food brand producer Endrina Maxwell is one of the most opportunistic and inspiring entrepreneurs to join me on the podcast yet. She explains how she has maximized value and competitive advantage at every stage of the food production process, from innovative fish farming to organic seed, feed and manure production - and in her latest venture the NutriSecret range of healthy, chemical-free food products and cooking oil. We cover brand, differentiation, pricing, benefits not features and how to effectively diversify to reduce risk and pursue market opportunities. She shares her personal tips on finding purpose, focus, and how she uses goals and planning to drive her onward.

Rachel Bews founded ALICAS, a startup with social purpose and ambitions to scale globally, and she joins Vicky Brock to discuss the particular factors 'for good' businesses need to think about as they startup and plan their growth. A social media professional, with an extensive background in content marketing, she also advises an entrepreneur struggling to get an impact from their social marketing efforts that perception is reality - founders can't afford to be so busy working on their startups that they delay working on the business and personal brands, as they are the same thing. She provides some tips, tools and organic & paid approaches that will help young businesses get more impact from their social media and social purpose efforts - and announces her new Tags-On clothing appeal, to help women fleeing domestic violence to dress with confidence and dignity.

Entrepreneur Dr James McIlroy is founder & CEO of EnteroBiotix, an award-winning and rapidly expanding biotechnology company that he started while at medical school. EnteroBiotix is focused on a whole new field of science and medicine, using the body’s own microorganisms to prevent and treat debilitating infections and diseases. James joins me to discuss practicalities of managing an incredibly busy workload, how he learned to delegate and focus on high yield outcomes - and why he has decided that now is the time to step back as CEO and bring someone in to help him scale the business, while he continues his medical training.

Vicky reports back on her recent Women Entrepreneur's Challenge to Malawi, organised by Kate Webb and her team at the Responsible Safari Company, including what she learned, and the profound impact this has had on her personally and as an entrepreneur. Tackling a listener question on how to startup when you have no money, they discuss the importance of having a support network of other business people, and why having the right people and expertise around you can be more important than cash. Kate shares her own experience of saying yes to opportunities and no to debt, then working with whatever you have to make it happen. To prove her point - the episode ends with an incredibly exciting request for help! If you are interested in getting involved in helping Kate and Dame Kelly Holmes promote Sport For Purpose or fancy joining them on a challenge in October 2018, check out http://www.orbis-expeditions.com/blog/dame-kelly-holmes-the-orbis-challenge-2018/

This episode I’m talking about quitting. And I’m talking to myself, because when you have a job, have a company, have investors, have staff - there are some things you just can’t say out loud without major consequences. “I quit” is one of them. So based on my own experiences, and the many conversations had with other founders & CEOs feeling trapped in their startups, here's the if, when, why and how of quitting in your startup.... Quitting your role, quitting the company, exiting a market, project or product - and winding up your startup completely.

Entrepreneur Jamie Shankland has taken products to market in 40 countries and has found problems worth solving in sectors including oil & gas, fashion and online events planning. He shares the lessons he has learned about ensuring customer meetings have meaningful outcomes, better business development, finding out what customers really, really want as he advises a founder with only 7 months cash left who is trapped having lots of conversations that have yet to convert into paying customers. "You need to reach out to people as you design and certainly before you finish the product. We're ultimately solving problems, your product is only that thing that solves the problem - it is that underlying customer problem that drives everything. Whenever you speak to a customer, it has to be linked to an outcome."

Incredibly inspirational "mad scientist", theoretical neuroscientist, AI inventor and entrepreneur Dr Vivienne Ming advises a listener overwhelmed by ideas and possibilities that finding your purpose is more important than forcing yourself to focus and be someone you're not. She talks about the importance of recognising your weaknesses and having a compensatory strategy for overcoming them and why hiring complementary collaborators is essential to entrepreneurial success and to delivering solutions that bring real value to people. As a leader and creative collaborator, she sees her number one job as explaining the why - then to simply be a resource to enable her team to be even more successful.

CEO, Chairman and NXD Kenny Fraser advises a solo founder having an existential crisis about what their role as CEO should be, urges entrepreneurs not to neglect their own personal and professional development - and advises a founder to forget everything they've heard about sales and commissions, in order to ensure their team remains aligned to common goals and a shared compensation structure. Great insights on people, teams, incentives and the growth mindset.

In a very frank monologue episode, Vicky urges entrepreneurs to pay themselves more and dives into the when, what and how to plan for a salary and the things people don't tell you about startup founders personal finances (or lack of them). Clearly, on a roll, and without pausing for breath, Vicky also covers financing your startup in desperate times, what worked and didn't work for her as her company faced running out of money, and what to do and not to do when there are only a few weeks of cash left in the bank.

What are the risks and rewards of working in a startup? And what 3 things do startup employees most wish their CEO would learn? I'm joined by Regina Berengolts, my head of data in my last startup, and now leading the data science team at a high growth TV analytics scaleup for the employee perspective on getting the people part of startups right. We talk about the startup mindset we look for in employees, whether a startup job is right for you, CEO transparency and the questions potential hires should be ready to ask of founders. We also get into the importance of knowing what you are hiring for before you bring people in and why you probably don't actually need to hire a data scientist yet.

