Corporate Start-up Accelerator Guide - AfCE · Messaging Traction Channels Iterate Pretotype...

Corporate Start-up Accelerator Guidefor Ideation and Discovery.

Copyright 2020 © Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship

02

Ideation P

haseInnovation Journey Map

afce.co

Copyright © 2020 Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship

01.Motivation Compelling Problem Avoiding Duplication Team

Interviews Early Adopters Segmentation Opportunity Size

Time

SponsorElevator PitchAssumptionsThink Different

Competitors& Alternatives

Develop PretotypeIterate PretotypeTraction ChannelsMessaging

02.

Is the problem (or innovation challenge) so compelling that each team member would be willing to spend the next 1 - 2 years working to solve it?

03.

Has at least 5 hours of research been conducted to prove your organisation is not already exploring the same idea or has been able to learn from previous efforts?

04.

Have you formed a suitably sized and well-balanced corporate start-up team with strong intrapreneurial personalities?

05.

Has each team member received their manager's approval to be able to invest the necessary (10% or 20%) time to begin their journey?

10.

Did the team design non biased interview questions, select interview channels and conduct 60 - 100 B2C interviews or 20 - 40 B2B interviews across 3-5 customer segments?

11.

Did the team identify a group of customers who were already experiencing the problem and were actively trying to solve it?

12.

Did the team run 1 - 3 (Fake Door) experiments to help segment and prioritise which customer segment to focus on?

13.

Gate 02

Your Average Score

06.

Gate 01Idea & Team

Formation

07.

Can the team clearly articulate their aligned problem,

customer, tentative solution idea and proposed ‘secret

sauce’ in a one sentence pitch?

08.

Has the team prioritised over 10 initial assumptions related to the problem, the customer

or the business model (not about the solution)?

09.

Did the team use either 1 - 2 focus groups, an enthnographic

or customer observation exercise, netnography, or convergent / divergent techniques to think

differently about their idea?

14.

Has the team uniquely positioned their value

proposition in relation to more than 10 competitors or

alternative offerings?

16.

Has the team observed customers interacting with

the pretotype and iterated / improved it at least 2-3 times?

15.

Has the team developed a pretotype (not prototype)

based on non-scalable killer features to demo their idea to

customers?

17.

Has the team received ‘currency’, e.g. personal data, time, money, and compared

their traction across 2 or more channels (using pretotypes)?

18.

Did the team test different messaging that communicates their value proposition to their

target audience?

Discov

ery

Pha

se

Your Average Score

03 afce.co

Copyright © 2020 Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship

19. 20.

Can the team walk through the 9 building blocks of the Business Model Canvas highlighting critical validation from numerous experiments of the ‘front end’ (5 building blocks)?

21.

Is the team still driven by at least 2 of the founding team members from gates 1-2 and are new members being on-boarded / caught up around lean startup methodology?

22.

Did the team test their most critical feature assumption with 2-3 iterations, with 5-20 early adopters using either Concierge, Basic Clickable Prototype or Wizard of Oz experiments?

27.

Did the team add 1-2 more key features to the MVP and prove customers want / use them (perhaps by using a High Bar experiment)?

26.

Did the team win a further 5 - 20 paying customers (or prove very strong intent to purchase)?

28.

Has at least 1 customer returned and kept using the MVP or are they one-off users? Either way, does the team understand why?

29.

Has at least 1 customer shown intent to refer the solution to another potential customer?

35.

Has the team tested most critical assumptions around the back end of the business model (resources, activitie, partners and cost structure) to ensure a feasible business model?

36.

Has the team evolved to include relevant business unit leaders who can bring the solution to market as per the tested business model?

37.

Are 2 original founding team members involved to guide the launch team through gates 4 - 7 for one or more new market segments or geographic regions to support go to market and launch?

Gate 07Established Base line AARRR Metrics

23.

Can the team clearly highlight at least 2 critical feature

improvements required to the developer team ready for minimum viable product

(MVP) development?

Gate 04Developed & Tested

Most Critical Feature

24.25.

32. 31.

Has the team shown improved activation metrics, by improving

the initial customer experience with the MVP solution?

30.

Has the team shown improved acquisition metrics

(200%-500%) by testing 2-3 different channels?

33.34.

Has the team won passionate customers whom

make referrals (1 - 10% have made a referral)?

Start-up Financials

WinningFurther Customers

Business Model Business Unit Expand & Repeat

Further Features Repeat Customer Referral

Increase AcquisitionIncrease ActivationIncrease RetentionStart-up FinancialsIncrease Referrals

Business Model Founder Continuation

Minimum ViableProduct (MVP)

Winning1st Customer

Critical Feature�Improvement

Critical Feature

Incubation P

hase

Launch P

hase

Gate 08

Gate 05Launch of MVP to

BETA Users

Your Average Score

Gate 03Proven Problem-Solution Fit

Gate 06Increased # Customers & # Features

Your Average ScoreYour Average Score

Your Average Score

Your Average Score Your Average Score

04

Content

Academy for Corporate EntrepreneurshipReady?Structure your 10hrs per week01. Your Tutorials + Assignment02. Weekly Team Call03. Weekly Mentor Check-In Calls04. Lean ExperimentsTools we useHow you are evaluated

The Foundation

The Ideation Phase: Gate 01 1. Motivations 2. Compelling Problem3. Avoiding Duplication4. Team5. Time6. SponsorReviewing Gate 01: Idea & Team Foundation

060707091011121314

15

161719

2021

242425

05

The Discovery Phase: Gate 02The Next Innovation PhaseWhat to expect from your Kick Off EventThe AfCE Mentors7. Elevator Pitch7a. The Bermuda Triangle7b. The Elevator Pitch8. Assumptions9. Think Different10. Interviews 10a. Identify Interview Channels10b. Interview Channel Costing 10c. Interview Cheat Sheet11. Early Adopters12a. Segmentation12b. End User Profile13. Opportunity SizeReviewing Gate 02: Identified a Problem worth Solving

The Discovery Phase: Gate 0314. Competitors & Alternatives14a. Solution Ideation14b. Value Proposition Canvas14c. Competitor Matrix15. Develop Pretotype15a. Minimum Viable Product (MVP)15b. Wireframes16. Iterate Pretotype17. Traction ChannelsHalf-way Workshop18. Messaging19. Start-up Financials20. Business ModelHow much were you able to validate?How to PitchFinal Pitch WorkshopYour “One Pager” PitchAdvice Before Your Final PitchReviewing Gate 03: Proven Problem-Solution Fit

GraduationSocial Impact

AppendixDo you speak Start-up?Extra Resources

262728293030323537373839404243444546

4748484950515152535354555657596061626364

6566

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Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship (AfCE)

While 84% of executives recognise that innovation is fundamental to their growth strategy, andmore than half of Fortune 500 companies have some kind of accelerator or incubator, 90% ofcorporate innovation initiatives are destined to fail. More than half of organisations struggle tobridge the gap between innovation strategy and overarching business goals, and more than onethird of companies fail to formally incentivise innovation. However for many organisations, it simplycomes down to not knowing what innovation really means.

The Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship (AfCE) redresses the balance. Its global network ofexperienced mentors are changing the face of corporate culture and helping companies achieve amore entrepreneurial approach to innovation. Our programs help businesses identify and solveproblems quickly and more effectively – from specific customer or market needs through to theworld’s most pressing and challenging concerns.

Founded in 2014, AfCE is proven to increase the success rate of innovation programs by 200% anddrive customer revenue and growth. Its network of mentors have already created more than $35billion worth of innovation projects worldwide.

Founder and CEO Jan Kennedy has experienced first-hand how belief in intrapreneurship couldunlock huge value for organisations – he unlocked USD 1 billion for Intel as an Intrapreneur. Born inGermany and brought up in the UK , Jan has lived and worked in Silicon Valley, Vienna, Hong Kong,Malaysia and Munich. He can be found on stage at intrapreneurship or innovation conferences ordown in the trenches with corporate start-up teams, testing and validating critical assumptions. Jan also runs an investment fund focused on start-ups and crypto currencies.

