10 REASONS WHY EARLY-STAGE COMPANIES NEED MANAGEMENT CONSULTING

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Management Consulting: Not Just for Established Businesses

Although entrepreneurs in start-up mode commonly think that management consulting is utilized only by businesses that have established themselves or grown to a significant size, the truth is that early-stage companies can benefit from management consulting a great deal. While I’m clearly an evangelist for business consulting services, having seen firsthand how they can turn things around for troubled companies and help new businesses get off the ground, I don’t think I’m too biased when I say that the start-up phase is one of the times when management consulting is most useful.

The purpose of management consulting is largely to offer advice. And who can really afford to turn down the advice of a seasoned professional? Certainly not entrepreneurs who are growing a business from scratch – even if they’re experts in their industry. There’s always value in having someone review your plans, offer second opinions on ideas and help identify areas for improvement.

So here are 10 reasons why early-stage companies especially can benefit from management consulting.

1. Management Consulting Helps You Keep up with Changes

Businesses, old and new alike, existing in an ever-changing landscape. What’s relevant, timely and appropriate one day can be tired, outdated and inefficient the next. A good business consultant stays abreast of fluctuations, from market instability to technological improvements to changes in standards or best practices, so entrepreneurs can stay focused on their primary goal: launching successfully.

2. Management Consulting Provides Honest, Unbiased Feedback

An entrepreneur will get glowing feedback about his idea from family, friends and even his professional networks. Before you know it, he starts thinking his concept is foolproof. But truly unbiased and actionable advice is hard to come by unless you harness management consulting to take a look at the big picture. You’ll get feedback not only about the concept behind your business, but about the details of execution, organization and other critical matters. At Shared CxO, we pride ourselves on having outsourced executives who offer completely honest advice without the personal agendas or blinders that entrepreneurs will encounter when seeking feedback from others.

3. Management Consulting Solves Problems

In my experience working with incubators and interacting with entrepreneurs daily in the busy start-up scene in San Francisco, I’ve seen plenty of entrepreneurs hit brick walls at critical moments in their business’s development. Whether the obstacle stems from a lack of planning, a lack of research, a lack of knowledge about a particular facet of business or something else, I’m positive that management consulting can help frustrated entrepreneurs solve problems. And the more experienced an executive is, and the more diverse his background, the quicker he can untangle even the most complicated issues facing early-stage companies. That’s why we’ve cherry picked only the most seasoned business veterans to work with our clients.

4. Management Consultants Love Forward Momentum

Management consultants simply love to see a company grow and achieve its goals. As such, an outsourced executive providing management consulting is incredibly motivated to help entrepreneurs overcome issues and move forward with their plans. They triumph when the start-up’s off the ground. And it’s easy to get caught up in this excitement. It’s one of the reasons I love working with early-stage companies!

5. Management Consulting Teaches Entrepreneurs Valuable Lessons

A good management consultant doesn’t just drop by, solve everybody’s problems and disappear. In management consulting an executive guides entrepreneurs through the process of finding solutions for the stumbling blocks they encounter. Entrepreneurs actually learn from the engagement, and become better equipped to handle issues in the future.

6. Management Consulting Helps Entrepreneurs Stay Focused and on Deadline

Because of the sheer amount of activities involved in starting a business, it’s easy for entrepreneurs to lose focus unless guided. Management consultants can keep entrepreneurs laser-focused on the tasks at hand. Management consulting also involves prioritizing activities so that entrepreneurs have a step-by-step walkthrough for what has to happen before the big launch. I’ve also seen entrepreneurs lose track of time or spend too much time on one particular aspect of business, at the expense of others. Business consultants can keep things running on time.

7. Management Consulting Involves Top-to-Bottom Analysis

Quality business consultants leave no stone unturned when analyzing an early-stage business – from the initial concept to the business plan, market research, company structure and organization, and post-launch next steps, management consulting examines everything holistically. Management consultants, as experienced executives, catch overlooked aspects of starting up a company. They’re a second pair of eyes and ears to watch things carefully.

8. Marketing Consulting Sets Companies up for Branding

One of the biggest challenges for start-ups is simply being discovered. Brand awareness comes with tremendous time and effort, and often financial investment. Part of management consulting is teaching you how to plan an initial marketing campaign that gives your brand a shot in the arm. You’ll learn the channels that will produce the biggest ROI and how to create a scalable, practical plan so that you don’t exceed budget or spend too much time on a potentially fruitless activity.

9. Trust is Implicit in Management Consulting

I completely understand the “play your cards close to your chest” attitude that some entrepreneurs adopt from the get-go. Nothing could be worse than investing time, effort and money in a unique business idea, only to find parts of the idea or the idea in whole stolen by someone with more resources to make it happen. But in management consulting, an outsourced executive honors privacy without question. Entrepreneurs don’t have to worry about details of their business plan leaked – everything is kept strictly confidential, which is not always the case if you appeal to peers or professional networks for advice.