My three-time co-founder and product lead, Stephen Budd, shares some hard-learned lessons on what non-technical founders need to know in order to successfully lead a technology or software based startup. We talk co-founders, CTOs, product build and outsourcing software development before diving into all things co-founders. When you need a co-founder, where to find them, choosing friends vs strangers, how to set up agreements, who should be CEO and what to do if it is all going horribly wrong with your co-founder.

How do you attract talent to your startup when resources are limited? Kirsty Mackenzie, founder, award-winning entrepreneur and recruitment specialist, explains how to find, reward and retain employees in your startup. She explains how to build your very first team, what to do if you get it wrong, why you need to think very carefully about company values and the skills you need before you hire and the different things to think about once your business grows. 

After being made redundant from her job as a UK Government Minister when she lost her seat in the 2015 General Election, Jo Swinson worried she was unemployable and felt frustrated her business skills were of little interest to recruiters. She reinvented herself as an entrepreneur and author, and was a great advisor to me, before regaining her seat in 2017 and becoming Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats. In this episode we talk unemployment, finances, networking, building a personal brand, repositioning your skills, charging for your time and how to create opportunities that will let even the most accidental entrepreneur thrive eventually.

As businesses grow, they hit key inflection points that mean the old tactics don't work anymore. The interplay of people, structures and process have to be updated as a startup develops and so you have to change how you and your people operate within your company. Mark gives very practical advice on how to recognize and survive these inflection points that increase frustration and reduce productivity. He explains how devolving decision making, growing your own people, encouraging them to look outside for inspiration and setting an expectation of world-class excellence maximizes the chances of surviving the organizational challenges that come with growth.

Taking a more thoughtful approach to understanding market focus was a major learning for Wendy Lea, when as an experienced CEO of a very hot, very high growth VC backed freemium software startup, her urgency to execute led to mistakes that she now recognizes were avoidable. Answering a question posed by a student startup, she references Steve Blank as someone she learns from every single time they meet and shares her thoughts on why a customer development playbook is a necessary reality check to all the BS talked around product-market fit. Having delivered business solutions in 30 countries, Wendy brings a worldly point of view to digital innovation and her entrepreneurial pursuits - she's currently CEO of Cintrifuse and on the Board of Techstars.  In 2012 and 2013, she was recognized as a Women of Influence in Silicon Valley and in San Francisco.

This mini extra episode is the audio of Vicky Brock's March 2018 TEDx Talk about coping with an involuntary career or life pause. After the shock of overhearing she was about to be put on gardening leave from the company she had founded, Vicky found the old map she'd used to navigate her life no longer applied. This is her story of the process she used to be ready to begin again.

The how, why and what you need to know about flexible and remote working with Dana Denis Smith. After realising her first business could not scale, Dana founded Obelisk Support to keep City lawyers, especially mothers, working flexibly around their personal commitments and to provide clients with quality legal support solution onshore. She now manages 1500 remote working lawyers, with over 1 million hours of capacity, and was named by The Times as one of UK's Top 50 Employers for Women and Outstanding Innovator by Legal Week for getting alternate ways of working accepted. "I don't care to be a sexy business owner, I want a sustainable business for the long-term".

Back by popular demand, Mark Logan joins me to talk about why founders block their company's success if they don't learn how to manage their idea flow and communication processes. We explore how product market fit is necessary, but not sufficient, the MVP trap, how to surface bad news internally and why so many startups are in the process of failing slowly. Mark is former Skyscanner COO and IOD Director of the Year.

How do you iterate your way to product market fit without scaring your investors? And what are the best practices as your company grows to multiple locations, or your team is spread across several sites? Tom Adeyoola, CEO and Founder of fashion technology company Metail, has grown his startup to over 100 people, raised $20million in strategic investment and had offices in both London and Cambridge from day one. He joins Vicky Brock to share the very deliberate people management processes he has evolved to develop his teams and combat any feeling of us and them. He also talks about how Metail looked beyond domestic markets and use the concept of 10x improvements to ensure that the products they bring to market are positioned in a way that will deliver sufficiently disruptive change.

More founders lose out on startup investment because they handled their Q & A badly than at any other point in the pitching process. Evelyn McDonald, is CEO of the Scottish Edge fund, an investment competition that awards roughly £1million per round, with maximum investments of £150k per young business. Our discussion covers what question you can expect to be asked by investors, how to prepare, why the Q and A is so important and what founders need to do and say ensure to have the best chance of getting funded. I thought the episode so useful for entrepreneurs who're pitching for money that I've had it transcribed here: https://goo.gl/WLjtUA

Small Business Entrepreneur of the Year 2017, Leah Hutcheon of Appointedd, joins Vicky Brock to help an entrepreneur who is sick of bad advice. We discuss when to trust advisors, when to trust your gut, where to find good advice, how to grow your team and how to manage input from investors and board directors that you disagree with. As Leah says, you need to build and use your network and trust yourself to know that with any people decision - if it is a maybe, then it's a no.