Helping corporates de-risk their innovation journey.

06

07

Ready?

This guide can be treated like a handbook which you can continuously refer to along your journey. This guide covers the Ideation Phase and the Discovery Phase.

Below you will see the graphical representation of the phases along with the AfCE offerings you may have access to. A typical journey would be to complete the De-risking Innovation Course and then attend a Kick Off Event with a real idea and team. The Kick Off Event is the first part of the Corporate Start-up Accelerators after which some viable projects receive further funding to enter the Incubation Phase.

In this guide, simply refer to the steps that are currently relevant for you.

Understanding where you are starting from.

See www.afce.co for more information on all our offerings.

Intrapreneur DNA Test Corporate Start-up Accelerators

De-risking Innovation Course Prototype Fund

08

Structure your 10hrs* per week.

Each participant learns streamlined theory via AfCE tutorials and applies the theory to develop their idea and entrepreneurial mindset.

Mentor(s) lead weekly 90 minute live video sessions and are plugged into team messaging app for daily contact.

Teams hold an internal team meeting to discuss the

assignments and update current experiment loops.

Teams run experiments leveraging the AfCE Experiment Playbook and

their Prototype Fund. They record results to report to Mentor ready for

next cycle.

01. Tutorials & Assignments

2 hrs

1.5 hrs

1.5 hrs

5 hrs

03. Mentor Check In

02. Internal Team Meeting

04. Test on Customers

* This 10 hours is based on participation in a Disruptive Corporate Start-up Accelerator. If you are working in the standard Accelerator simply update these hours to reflect your weekly total and split them according to the same ratio.

09

Below you can find a list of tutorials and assignments you will complete throughout the program.

Each topic listed below consists of 2 tutorials and 1 assignment.

The tutorials are generally between 8 and 12 minutes. Per topic there will be one tutorial explaining what we will be doing and why this is important. After this you will be asked to complete a mini test. The next tutorial discusses how your team will complete the assignment in the provided template.

Your team has to watch the tutorials and complete the assignments before the relevant mentor call.

Design Thinking Early Adopters (potentially covered during Kick Off Event) Customer Segmentation (potentially covered during Kick Off Event) Identify Interview Channels Interview Channel Costing Total Available Market Solution Ideation Value Proposition Canvas Competitor Matrix End User Profile

Lean Start-up Minimum Viable Product How to pitch your corporate start-up idea

Sales & Marketing Messaging Framework Channels Start-up Financials

Business Model + Pitch Business Model Canvas How to pitch your corporate start-up idea (re-visited) Pitch Deck

The engagement and comprehension levels can be tracked and assessed so that reporting can be provided at the end of the program. If your mentor asked you to skip certain tutorials, this will be accounted for in your final scoring and evaluations.

01. Your Tutorials + AssignmentsLearning and applying the theory to develop your idea.

Tutorials

Access them by logging in on www.afce.co with your company email address

Assignments

The assignments are located in the template(s) that has been provided to you.

On the previous page you could see that we spend half of the time in the program testing on actual customers. Rather than watching tutorials on Lean Start-up we will get out of the building straight away to build, measure and learn from real life customers and data. That is the best and fastest way to truly learn about Lean Start-up!

10

It’s important that you have a fixed weekly team call so you can debrief each other and further discuss your learnings. We recommend you do this 1 or 2 days before the mentor check in call so you are all up to date and aligned when going into that call. Feel free to use the same Zoom link.

During the Kick Off Event or directly after, your team should have set up specific team roles for this project. It’s up to you as to how long you think your call should be, but we recommend a good 60 - 90 mins. Here are some hints on how to use those team roles to structure this call and what you need to get out of it.

Covering the above points will help you keep pace with the program and to be well prepared for your next mentor call. Feel free to communicate such topics and updates in your team messaging app as well, throughout the week.

Don’t forget to apply these common best practices for joining these calls:

Join using working video and a big smile

Avoid locations that will have disruptive background noise

Use a headset

Join via laptop so you can easily view and share documents

Scheduling Lead: Include Zoom link in recurring calendar invites. Ensure everyone has joined, moderate the call and share screen with Assignment Sheet open. Announce any changes to the proposed schedule of team calls or mentor calls. Note any key questions or topics that need to be raised in the next mentor call.

Assignment Lead: Invite the team members (or yourself) who are working on current assignments to report what they have done and ask for any feedback, inputs and help from the team to improve the assignment. The stronger the assignment, the better your pitch will be.

Experiment Lead: Update everyone on the progress of active experiments. Try to close your last loop filling in the experiment map (results and learnings) and brainstorm assumptions with the team as to what you want to learn / test next. Draft a new loop in the experiment map.

Pitch Lead: Update the team on how the pitch skeleton is progressing (especially from week 6 onwards), asking for critical feedback around your communication and messaging. Challenge the team if you are using the most compelling evidence in your pitch.

02. Weekly Team CallsKeep your team aligned and on track.

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You will be checking in weekly with one of your mentors. These check ins are where most of your learning will take place and where mentors observe and build an impression of your performance. These are not your standard “conference calls” where you get to listen in or only make minor contributions. They require everyone in the core team to be actively engaged and to demonstrate the entrepreneurial mindset you have been picking up on. It is hopefully the most impactful and valuable call you will have all week! The call is typically structured as follows:

As you can see, it is no good to just turn up to the call without having done your homework and being prepared. If you did not complete the assignments, then there is nothing for the mentor to give you feedback on. If you have not shared the results of your last experiment and updated the experiment map, then you won’t have much to present and you’ll just be scrambling in the call. Thus, making it very hard for the mentor to guide you for your next steps.

03. Weekly Mentor Check-In Calls“Mentoring is a brain to pick, an ear to listen and a push in the right direction” - John Crosby

Mentors will be monitoring your attendance and will also be making notes as to your levels of engagement and mindset. They try to take a full perspective but it is obviously from these calls where the mentor learns the most about your contributions to the team etc.

Don’t forget to apply these common best practices for joining these calls:

Join using working video and a big smile

Avoid locations that will have disruptive background noise

Use a headset

Join via laptop so you can easily view and share documents

Mentor offers quick feedback on assignments to guide thinking

Mentor gives guidance and clarifies next steps

Team present results of last experiment (closing the loop) & suggest next critical

assumption and experiment design (leverage AfCE Experiment Playbook)

30 min

30 min

30 min

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A Prototype Fund Manager will control the expenditure of the Prototype Fund. Communication with the Prototype Fund Manager is supported through the AfCE online portal.

You can access the tool by navigating to www.afce.co and clicking on log in.

To help you experiment you can use the pre-paid Prototype Fund which is managed by AfCE. It will help you to:

Make your project tangible and come alive

Dramatically increase the validation of your idea through better experiments

Create an awesome pitch that will get you funded

Below are the main services for which an allocated Prototype Fund can be used for:

04. Lean ExperimentsLeveraging the Prototype Fund Guide.

Refer tothe separate

Prototype Fund Guide

Designers

A pool of UX / UI designers who bring

your idea to life and get it ready for

testing

1. Select an offering that is relevant for

your team

2. Download the template to request

the deliverables from the fund

3. Upload the template in the portal

Web / Mobile Developers

We work with developers who

set up your online experiments really

quickly

Online Marketers

Our marketers help you test

traction across multiple channels

and provide full analysis

Project Manager

First point of contact to ensure all development

and testing is agile and lean

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Tools we useGreat Intrapreneurs need great tools!

Some of the tools you might be using:

As you progress through the Discovery Phase, you will need to access certain tools that help you. For your team messaging app, most teams use Whatsapp or Slack. In Asia WeChat is also commonly used and occasionally some corporates like to use Threema.

For sharing project related info you can opt for an external Google Docs or an internal Microsoft Office 360 Sharepoint/Teams Channel site and invite your mentors.

