There is a common problem in companies that start growing quickly.
The team is good.
The people are capable.
The company has product, revenue and customers.
But there is one important issue: no one inside the organization has ever been through a growth phase like this before.
That does not mean the team is weak.
It simply means the company has entered new territory.
Growth creates new problems
Each stage of a company requires different capabilities.
A company with $500,000 in revenue faces different problems from a company with $5 million.
And a company with $5 million faces different challenges from one with $25 million.
As the business grows, new questions emerge:
- how do we build a more sophisticated sales organization?
- how do we hire a new layer of leadership?
- how do we implement governance?
- how do we prepare for fundraising?
- how do we enter new markets?
- how do we internationalize?
- how do we build new sales channels?
- how do we professionalize operations?
- how do we manage investors?
- how do we maintain speed without losing control?
For the founder and the team, many of these challenges may be new.
For other people, they are not.
Experience reduces the learning curve
There is an important difference between information and experience.
Today, information is widely available.
Founders can find articles, courses, videos, books, podcasts and frameworks on almost any business topic.
But information does not replace experience.
An executive who has already led an international expansion may recognize risks that rarely appear on a checklist.
A founder who has already scaled a company from $5 million to $50 million may recognize growth patterns another entrepreneur is still discovering.
An experienced investor may anticipate how a certain decision will be perceived in a future fundraising round.
Experience is knowledge accumulated through real decisions.
The question should not only be “who should we hire?”
When a company realizes it lacks experience, the natural reaction is often to think about hiring.
But hiring an executive is not the only way to access knowledge.
Depending on the challenge, the company can work with:
- advisors;
- board members;
- mentors;
- specialists;
- fractional executives;
- consulting firms;
- investors;
- experienced founders;
- strategic networks.
The ideal model depends on the type of problem.
A problem may require experience, not necessarily execution
Consider a company planning to enter the United States.
It may not need to immediately hire a Chief International Officer.
It may first need to speak with three or four people who have already:
- opened operations in the US;
- hired local teams;
- built distribution channels;
- dealt with regulatory issues;
- adapted products;
- sold in that market.
Their experience can significantly improve the strategy before major resources are committed.
The same applies to fundraising
A company preparing to raise capital may need to understand:
- what type of investor to approach;
- how to structure the narrative;
- which metrics to present;
- how to prepare the data room;
- which terms to negotiate;
- which mistakes to avoid.
Having access to founders and investors who have already gone through this process can reduce an unnecessarily long learning curve.
And the same applies to commercial growth
Companies trying to accelerate sales can benefit from executives who have already:
- built sales teams;
- created channels;
- developed partnership programs;
- sold to large enterprises;
- expanded internationally;
- built recurring revenue models.
The logic is simple.
If someone has already lived through the problem you are facing, their experience can help.
One person rarely has all the answers
Another common mistake is to look for a single “super advisor” who can solve every problem.
That person rarely exists.
A company may need different kinds of experience at different moments.
Today, the challenge may be sales.
Six months from now, fundraising.
Then governance.
Then internationalization.
Then leadership development.
For that reason, a network of people with complementary experience may be more valuable than relying on one person alone.
Strategic minds
At Koinz Capital, we use the concept of strategic minds to describe people who have accumulated relevant experience and can contribute to companies facing important challenges.
They are executives, founders, investors and experienced professionals who have already gone through situations other companies are only beginning to face.
When that experience is applied to a new business challenge, it becomes intellectual capital.
What does intellectual capital mean in practice?
Intellectual capital is not just theoretical knowledge.
It combines:
- experience;
- knowledge;
- analytical ability;
- networking;
- references;
- patterns recognized over a career;
- access to people and opportunities.
When these resources are applied in a structured way to a company, they can increase its ability to decide and execute.
Companies do not have to learn everything alone
Every company needs to learn.
But that does not mean it needs to make every possible mistake in order to gain experience.
A company can accelerate its learning curve by getting closer to people who have already faced similar situations.
At many points in the journey, the most important resource for unlocking the next stage is not simply more money.
It is access to the right experience, at the right time.
