This is the second in a five part series in an interview with Matt Ronge, CEO, Astropad: an extension of our April 20th webinar hosted by Modern Logic and Lighter Capital.
According to the GrowthInstitute, about half of startups survive the first 5 years, and only 1 in 200 actually scale up. How do you know when the time is right for your make-or-break moment?
Matt Ronge, CEO from Astropad, scaled his startup and is sharing these five tips for other startups:
Identify the Right Moment
“When you’re at that initial point when you have traction with your product, it’s time to keep improving on what you have. Wait until you have repeated success and customers to scale.”
Hire Slow, Fire Fast
“Keep your team as small as you can make it while getting things done. Make sure you need this person, you’ve defined the position, and you know it will be a long term need before hiring. It can be dangerous to add too many people too early, when you just think big things are going to happen. When those big things don’t materialize, you’ve brought people on board. That’s a tough situation to be in.”
Introduce More Structure
“As a small company, you don’t want to have red tape or established procedures. But as you’re scaling up, you need more structure. You need to add more structure over time or it becomes harder to bring people on if you don’t have processes in place.”
Expect and Adapt to Resistance
“For people that join a company in the early stages, it’s a weird feeling to see new structures being added. A lot of people were trying to escape that at big companies. But you can’t fly by the seat of your pants forever. You’ve got to show people how it’s going to help them in the long run. ‘Here’s how I’m going to bug you less.’ If they’re skeptical, you’ve got to find the ways in which your new processes will help them.”
Play the Long Game
“A good rule of thumb is to know that things will always take longer than you expect. If you think it’ll take one year, it’ll take two years.”
This article is Part 2 in our Thought Leadership series with Matt Ronge from Astropad. Stay tuned for his thoughts on how to maximize the potential of advertising to scale your startup!