The E-Learning content provided to you is hosted in Docebo, an enterprise Learning Management System (LMS) and from here some content may open up in Elucidat, an elearning content authoring tool we use to create some of our content. You can use this across devices and also offline.

We will offer you a Zoom video conferencing account for your team to use with mentors to help you record your mentoring calls in HD and to easily screen share etc. It’s much better than webex or Skype for Business etc.

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How you are evaluated:We evaluate you based on 6 criteria with different weightings that contribute to an overall score.

We evaluate the engagement of each participant in the weekly mentoring sessions as well as from assignments, running experiments and their level of team communication in WhatsApp / Slack / etc.

Engagement (30%)

A scientific prediction of suitability for intrapreneurship as per personality preferences and attitudes.

DNA Test Score (10%)

For weekly online mentoring sessions and workshops within the program.

Attendance (10%)

We track the completeness of your modules as well as the scores from the end of module tests.

Intrapreneurship E-Learning Score (10%)

We track the completeness of your tutorials as well as the scores from the short tutorial tests.

Tutorials Score (10%)

We are teaching an entrepreneurial mindset which is closely tied to the Lean Start-up methodology of testing assumptions. Are participants adopting this entrepreneurial mindset and new way of working or do they rebel against it? Do they appreciate its value? Are they likely to pass this on to others?

Mindset (30%)

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The Foundation

Before you embark on your journey, it can be very insightful for you to understand how your own personality and attitude relates to Intrapreneurship. These results can also support you in forming a well balanced team and to better understand your team mates. Therefore if you have been invited to take the AfCE Intrapreneur DNA Test, we ask you to complete it to the best of your abilities and keep your report on file. It just takes 30-40 mins online using the link that was sent to you. Your report will be emailed to you once you have completed the assessment.

If you have not been issued the assessment, please check with your sponsor.

Your Intrapreneur DNA Test.

Now that you laid the foundation by completing the DNA test and the e-learning course it is time to get started on your journey!

Ideation: Proceed to Gate 01

De-risking Innovation Course.

Most participants wishing to enter the Discovery Phase are required to first complete the De-risking Innovation Course. This course offers you fundamental education about Intrapreneurship, in an interactive e-learning format, and encourages the entrepreneurial thinking process. This content helps you to prepare for the Kick Off Event hosted before the Corporate Start-up Accelerators.

The course should take around 8 hours to complete and can be spread over numerous days or weeks.

Where good ideas come from?Creating start-up ideasWhat is Design Thinking?Jobs to be DoneConvergent & DivergentEthnographyDesign Thinking ExamplesElevator PitchEarly AdoptersCustomer SegmentationCustomer Interviews

What is Lean Start-up?What are assumptions?Opinion vs BehaviourPretotype or Prototype?Customer Journey introBusiness Model introThe Experiment Map10 Experiment Methods

Intro to Incubation Comparing types of SprintsDesign Sprint HacksWorking with developersIncubation in Silicon ValleyIncubation Deep DiveDifferent incubation models

Go To Market PilotPirate AARRR MetricsLaunch ChecklistExport your Insights & Plan

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06.Sponsor

Gate 01Idea & Team Formation

05.Time

01.Motivations

04.Team

02.Compelling Problem

03.Avoiding Duplication

Has the team secured a business or program sponsor who believes enough in the strategic fit of the project to fund the next 14 steps of your journey?

Has each team member received their manager’s

approval to be able to invest the necessary (10% or 20%) time to

begin their journey?

Has each team member identified 3 personal reasons as to why they would like to begin this tough journey of innovation for your organisation?

Have you formed a suitably sized and well-balanced corporate start-up team

with strong intrapreneurial personalities?

Is the problem (or innovation challenge) so compelling that each team member would be willing to spend the next 1 - 2 years working to solve it?

Has at least 5 hours of research been conducted to prove your

organisation is not already exploring the same idea or

has been able to learn from previous efforts?

The Ideation PhaseScore yourself against these steps.

17

1.Motivations

Why are you starting this innovation project?

Has each team member identified 3 personal reasons as to why they would like to begin this tough journey of innovation for your organisation?

List your motivations.

Notes:

Before accepting the challenge of a personal innovation project, consider if it matches your goals. Success is far more likely when work and personal objectives align. In short, motivation matters. What personally meaningful goals will a successful innovation project help you achieve?

Refer to the next page for inspiration.

01.

02.

03.

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Motivation.

Prove to myself I can do this.

Be a positive example for others.

Invent something that matters.

Make something that helps others.

Create something people love.

Make something cool.

Make a difference.

Show the world I can innovate.

Increase my company’s share price.

I love doing hard things.

I like surprising people.

I have a healthy ego. It has needs.

I want it. It doesn’t exist. Let’s fix that.

Create something that reflects my values.

Raise my visibility inside my company.

Raise my visibility outside my company.

Help my family.

Help my community.

A deep sense of personal satisfaction.

Get a raise or bonus.

Get a promotion.

Life is a game. This how I ‘Level Up.”

Demonstrate my value.

Change the world.

Change one corner of the world.

Spend more time with customers.

Directly drive new revenue.

Do work I love.

I’m an untapped natural resource.

Dammit, my company is doing it wrong!

The whole industry is doing it wrong.

Protect my job during the next layoff.

Protect my group during the next layoff.

Prevent the next layoff.

I’m bored.

The act of pure creation drives me.

How smart am I? Let’s find out.

How creative am I? Let’s find out

Create moments of astonishment.

I have something to prove to myself.

I have something to prove to family.

I have something to prove to _________.

Know myself better.

Work with great people I like.

No one else can do what I can.

Learn to innovate so I can do a start-up.

Buff my resume.

This is how I keep insecurity at bay.

I hate my boss.

I love my boss.

Motivations are different because people are different. None are right or wrong. Choose wisely, if your reasons are unable to change you, they certainly cannot change the world.

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2.Compelling ProblemIs the problem (or innovation challenge) so compelling that each team member would be willing to spend the next 1 - 2 years working to solve it?

Ensure you scored 8 or higher on your problem / challenge.

Notes:

Is the problem / challenge so compelling that you would be willing to spend the next 1-2 years to solve it?(Rate from 1 - 10, with 10 being the highest)

1 52 63 7 94 8 10

If you scored 5 or lower:This most likely is not the right problem for you(r team) to be solving. Go back to the drawing board to find a problem that you are driven to solve.

If you scored 6 or 7:What would it take for the problem / challenge to become more compelling? Can you reframe the problem or shift the focus to an area that excites you more?

If you scored 8 or above:You have successfully identified a problem / challenge you would like to tackle, congratulations! In the next weeks you will work on validating that solving this problem is not only meaningful to you, but for your proposed customer as well!

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3.Avoiding DuplicationHas at least 5 hours of research been conducted to prove your organisation is not already exploring the same idea or has been able to learn from previous efforts?

Perform Basic Idea Research

It’s surprising how often we had teams coming into an Intrapreneurship program and they had not yet even done a google search about their idea. Some agencies out there make money from workshops that basically ask you to “print off the internet” and stick it on the wall. We think it is common sense and pretty much ground zero for any aspiring Intrapreneur to inform themselves about their idea.

Intrapreneurs need to become the expert about their idea. It doesn’t mean that you need to have all the technical skills or subject matter knowledge yourself, but you do need to be the one who knows what the pieces of the puzzle are and how they fit together (at minimum your team does). Simply ask yourself this question: Does it already exist?

Many people have absolute tunnel vision and think that their idea is unique and original. The truth is, that it is almost certain that someone somewhere probably had the same or very similar idea to you. May be they are from the same company as you, or from a different organisation and potentially from a different industry. This is not a bad thing and does not mean you should give up. In fact, it’s a huge opportunity to learn what has already been done and what has been working and what did not work and how others think and feel about the idea. Searching for answers here will help you to become the expert on your idea within the context that is relevant for you. Try some of these:

Google is your best friend!

A lot of this can be done within a few hours and can help form a basis of knowledge. Don’t restrict yourself to what you already know. Find out what you don’t know yet!