10. Management Consulting Dots I’s and Crosses T’s

With a management consultant on board, you’re no longer solely responsible for everything. Management consulting involves quality assurance and identification of areas of improvement. While entrepreneurs still need to be vigilant, with an executive on their side to help make sure everything is complete, correct and ready for the next stage of growth, they can have peace of mind.

Ready for Management Consulting? Take a look at our CEO advisory and outsourcing services and browse our membership packages, or contact us to discuss your needs.

20: Caryn Tomer Talks How Startups Can Gain Exposure & Buzz

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Caryn is Techli’s Editor-in-Chief. She is a writer who loves sharing stories of innovation, no matter the location. She has her masters in mass communication from SIUE and has been in corporate marketing for 6+ years, working on campaigns for all kinds of products. When she’s not writing, you can find her hitting the trail as an avid runner and general sports enthusiast.

18: CEO of oDesk Gary Swart Explains How To Grow Successful Companies

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Gary Swart is the CEO of oDesk, the world’s largest online workplace—which has more than 4 million freelancers, and on which more than $1 billion of work has been done. Gary is a thought leader in entrepreneurship; how best to hire and manage teams; and the future of work, including online work. He is passionate about helping small businesses thrive, fueled by his extensive experience working with startups and small businesses that use oDesk, as well as by mentoring entrepreneurs and business school students. Gary has spoken at the Inc. Leadership Conference, The Economist’s Ideas Economy panel, South by Southwest, TechCrunch 50, TiECon, GigaOM’s Net:Work Conference in 2010 and 2011, and at Harvard Business School which teaches a case study on oDesk. His commentary has appeared in a variety of publications including Forbes, TechCrunch and The Washington Post. He has also appeared on numerous TV and radio shows, including BBC, National Public Radio, and the Fox Business program “After the Bell.” Previously, he led SMB Sales for the Americas at IBM’s Rational Software Product Group, and also served as VP of Worldwide Sales at Intellibank, where he was responsible for leading the sales organization.

Episode 6: Jon Ferrara Explains How To Build Your Startup Without Marketing Capital (Part 1)

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Jon Ferrara is an American entrepreneur and the founder of Nimble LLC, his most recent venture. Ferrara is best known as the co-founder of GoldMine Software Corp, one of the early pioneers in the Sales Force Automation (SFA) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software categories for Small to Medium sized Businesses (SMBs).

Our conversation with Jon covered so much great insight into success we turned decided to create two episodes. In part one, he talks about:

  • Growing your startup without marketing capital
  • Importance of relationship building
  • Gaining income and investment capital
  • Long term sales logic
  • What is social selling

Importance of relationship building

Jon had lots of great quotes but one that epitomized importance of social selling and relationship building came from Mae West: “Out of sight is out of mind, and out of mind is out of money honey!”

Insight into the startup journey

Just like so many entrepreneurs Jon got frustrated with sales options in his early days, decided to jump ship and get started on his own with Goldmine which revolutionized the CRM concept. Built, grew, sold and is now on to doing the same with Nimble.

John and Ledge hear this story in every interview. The urge to start is so overwhelming that we just can’t help chasing down that idea and starting a company! Leave us a comment if you’ve ever felt that way and followed it. If you haven’t followed the feeling, why not?

What is social selling?

Jon explains the growth of the internet and its use in sales and business development over the past 20 years, with amazing insight into how social selling has become the new way to grow companies, build relationships and achieve success as an entrepreneur. We also discuss how social media is becoming common place and will likely begin to fade into a standard business practice from today’s “hype”.

How to get in touch

Make sure you follow Jon on Twitter and check out Nimble, a fantastic platform that enables you to manage all your social platforms in one place from a business perspective.

Episode 3: David Meerman Scott (Part 2)

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In this packed episode with David Meerman Scott we covered such a broad list of topics that we had to cut it into two episodes. Start with the first one and then jump in here.

Here’s a quick rundown of what we discuss throughout the two episodes:

  • How and why getting fired from his corporate gig was a gift
  • How going on your own is less risky than working for a single corporate entity
  • Why job #1 is creating content assets no matter where you are in your career
  • How content marketing is largely free and gives you a huge advantage
  • Who you should hire (personnel and staff) to tell your story
  • Whether experienced business people from industry are better entrepreneurs than scrappy 20-somethings
  • Why you should say “no” to the wrong investor
  • Is a self-employed consultant a “real entrepreneur?”
  • How to setup with an advisory role at another company