Sales expert, author and entrepreneur Jim Sterne talks about how to land your first four sales, pricing those early sales, and how to hire and compensate sales professionals. He also advises founders on how to avoid the pressure to give away your time and expertise for free. He urges: "if someone ever tells you as a founder to hire a sales-person, listen to them - sales comes first. Sales is a skill that can be mastered over time, but that takes talent and experience - and of course - experience costs money!"

Equity investment, knowing your value and the importance of raising enough money to fuel your startup for 18 - 24 months of growth. Global Invest Her founder Anne Ravanona and Vicky Brock urge a high potential female founder to think big and ask for more money.

Answering a listener's question on whether to expose their early pre-startup idea on social media to get validation, guest Joel Blake OBE joins the Entrepreneur Agony Aunt to talk collaboration, iteration, validation and being ready to embrace your vulnerability. He explains: "entrepreneurship changes you to your core - how open are we really to being changed?"

Serial entrepreneur Dennis Mortensen talks about how hyperfocus, urgency, radical transparency and a single KPI have become part of his process for building successful startups at scale. CEO of x.ai, whose AI personal assistants are changing the way meetings are scheduled, Dennis advises a founder looking to inject more pace into their startup team.

Founder of tourism companies spanning two continents and working with entrepreneurs in Malawi and the UK, Kate Webb of Orbis Expeditions advises a founder wanting to build a business with social purpose in developing regions. In this fascinating discussion, Kate shares her learnings from over a decade of entrepreneurship in Africa, and why she so strongly believes in pursuing business and economic development, instead of charitable aid.

Funding from debt, crowdfunding, equity and desperation financing for smaller and early-stage startups with Anne Ravanona, CEO & Founder of Global Invest Her, a global community and platform that helps women entrepreneurs get investment-ready. Speaker, writer and advocate, Anne is an expert in demystifying fundraising and she joins Vicky to answer two listeners' funding questions, and to discuss Vicky’s personal experiences of raising angel investment, grant and debt funding. This blog post on desperation financing expands on some of the other themes touched on in this episode: https://goo.gl/D1o5hE

Dean Nash, Head of Legal & Compliance at Monzo Bank, talks light touch risk management processes, trust and autonomous decision making - and the tensions that arise from very different worldviews of the founder and the board director. Dean may just have changed my mind about a few hard truths of board governance as we dive into a question from a first-time board director trying to support a fast-moving founding team who regard board meetings as an unnecessary distraction.

Retail technologist Cathy McCabe talks about finding good technical hires for your startup. She believes you need high-performance individuals who can wear different hats. Hungry, ambitious generalists who want to learn and do different roles - but with that comes the challenge of high maintenance. As a former retail CIO turned tech startup CEO, she also advises how technology entrepreneurs can better sell to large retailers and brands. “Constantly be looking at the pipeline and how you’re growing the business - you have to focus relentlessly on your product. You can’t just hand the solution over and move on. You have to really help them adapt to make sure that what your solution is promising is actually delivered and continues to deliver.”

In this mini extra episode, Mark Logan, IOD Director of the Year and former Skyscanner COO advises a startup founder who asks whether the stress they are under is a normal part of the CEO job, or something more troubling. He explains that while moments of acute stress come with the CEO title, the problem is when these join up to become chronic. We shouldn’t live with that because while it might become normal, it is not sustainable. “Remember you didn’t start the company because you were after more stress in your life!" The blog post referenced by Vicky in this episode: Mistakes that cost founders their companies

June Angelides, Mums In Technology founder, and her 3-year-old Ivy join me to advise a listener who yearns to give it a go as an entrepreneur, but worries about putting their family financial security at risk. We talk finances, family and the power and joy that comes from taking the risk and giving your goal your best shot. Mini Christmas extra episode.

Founders Joe Tree and Vicky Brock talk about losing their companies and facing, then surviving the pains of startup failure in this frank episode. They share the invaluable if difficult, learnings that come from that experience. Under-capitalisation, product-market fit issues, slow sales cycles, and board/investor tensions don’t take away from the sense of personal responsibility and pain when you lose your company - but as Joe says: “we didn’t fail to do something remarkable... I have no regrets. You have a whole arsenal of experience that very few people have.”

Cally Russell, founder and CEO of Mallzee, gives wise, practical advice on getting PR, boosting startup visibility on a shoestring, the power of the founder sale and why you should be focussing on OKRs. All while patiently taking the odd below the belt insult from fellow entrepreneur Vicky Brock in surprisingly good humour.

Mark Logan, former COO of Skyscanner and IOD Director of the Year joins Entrepreneur Agony Aunt Vicky Brock to tackle two reader questions. In 30 minutes we cover why founders and leaders also have to develop themselves as managers, how to make meetings more effective by banning status updates, how to handle a problem boss and when it is time to quit your job.