Google different combinations of keywords associated with your idea and open all the links in a new tab for at least 2 pages of search results

Check amazon to see if books have been published on the topic or search TED.com for any relevant published talks

Search the best keywords in YouTube and also browse the recommended videos

Are there any relevant conferences or forums for your topic?

Set up free Google News alerts using specific key words that appear in the title of news articles

Is anyone talking about your idea on Twitter or other social media?

Talk to colleagues internally and find others who have knowledge about your idea and what sources they read

Scout the start-up ecosystem and sites like angel.co or crunchbase.com to see if there are start-ups in your field who have received investment.

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4.TeamHave you formed a suitably sized and well-balanced corporate start-up team with strong intrapreneurial personalities?

Team Overview: list the team members here and their strongest talents.

A corporate start-up team should consist of around 4-6 (core) team members. More than that means working together effectively can be a challenge and less than that will make it hard to distribute tasks and get everything done.

As part of your onboarding you will likely have completed a Intrapreneurship DNA test.

List your top talent here:

List your next best talents here:

1stTalent a.Talent b.Talent c.

2ndTalent a.Talent b.Talent c.

3rdTalent a.Talent b.Talent c.

4thTalent a.Talent b.Talent c.



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Complete the Idea Submission Template.

Notes:

Now is the time to submit your idea and team members so we can get started with the Discovery Phase. We don’t require lots of background information about your idea - we will dive into more details soon enough. I’m sure you have lots to say about your idea, but for now we just need some very precise bullet point style descriptions around the following:

3 potential sponsors

Core team members

The innovation challenge

Your motivation

The customer The strategic relevance for your organisation

The problem The customer value

The solution The potential impact

Idea Submission Template

Submit your idea and teamGet ready to start discovering...

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24

5.Time

6.Sponsor

Has each team member received their manager’s approval to be able to invest the necessary (10% or 20%) time to begin their journey?

Has the team secured a business or program sponsor who believes enough in the strategic fit of the project to fund the next 14 steps of your journey?

Notes:

Yes. No.

Yes. No.

What changes are you making in your schedule to work on this innovation project?

What has he/she committed to?

Notes:

List the name of your sponsor:

25

Gate 01Idea & Team Formation

Discovery: Proceed to Gate 02

Revisit your scores for step 1 to 6. Have they changed?

How do you feel about the Ideation Phase and the Innovation Journey so far?

1 52 63 7 94 8 10

Complete before your Kick Off:The Intrapreneur DNA test.

The De-risking Innovation Course and post your badge on LinkedIn.

Score 2 or higher on every step so far.

Set up an AfCE mentor call with your team.

Set up a shared team project folder and team messaging app.

Passing through Gate 01

26

13.Opportunity Size

Gate 02Identified a Problem worth Solving

12.Segmentation

08.07.AssumptionsElevator Pitch

11.Early Adopters

09.Think Different

10.Interviews

Has the team performed tops down & bottoms up TAM calculations and calibrated this with 3 experts to prove that the opportunity (market) is significant enough to pursue?

Did the team run 1 - 3 (Fake Door) experiments to help

segment and prioritise which customer segment to focus on?

Has the team prioritised over 10 initial assumptions related to the problem, the customer or the business model (not about the solution)?

Can the team clearly articulate their aligned problem, customer, tentative solution idea and proposed ‘secret sauce’ in a one sentence pitch?

Did the team identify a group of customers who were already experiencing the problem and were actively trying to solve it?

Did the team use either 1 - 2 focus groups, an enthnographic or customer observation exercise, netnography, or convergent / divergent techniques to think differently about their idea?

Did the team design non biased interview questions, select

interview channels and conduct 60 - 100 B2C interviews or 20

- 40 B2B interviews across 3-5 customer segments?

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27

The Next Innovation Phase

The goal of this Discovery Phase is for you to find problem market-fit, meaning you should be able to highlight evidence that suggests you are solving a real problem, for a real customer in a feasible way and that the business model makes sense for your organisation. At the end of the program, you will be required to communicate this in a strict 7 minute pitch to management. Depending on your organisation, you may have a 5 - 20 min Q&A session after your 7 minute pitch where you can go into key details. This pitch usually determines if your team will win significant follow on investment to go into the incubation phase where you will focus on building the solution.

Therefore we work from the pitch backwards to cover everything you need to include in a pitch from the theory side as well as having collected real world evidence that helped validate your idea.

The Discovery Phase.

Your Kick Off Event.

At the Kick Off Event you will get to work with an AfCE mentor. We believe in mentoring over consulting. We are not industry experts coming in to advise you about your idea. We are accomplished Intrapreneurs, Entrepreneurs and Innovators (often all three) coming to help guide you along your journey so that you can maximise your time and resources, helping you to avoid mistakes. If you engage and follow the process, our mentors will transfer their entrepreneurial skill and mindset to you, and will often go the extra mile to help you!

At the Kick Off Event we either have one mentor guiding one or multiple teams, depending on your specific program. This mentor will then stay with you and guide you through the next 12 weeks. In some cases you will be guided by two mentors who will tag-team with each other.

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What to expect from your Kick Off EventThe fun starts here!

The Kick Off Event is for many participants the most memorable part of the program. You will be guided in how to further define your idea, assess the most critical assumptions you are making and learn how to set up non-biased experiments so that you can validate your idea. We will push you outside of your comfort zone and get you speaking with real customers. Your mentor will guide your team throughout 2 or 3 days and set up the framework you will be using for the following 12 weeks.

Most of the time you will be working hands-on in teams but we will disperse the 2 or 3 days with interesting intro talks around key innovation concepts that each lead you into the next activity such as:

Intrapreneurship The Bermuda Triangle The Elevator Pitch Lean Start-up + Assumptions Experiments

Interviews Early Adopters Customer Segmentation Business Model Start-up Team Dynamics

Make sure you bring the following to your Kick Off Event: Laptop with power cable & internet access Smartphone with headset Smart/Casual comfortable clothes and shoes (you may be walking around a bit) Your full core team with an entrepreneurial attitude :-)

The exact agenda of a Kick Off Event may vary from engagement to engagement. On the next pages we have described exercises that you will typically cover.

Assign team rolesConfirm your team Zoom conferencing account and ensure you can join the calls via videoSet up team messaging app and invite mentors & AfCE project managerBlock recurring weekly team calls in your calendar (without the mentor)Block recurring mentor calls (1.5 hrs) in your calendarUpdate the experiment map template and interview tabs with the results you gathered from the Kick off EventComplete the next tutorials and assignments as suggested by your mentor before the mentor call

What to bring:

Ensure you complete this during your Kick Off:

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What is the role of an AfCE mentor?• Provide independent entrepreneurial thinking & mindset putting the customer first

• Guide teams in leveraging the curriculum and key start-up methodologies

• Help teams design suitable lean experiments to collect data and interpret results

• Transfer relevant knowledge and experience from other teams

• Assess individual and team performance and provide feedback

• Help teams to be organised and work like a start-up

• Provide access to their extended network where relevant

What is not the role of an AfCE mentor?• To be the first person to suggest ideas or design experiments

• To conduct interviews and experiments

• To take notes and minutes in meetings

• To make decisions on behalf of the group

• To engage with internal politics or fight battles

World-Class Mentors

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37

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Average No. of Start-ups founded

No. of InnovationProjects mentored

Average No. oflanguages spoken

Average No. ofcorporatesemployed by

Total value ofinnovation

projects

Countries worked in

Age range

The AfCE Mentors

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Ensure you capture the data of your physical poster.

Use sharpies (permanent markers) to write on your post-it notes.

Complete during the kick off.

Notes:

This exercise teaches us the importance of getting specific around the problem we are solving, who the customer is and the solution we may offer. If we can’t do that, we may get stuck in the Bermuda Triangle, which is definitely a place where you don’t want to be for long. Many people have never returned!

