Over the past few weeks, people have asked me what we offer on our programmes. And while I tell them it's a combination of highly targeted hybrid workshops, one-on-one mentoring with experienced entrepreneurs, £100Ks of perks and, depending on the programmes, grants and trips - It's actually a much harder question to answer.
And that’s because what I've actually listed above is the structure: the format of the programmes.What gets lost is the value we provide for tech startup founders.
I can never tell people exactly what will go into each programme because it's highly bespoke to that cohort, what they need and the current environment they're building their businesses in. In order to make a meaningful difference, our content and our approach is always different and always evolving, because each founder is unique and solving different problems in a new way. There’s no one playbook for any of this, founders have to find the right combinations of approaches that will work for them and their vision of the future. We surround them with many different approaches so they can pick the bits that work for them.
And yes, there are some fundamentals which need to be thoroughly understood which is why we have a range of different ‘entrepreneurs in residence’ who have put the theory into practice.
That's why we can confidently say we're founder first. I strongly believe that if we build great founders, they will build the fast growing exciting businesses we all want to see in the North East. So that's the approach we take when we're designing all our programmes. Whatever support that founder needs, we do our best to provide it.
Sometimes that's creating a structure that might enable a founder to work on their idea around work commitments, like our 6 week launch programme, or making our full-time Pre-Accelerator programme hybrid so founders can balance life commitment. On a day-to-day basis it also involves tailoring the individual sessions to make sure everyone gets all the value they can from each session.
If you have a idea - we can help you work out if it's worth pursuing, and if not help you find alternatives.
If you have a plan, but don't know how to start, we can help you explore ways to make that a reality.
If you've built something - we can help you find customers and work out how to keep them.
If you think you're killing it, (just joking, we all know no-one is killing it)
Whatever stage you’re at, we can help you do even better and get there faster.
You get accelerated - from wherever you are to where you want to go, depending on how much effort you put in. You really do get out what you put in. Think of us as jet fuel.
We're moral support, cheerleaders, community, a hive mind, a safe space, a sounding board and we spark network effects.
Between sales, marketing, UX, engineering, pricing, fundraising, hiring, there’s a lot to do.
We change lives - I've already written about how ignite changed my life - here's Tom’s post
We're really effective at helping founders, because we are founders. Startups are hard enough as it is, you don't need to do it alone. What are you waiting for? You have until tonight to apply
