Jul

08

Startups: What MBA Grads Are Missing

Filed Under (Small Business, Start Up Ideas) by Jeff Stripp on 08-07-2009

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A great post today can be found over at onstartups.com - post is titled: Startups: 10 Things MBA Schools Won’t Teach You. Not only is the post full of great information - the comments are even better.

Here is a summary of the 10 Things MBA’s Won’t Teach You:

Strategic planning won’t take place of managing your bank statement and cash flow.

There are always more things to do. Start deciding “what not to do”.

Sleep - entrepreneurs work in their sleep.

People are Resources, not the other way around.

Learn to read your market, and put down the book on efficient pricing theories.

Understand all of your costs.

Spend more time on lead generation and sales conversion than on product matrices.

Build a visionary and passionate work culture.

People buy and do business with people they like. Be likeable.

People and markets are not always rational.

Additional reading about start-ups and small business trends:
Five Myths about Financing Start-Ups that Hurt Entrepreneurs

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Comments:

3 Responses to “Startups: What MBA Grads Are Missing”

1. Rico on 9 Jul 2009 at 5:09 am #
   
   

   I think dealing with competition is taught from a totally different perspective at bschool. Assuming that there is an existing market, an existing pipe line of customers and new products, strategic planning and business intelligence is a must in a large corporate (totally agree with point 1, Dharmesh!).

   Most startups (or sme) are either in a huge market or just have created a new market. In the first situation, you’ll face an indefinite number of competitors (or several large ones). in the second situation you’re competition-free… until you start earning money. As soon as you grow your newly created market (meaning grow popularity), you’ll attract other companies.

   Both situations result in: you will always have competition. All that is taught in an MBA about fighting competition and strategic matrices is nice to have. But all assumptions and long-term strategies will be old after six months.

   Facing competition, in my view, is:
   - observe how they act in the market
   - observe their business model
   - talk to them, share what you want to share and learn together
   - are they targeting customer segments that you’ve left out?
   - why are they targeting those customers?
   - what are they doing better than you?
   - focus on your product, your customers, deliver the best services you can, and the word will spread automatically

   I suppose, you cannot grow/cover a worldwide market within one year (not even U.S.). Not on a startup budget. Grow and learn. Improve and sell. And you’ll bail-out competition.

   Cheers

   Rico
2. Jeff Stripp on 10 Jul 2009 at 9:14 am #
   
   

   Rico,

   very thoughtful - I agree with most of what you say - I especially liked: “all assumptions and long-term strategies will be old after six months”.

   -jeff
3. Rico on 10 Jul 2009 at 9:17 am #
   
   

   Thanks. I guess it’s hard to generalize. this is just a startup perspective at an early stage. Surely things change with growth, with customers, and with competition.

   Nice weekend.

   Best

   Rico