During the Kick Off Event you will be guided by the moderator or your mentor, but for your reference you can follow these simple instructions:

• Individually generate a description on a 3x3 inch Post-It for the problem, customer and solution - in your own words how you currently feel about each 3. You can note down more that one description

• Everyone in the team should share their descriptions with each other and if you have many, try to collate the similar ones together

• Add at least 3 descriptions that you like to your poster in the A B C fields• Then discuss the options you have and try to merge, select and define 1 that you as a team

feel most happy with. You can also rewrite it.

Download the Bermuda Triangle from www.afce.co/resources.

7.Elevator Pitch

7a.The Bermuda Triangle

Clearly communicate your idea in 30 seconds or less.

Not being specific can get you lost.

32

7b.The Elevator PitchCan the team clearly articulate their aligned problem, customer, tentative solution idea and proposed ‘secret sauce’ in a one sentence pitch?

This Elevator Pitch format is used by entrepreneurs all around the world to help them clearly communicate their idea. It covers all the aspects that someone would want to hear about your idea in one sentence. However, it is not always easy to define this and as you work on this you often find better ways to formulate your idea. Your elevator pitch will remain a work in progress and may change several times as you advance through the first few weeks of the program.

During the Kick Off Event you will be guided by the moderator or your mentor, but for your reference you can follow these simple instructions:

• If you did the Bermuda Triangle exercise, you can transfer or copy the relevant Post Its from there (Problem, Customer, Solution)

• If you did not do the Bermuda Triangle exercise, allow everyone to brainstorm thier own version of the pitch individually before sharing as a team

• Try to think of a relevant name for your team• Add some secret sauce (think about what makes you special compared to any other start-up

team that might be trying to do the same thing or why your solution would be better)• Check if it flows and create multiple versions. Improve it over time

Download the Elevator Pitch from www.afce.co/resources.

Capture the data of your physical poster.

Continue to improve your pitch over time.

Complete during the kick off.

Refer back to your Bermuda Triangle.

Notes:

34

ExampleMy team, the Founder Institute, is developing a training and mentoring program to help entrepreneurs launching a new start-up, to create meaningful and enduring technology companies, with shared equity that encourages peer support.

It’s helpful to express each idea in a consistent Elevator Pitch. Boiling a product or service down to one sentence is hard. It requires deciding what really matters and can sharpen the idea in powerful ways.

My team,

is developing

to help

to

with / by

[ name of product / project ]

[ a defined solution ]

[ a defined customer ]

[ solve a problem ]

[ secret sauce ]

The Elevator PitchCan the team clearly articulate their aligned problem, customer, tentative solution idea and proposed ‘secret sauce’ in a one sentence pitch?

35

8.AssumptionsHas the team prioritised over 10 initial assumptions related to the problem, the customer or the business model (not about the solution)?

Download the Lean Experiment Map from www.afce.co/resources.

With your mentor, you’ll learn how to generate assumptions and prioritise which ones are the most critical yet also unknown - meaning that if the assumption is not true, it could cause your idea to fail. You will then run through the 7 step Experiment Map which supports you in setting up your experiment and documenting the results. Hopefully you’ll achieve a full 2 experiments during the Kick Off Event.

Here’s how to complete your assumptions exercise:• Individually brainstorm assumptions about your idea, trying to focus more on the customer and

the problem, rather than assumptions about the solution. Focus yourself on market risk and not technical risk at this time

• Share all the assumptions as a team and collate the similar assumptions together (put the Post-It notes on top of each other)

• As a team, stand by your Experiment Map and discuss each assumption 1 by 1 to determine where it should go on the 2x2 grid to prioritise your assumptions

When you are requested to use steps 1-7 on the right hand side of the experiment map, follow these prompts:1. Most Critical Assumption to Test Now: Select the “most critical unknown assumption” you

want to test (if this assumption is false, it will cause your idea to fail).2. Experiment Design: What type of experiment did you use? 3. Minimum Success Metric: Commit to a metric that you consider high enough to get you

excited if true, making sure it is relative to your experiment design.4. Reach: How many people did you speak with, reach with your ads, interacted with in another

way (based on your experiment design), etc.?5. Results: What was the numeric result of your experiment?6. Validation: Did you “validate” or “invalidate” your Critical Unknown Assumption based on your

Minimum Success Metric?7. Insights & Actions: What did you learn from the experiment? What actions will you take based

on the experiment results?

De-risk your idea and validate your assumptions.

The Lean Experiment Map

List your assumptions in the template or on the Experiment Map directly

37

Notes:

Notes:

9.Think Different

10.Interviews

Did the team use either 1 - 2 focus groups, an enthnographic or customer observation exercise, netnography, or convergent / divergent techniques to think differently about their idea?

Did the team design non biased interview questions, select interview channels and conduct 60 - 100 B2C interviews or 20 - 40 B2B interviews across 3-5 customer segments?

Yes. No.

Yes. No.

In what way do you now think differently about your idea?

38

10a.Identify Interview ChannelsHow will the team reach their target customers?

Complete the assignment.

Comple mini test.

Watch the two tutorials.

Notes:

This is a brainstorming exercise for you to be creative using alternative ways to think about how you might reach your target customers. Enter your customer and problem descriptions and then brainstorm the different ways to identify your early adopters using the prompts in the blue cells. Once complete, discuss with your team and decide on a top 5 and enter in the template provided as part of your assignments.

Remember:• Individually log in to the online portal to complete the tutorials allowing videos to play fully

until the end.• One or more people working together can complete the assignment. Use the relevant tab in

the Assignment Templates and share in your team call to make improvements.

39

10b.Interview Channel CostingWhat channels should the team focus on?

From the Identify Interview Channels assignment, you should have zoomed in on 5 prefered interview channels. This assignment will help you to determine which channels are most worthy of your time based on their relevance and how quickly you can access customers.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




40

10c.Interview Cheat SheetDid the team design non biased interview questions, select interview channels and conduct 60 - 100 B2C interviews or 20 - 40 B2B interviews across 3-5 customer segments?

A big highlight of the Kick Off Event is to start speaking with real customers. We use the word “interview” which can sound a bit scary, but in reality we are trying to have a fairly natural conversation.

Your prep work and mentor call before the Kick Off Event should have aided you in establishing a strategy to speak with customers. Ideally you will speak to them face to face but if that is not possible, then via video call or phone can also work. The emphasis is on learning and practicing the methodology. One team managed to speak with 63 customers within 2 hours but we typically aim for 20. You will likely do this twice over the two days during the time slots that were provided to you. Be sure to use the Interview Cheat Sheet available to draft your questions and once you are happy, go ahead and use the Interview Template provided as part of your assignments.

If you cannot already guarantee that this person is from your target segment and has experienced the problem you are enquiring about, then use a pre-qualifier question before you get started. For example, when I was in Manila, Philippines wanting to interview Filipinos who had previously worked abroad, my pre-qualifier was: “Hi, I was just interested to see if you have spent any time working abroad in the past 3 years”?

01. Pre-qualifier question:

My example: “Could you tell me about the last time you were working abroad and you sent money home to your family”?

02. Could you tell me a story about the last time you experienced problem XYZ?

Interview cheat sheet.When running problem interviews, try to adhere to the following 5 questions. You may change them to fit the context of the problem you are interviewing about.

41

(You are trying to learn if the problem is indeed perceived as a real problem by this potential customer).

03. What was hard / tough / difficult about that?

For example: “OK interesting, what annoyed you about not knowing exactly what your family members were spending the money on”?

04. Interesting... Can you tell me a bit more why that was hard / tough / challenging / [insert words they used ] ?

For example: “I’m sorry to hear this. So how do you deal with this now – how do you find out what they spend the money on”? (If they can’t answer this well, it means they might not be your early adopter because they did not try to find any solutions to the problem yet).

05. So how do you solve that problem now / how do you deal with this?

(You are trying to learn what the disadvantages of the workaround solutions are so that you can engineer your solution to be 10 times better).

06. Hmm interesting, what is not so great about this solution or what are the disadvantages?

• Conduct your interviews in pairs so one can ask the questions and the other can note the answers.

• If they can’t answer question 1, you can try re-phrasing the context in case they did not understand (but don’t change it too much) and if they still can’t answer, do not continue to question 2 – find someone else!

• Speak 10% of the time (maximum) and listen for 90% of the conversation.

• When asking the questions, do not wander off script (you will put leading words into their mouths and create unintended bias so your results will not be accurate).

• Try to ask the same questions to the same defined customer segment so you can find patterns of people who have the problem and are trying to solve it.

• Take photos to remind yourself of whom you spoke to and start building your customer profile.

Interview tips

42

11.Early AdoptersDid the team identify a group of customers who were already experiencing the problem and were actively trying to solve it?

During the Kick Off Event, you may be asked to already dive into some of the weekly tutorials we have available. This assignment gives you the chance to brainstorm who your early adopters may be and get direct feedback from your mentor. It’s useful to start thinking about the current behaviours of early adopters before trying to segment your market.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




43

12a.SegmentationDid the team run 1 - 3 (Fake Door) experiments to help segment and prioritise which customer segment to focus on?

Some teams may be facing many potential customer segments and it is difficult to chose which one to focus efforts on. In this scenario it can be very useful to work through the Customer Segmentation assignment together with your mentor during the Kick Off Event. Simply watch the tutorial and then open up the Assignment Sheet on your laptop from the shared project folder you set up.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




44

12b.End User ProfileCan the team clearly describe their target customer?

In your final pitch, you will need to personify your target customers and explain key characteristics about them, beyond simple demographics. It is really useful to profile their needs and goals, along with their behaviours and key facts. You may have multiple end user profiles.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




45

For new ideas, you can not rely on existing market reports to understand how big your market is. You will need to reflect on a tops down approach as well as a bottoms up approach to derive an accurate market size which you can talk about in your final pitch. Don’t fall for the typical trap of believing you just need to grab a 1% share of market XYZ...


Comple mini test.


Notes:

13.Opportunity SizeHas the team performed tops down & bottoms up TAM calculations and calibrated this with 3 experts to prove that the opportunity (market) is significant enough to pursue?

Total Available Market (TAM)Calculating how big the market is.




46

Gate 02Identified a Problem worth Solving

Discovery: Proceed to Gate 03


How do you feel about the Discovery Phase and the Innovation Journey so far?

1 52 63 7 94 8 10


Complete before Gate 03:Score 2 or higher on every step so far.

47

20.Business Model


19.Start-up Financials

15.14.Develop PretotypeCompetitors

& Alternatives

18.Messaging

16.Iterate Pretotype

17.Traction Channels

Can the team walk through the 9 building blocks of the Business Model Canvas highlighting critical validation from numerous experiments of the ‘front end’ (5 building blocks)?

Did the team AB test pricing of their solution and determine

key financial model variables (i.e. Unit Economics, COCA, LTV)?

Has the team developed a pretotype (not prototype) based on non-scalable killer features to demo their idea to customers?

Has the team uniquely positioned their value proposition in relation to more than 10 competitors or alternative offerings?

Did the team test different messaging that communicates

their value proposition to their target audience?

Has the team observed customers interacting with the pretotype and iterated / improved it at least 2-3 times?

Has the team received ‘currency’, e.g. personal data, time, money, and compared

their traction across 2 or more channels (using pretotypes)?

The Discovery Phase

48

14. Competitors & Alternatives

14a.Solution Ideation

Has the team uniquely positioned their value proposition in relation to more than 10 competitors or alternative offerings?

Converging & Diverging on your solution.

This assignment helps your team to be creative using alternative ways to think about how you might offer a solution to the problem you have identified. It’s best if you can get the entire team together for this one and make it a fun activity.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




49

14b.Value Proposition CanvasSolving for pains, gains and jobs to be done.

As you start imagining your solution, you will need to ensure that there is a good fit between the aspects of your solution and how it addresses the customer gains, pains and jobs to be done. The exercise helps you to gain deeper clarity around the Value Proposition section and the Customer Segment sections of your Business Model Canvas.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




50

14c.Competitor MatrixLandscaping competitors and other solutions.

When developing an innovative idea, you need to be aware of what solutions already exist and from where you may gain traction in the future. You may be creating a new market or re-segmenting an existing market which follow new structures, or you may be competing against existing behaviour which you will need to be clear on in your pitch. This article will help:https://steveblank.com/2013/11/08/a-new-way-to-look-at-competitors/


Comple mini test.


Notes:




51

15. Develop Pretotype

15a.Minimum Viable Product (MVP)

Has the team developed a pretotype (not prototype) based on non-scalable killer features to demo their idea to customers?

Which are the killer features?

Yes. No.

This assignment forces you to think about what are the killer features of your solution. As entrepreneurs, we typically try to build too much and we must zoom in on key features, even if we are going to “fake them before we make them”. You will differentiate between scalable and non scalable MVPs.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




52

15b.WireframesLandscaping competitors and other solutions.

Wireframes are a low-fidelity visual guide that represent the functional framework of an app or website. They can be as simple as drawn sketches or you can use software to help create wireframes.Wireframes force everyone to think clearly and objectively about an app or website’s functionality, conversion paths, navigation placement, feature placement and ease of use.

Wireframes ensure that each page has a purpose, achieves the goals set out in the brief and define a logical navigation for your solution.

Use the prototype fund to create your assets based off the wireframes.

Create wireframes with the help of your mentor.

Refer to your Experiment Playbook.

Notes:

53

16. Iterate Pretotype

17.Traction Channels

Has the team observed customers interacting with the pretotype and iterated / improved it at least 2-3 times?

Has the team received ‘currency’, e.g. personal data, time, money, and compared their traction across 2 or more channels (using pretotypes)?

Yes. No.

This assignment makes you start exploring and testing the potential channels you can use to bring your value proposition to the customer segment. We zoom in on 11 channel types which you can use as categories to brainstorm within. Get an idea of the investment required (time and money) to understand which channels will give you a better ROI.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




54

Half-Way WorkshopPivots, realignment, next steps.

Your program might include a Half-Way Workshop. The exact agenda will be decided together with your mentor and will depend on where you are in your journey as a team. However, you may well cover many of the following agenda items:

• Team performance update based on first 6 week mentor evaluations (attendance, mindset, engagement) • Discuss missing or weak assignments • Checking in on team dynamics • Clarify Elevator Pitch • Clarify Business Model • Do we need to pivot? Recapping the experiment loops conducted so far • Pretotyping vs Prototyping: How to increase the fidelity of your experiments • Highlight the AfCE Experiment Playbook • Designing the next experiments • Setting pitch expectations: Good pitch vs bad pitch

All in all you should consolidate the first half of your program, iron out any issues that had come up and feel clear on what your next steps are to get to the finish line.

Ensure full team are attending and have travel booked.

Book a suitable meeting room with projector and wall space.

Please ensure the following:

55

18.MessagingDid the team test different messaging that communicates their value proposition to their target audience?

This assignment is useful in helping you pull together what you want to say about your idea and how you want to say it. Use it to professionalise your messaging. It’s great input before running any experiments that involve much messaging for websites, brochures, videos etc about your idea.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




56

19.Start-up FinancialsDid the team AB test pricing of their solution and determine key financial model variables (i.e. Unit Economics, COCA, LTV)?

Follow these 13 steps to create your “back of the napkin” start-up financials based on unit economics. These will help you understand how profitable your venture is, if your costs can stay under control, the Life Time Value of your customer, your revenue model as well as what investment you need. This will be beneficial for 3 slides in your pitch deck: the revenue slide, the go to market slide and your big ask slide, so it’s worth doing well.


Comple mini test.


Notes:




57

20.Business ModelCan the team walk through the 9 building blocks of the Business Model Canvas highlighting critical validation from numerous experiments of the ‘front end’ (5 building blocks)?

A Business Model Canvas defines the key elements of your proposition. It can be absorbed in seconds yet highlights the critical elements of an opportunity. You will likely make changes to the canvas after you begin. Review the canvas with your colleagues. Is it clear to them? Does it make sense? Is it compelling?

Draft your own business model01. Customer Segments: For which customer / user / stakeholder are you solving a problem for? (Refer back to step 12)

02. Value Proposition: What is your elevator pitch? Apply special attention on how your solution solves the problem for the customer segment. (Refer back to step 14)

03. Channels: How do you deliver your value proposition to the customer segment? How will you generate awareness and enable purchase, delivery and any after sales support? (Refer back to step 17)

04. Customer Relationships: What type of relationship will you need to have in order to get, keep and grow your customers? Is it more ‘low touch’ or ‘high touch’?

05. Revenue Streams: Try to quantify how much money you will make or save. Or will you achieve some kind of efficiency gain like ‘time saving’ or some other kind of impact that can be quantified?

06. Key Resources: What resources does your team need to have, in order to deliver on steps 1-5?

07. Key Activities: What things does your team need to be good at, in oder to deliver on steps 1-5?

08. Key Partners: What partners would you require so that you can gain the key activities and

key resources you need?

09. Cost Structure: Try to quantify how much money you will need to spend to achieve your revenue stream. (Refer back to step 19)

Download the Business Model Canvas from www.afce.co/resources.

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Your experiments / customer interactions so far should have helped you partially validate most of the “front end” (boxes 1 - 5) but you still may have some unexplored assumptions around the “back-end” of your model (boxes 6 - 9). You’ll need to be able to explain your business model in your pitch and and work to further validate all aspects of it in the future. Any last assumption you can still test before the final pitch?


Comple mini test.


Complete Business Model Canvas.

Notes:




How much were you able to validate?

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How to PitchHow to get funded in only 7 mins.

Now it is time to start preparing for your pitch. This tutorial walks you through the best advice on how to tie all of your assignments, experiments and learning’s into a 7 minute pitch deck. You can use the provided Pitch Skeleton to nail your speaker notes slide for slide whilst also referring to the Pitch Deck Template for proposed slide structure.

Copy and paste speaker notes into draft pitch deck (below slides).

Consider any visuals + graphics that help summarise your key messages.

Complete Pitch Skeleton.

Watch Tutorial.

Notes:

Note:• Individually log in to the online portal to complete the tutorials allowing videos to play fully

until the end• One or more people working together can complete the assignment. Use the relevant tab in


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Your agenda may include some of the following points:

Experiment and Prototype Fund wrap up

Review of current pitch structure and content

Present and record pitch to team members

Analyse recording and suggest improvements

Wordsmithing & suggestions for visuals

Pitching to invited attendees with Q&A

Discuss strategy for Q&A section of pitch

Setting pitch expectations: Good pitch vs bad pitch

Please ensure the following:

Book a suitable meeting room with projector and wall space

Ensure full team are attending and have travel booked

Invite stakeholders to come and listen to pitch

Pitch skeleton is completed and refined to 7 mins (normal speed)

Complete any other prep-work given by mentor

Final Pitch WorkshopScripting, Slides, Practicing

Your program might include a Final Pitch Workshop. In this case, after week 12, or depending when exactly your final pitch event is, one of your mentors will plan a full day workshop with everyone attending in person. This is a chance to get the entire team back together and reflect on what you have learned so far. The main focus of this workshop will be wrapping up existing experiments and finalising your pitch deck. Please note that the emphasis here is on finalising your pitch deck and not starting your pitch deck, which should have already been in motion since week 6.

Notes:

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Your “One Pager” PitchAn overview of your journey to give to an outsider.

As a final deliverable you are required to submit a one pager about your journey, which compliments your pitch deck and can be handed over to someone who has not been involved with your project. We recommend using the One Pager Pitch template that can be downloaded from our website: www.afce.co/resources.

Notes:

IDEA NAME

The Problem: The Approach: The Turning Point: The Solution: The Next Steps:

Name of Your Idea:

The Team:

Theimpact

Submitted by: (your name/team)

Please enter your most recent one sentence elevator pitch here.

Enter NameEnter NameEnter Name

One Pager Pitch

Describe here what impact you think your solution will have if we were to further develop and implement it. Impact can fall under new revenue, decreased costs or increased efficiencies as well as other types of impact. Where possible, include data to support your claims

Describe the context around the problem you are addressing as well as the customer, including the most relevant market and data you have collected.

Tell us how many interviews and experiments your ran to gain validation, elaborating on the most impactful parts of your journey.

Many innovation journeys encounter significant turning points, aha moments or times of traction and momentum. Summarise the biggest ones you experienced.

Tell us more about the proposed solution you want to develop, the features and how you want to build it.

Where do you think you need to go from here? What support, resources, skills, stakeholders, sponsors do you need to move forward?

Work your way through this checklist before you head into your pitch opportunity.

Perfect your speaker notes and timing before submitting your slide deck to a designer

Make sure you are leveraging the most important evidence and numbers you gained

Give the designer clues on how to summarise the message in your slide visually or using

simple infographics

Practice the full pitch at least 20 times (record yourself and playback the video)

Prepare 2 people to present (but ensure that each person is prepared to deliver the full pitch

in case one person needs to drop out due to unforeseen circumstances etc)

Know the exact date and location for your pitch

Understand who will be in the audience / jury

Advice Before Your Final Pitch The best way to get funded is by nailing your pitch!

Life’s abitch.

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Step 21 - 37 are covered in the Incubation GuideIncubation: Proceed to Gate 04


How do you feel about the Discovery Phase and the Innovation Journey so far?

1 52 63 7 94 8 10


Complete before Gate 04:Score 2 or higher on every step so far.

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During the program, we are looking for future innovators who can be further trained to pass on entrepreneurial mindset and skills to others across the organisation. It is our goal that your organisation will be able to run similar programs without the need for AfCE mentors in the future. Therefore we produce a final evaluation based on mentor observations and discuss these with you in a short debrief session.

03. Train the Trainer NominationA recommendation by AfCE to the program sponsor as to which participants show future innovation mentoring potential to receive further training based on a mixture of quantitative and qualitative analysis.

01. Individual and Team EvaluationA short team summary as well as an individual summary about attendance, engagement and entrepreneurial mindset is summarised from mentor observations throughout the program. The client sponsor determines if this is to be shared directly with participants.

GraduationCertificates, Evaluations & Trophies.

02. Certificate of CompletionIf you have successfully participated in all parts of the program you will (have) receive(d) the following LinkedIn certifications:

After completing the E-Learning

Course

After participating in the Kick Off

After successfully completing the

Corporate Start-up Accelerator

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Social ImpactWe believe in making an impact in the world through innovation.To increase the impact you are making beyond your own organisation we have decided to give back. If you attend any of our kick off events, complete a program with us or refer us to an organisation looking to innovate we ensure an aspiring entrepreneur in the developing world gets access to business mentoring.

Spreading the power of mentorship.Having access to mentorship and ongoing training is crucial in acquiring the skills aspiring entrepreneurs in the developing world need. We help entrepreneurs who received a micro-loan to get the skills and mentoring support they need so they can grow their businesses and lift their families from the cycle of poverty.

afce.co/social/

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Appendix

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Do you speakStart-up?

Agile: Agile Project Management (APM) is an iterative approach to planning and guiding project processes. Just as in Agile Software Development, an Agile project is completed in small sections... The main benefit of Agile Project Management is its ability to respond to issues as they arise.

Ambidextrous: (Organisational) ambidexterity refers to an organisation’s ability to be efficient in its management of today’s business and also adaptable for coping with tomorrow’s changing demand.

Assumptions / Hypothesis: Something taken for granted, or accepted as being true without proof or evidence. Asking yourself, “if we do X then will Y happen?”

Bootstrapping: A form of financing a start-up largely via “friends, fools and family” or from initial sales revenues, but certainly avoiding equity investments such as Angels and Venture Capitalists.

Business Model: A business model describes the rationale of how an organisation creates, delivers, and captures value, in economic, social, cultural or other contexts. It is made up of 9 building blocks which can be plotted on a ‘business model canvas’.

Business Plan: A business plan is a written document that describes in detail how a business, usually a new one, is going to achieve its goals.

Customer Development: Is a methodology to discover and validate that you have identified the market for your product, built the right product features that solve customers’ needs, tested the correct methods for acquiring and converting customers and deployed the right resources to scale the business. Steve Blank created this method.

Discovery: A critical phase of the innovation process where you try to prove you are solving a real problem for a real customer in a feasible way, especially by using the Lean Start-up methodology.

Design Thinking: A discipline that uses a designers sensibility and methods to match people’s needs with what is technologically feasible and what a viable business strategy can convert into customer value and market opportunity.

Disruption: When an innovation has a huge impact on an existing market or business model, often rendering the incumbents obsolete (e.g. Blockbuster vs Netflix).

Here are some useful terms and phrases you might like to familiarise yourself with before you get started

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Experiment: Just as in science, an experiment is a way of testing if a preconceived hypothesis (driven by an assumption) is true or false. Over 40 “lean experiment” types exist with each one being unique to the hypothesis being tested.

Hackathon: An event (usually up to 48 hrs) where (mostly tech people) come together to collaborate and compete on building MVP solutions to a particular problem or challenge. A lot of Red Bull is consumed.

Ideation: The process of forming ideas or concepts, before executing them. It is the first phase of theInnovation Process before the Discovery Phase.

Incubation: The third phase of the Innovation Process (after Ideation and Discovery) where you are tryingto prove if your solution has achieved “product-market fit” meaning you have a suitable solution, which the market is demanding from you.

Innovation: Is not invention in itself, but rather invention x commercialisation. To be able to commercialise an invention, i.e. to earn money from new ideas by offering it in a sustainable way, is to innovate.

Innovation Accounting: Innovation accounting refers to the rigorous process of defining, empiricallymeasuring and communicating the true progress of innovation – such as customer retention and usagepatterns - whether for start-up companies, for new products or business units within established companies.

Innovation Metrics: Non traditional business KPI’s and metrics used to measure innovation activitysuch as number of customers spoken to, speed of running experiments, number of validated assumptions, number of pivots etc.

Intrapreneur: Someone who acts like an entrepreneur but within an existing organisation. GiffordPinchot the 3rd who also wrote the book “Intrapreneuring” coined the term.

Jobs to be Done: Is a phrase used to help re-frame what the purpose of a solution / product / service / offering is being ‘hired’ to do: “what job am I hiring this product to do”? It was coined by Clayton Christensen.

Lean Start-up: A scientific approach to creating and managing start-ups to get a desired product tocustomers’ hands faster. The method teaches you how to drive a start-up and how to steer, when to turn and when to persevere and grow a business with maximum acceleration.

MVP: Stands for minimum viable product. If you are not embarrassed by your first release, then it means you are not launching early enough.

Pitch: This is how an entrepreneur explains their business model to prospective investors in the hope ofreceiving support and financing. There is a 30 second “elevator” pitch as well as a 7 min pitch or a full 20 min pitch depending on the format. The entrepreneur explains a compelling story addressing the problem, solution and market amongst other important factors.

Pivot: When you take a serious change in business direction. This may mean changing your customersegment or solving an entirely different problem and can cause the rest of your business model to change also. You will pivot if you have proven a critical assumption to be wrong and therefore your idea is in grave danger of not working.

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Pretotype: Comes before prototype. It’s a way to invoke a behavioural reaction from your target customerallowing you to measure their reaction to something e.g. watching a fake video of how your solution works. The phrase “fake it until you make it” is often used to express pretotyping.

Prototype: The stage after pretotype. It’s a way to measure your target customers behaviour whilst they are interacting with an early version of your solution, which has functional parts to it.

Silicon Valley: Region in San Francisco, California that is considered to be the technology hub of the United States. The region is made up of a number of computer companies and computer chip manufacturers. The region gets its nickname from the silicon that is used in computer chips.

Start-up: An organisation that has not yet found a repeatable and scalable business model.

UI/UX: User Interface or User Experience. Anything referring to the usability or design of your solution or product. Contrary to work in corporate, start-up solutions and product MUST be very user friendly and intuitive to understand so lots of attention is paid to the aesthetics of the end product.

Unicorn: A private non-listed company with a valuation exceeding USD 1 Bln.

Waterfall: In software development, it tends to be among the less iterative and flexible approaches, as progress flows in largely one direction (“downwards” like a waterfall) through the phases of conception, initiation, analysis, design, construction, testing, deployment and maintenance.

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Extra ResourcesThese top resources will help you go the extra mile!

• 5 Start-up Failures:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qj2YSBNwMw In 4 mins Justin Wilcox, customer development guru, sums up what the next 12 weeks are essentially going to be about. Nicely framed in 5 assumptions.

• How to talk to customers when everyone is lying to you:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqHR7CUPVbA Rob Fitpatrick is a customer development guru giving concrete advice on how to do customer interviews.

• 95 Ways to find your first customer:https://jasonevanish.com/2013/08/11/95-ways-to-find-your-first-customers-for-customer-development-or-your-first-sale/ (more useful for B2C projects) Scroll through this list of 95 techniques / channels that you may use to help you identify channels to reach your customer.

• Start-up Secrets about Value Proposition by Harvard iLab:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYJeGYboPnw#t=81 A 1.5hr deep dive Harvard lecture with 5 guest entrepreneurs on how to from idea to value proposition.

• How to talk to run a user interview:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAws7eXItMkFrom the “How To Start a Start-up” course via Ycombinator and Stanford this is a very useful lecture from a renowned entrepreneur using live examples.

• Building your End user Profile:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VBALxubDzI Bill Aulet is the man behind the MIT Entrepreneurship Centre and offers a 7 min tutorial to help you define your customer profile.

• Do things that don’t scale:http://paulgraham.com/ds.html Fantastic advice from Paul Graham, founder of YCombinator (world’s most successful incubator) on not thinking too big too early.

• The Pretotyping Manifesto:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4AqxNekecYLecture by Alberto Savoi, creator of Pretotyping, at Stanford

• How Dropbox started as a Minimum Viable Producthttps://techcrunch.com/2011/10/19/dropbox-minimal-viable-product/?guccounter=1 Article by Techcrunch using the dropbox video as an MVP example..

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• How great leaders inspire action:https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action?language=en A Ted Talk from Simon Sinek to really help you understand how to frame your marketing message - beginning with “why” not “what” or “how”.

• Start-up Killer: The cost of customer acquisition:https://www.forentrepreneurs.com/start-up-killer/ Great summary article by Davik Skok, legendary VC about Cost of Customer Acquisition and Life Time Value which re-inforces the COCA & LTV assignment.

• Start-up Sales & Marketing:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHAh6WKBgiE&index=19&list=PL5q_lef6zVkaTY_cT1k7qFNF2TidHCe-1Lecture at Stanford by Tyler Bosmeny, Partner at YCombinator, about start-up sales. The second part talks about pitching to investors.

• Winning pitches of the Founder Showcase pitch events:http://www.foundershowcase.com/videos/ Scroll through the videos and zoom in on the winning pitches to get a feel of the different styles and how they differ from typical corporate presentations.

• Short pitch advice from Dave McClure:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jSYuUGZzas Co-founder of the infamous “500 Start-ups” accelerator offering solid advice on how to pitch.

• Pitch Decks from legendary companies:http://bestpitchdecks.com/Go back in time and view the pitch decks used by great start-ups such as LinkedIn, Airbnb, Facebook, FourSquare etc to see how they pitched for their first funding rounds.

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There’s a way to do it better. Find it.

See youin Incubation!

To get in touch with us, please contact your

project manager, mentor or AfCE representative.

@[email protected]

www.afce.co+49 (0) 152 2301 8392

Copyright 2020 © Academy for Corporate Entrepreneurship

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