This summer I’m working with five new technology companies that are in the process of going from bench to business. What is common with all these entrepreneurs is the belief that once you have a product, all you have to do is find a customer to buy it and you’ve got a business. (Remember I talked about going from idea to prototype in my previous post) Yes, Peter and I are famous for saying that without a customer you don’t have a business, but that’s just a clever saying. It completely overlooks the fact that a business has a lot of moving parts and the entrepreneur, the product, and the customer are just three of them.
The other moving parts include employees, strategic partners, manufacturing, distribution, financial controls, and the list goes on and on. Every product or technology entrepreneur I’ve ever worked with figures that all these “business” things will just work themselves out. “Hey, I’ll figure it out when the issue comes up; how hard can it be?” Right! Unfortunately, these very same people come back six months to a year later to report that “business is SO much harder than they ever thought it would be.” Duh! It's true that business is not rocket science; it’s actually much harder because there are no clear-cut rules and formulas for how to get things done. A lot of business is finesse, awareness, and intuition. You need an uncanny ability to see the big picture but not get ambushed by the details.
You might want to start crawling from bench to business by doing the following:
1. Depict a process flow chart of all the activities required to secure a customer, make the product, deliver it, and so forth.
2. Now make sure you understand what it takes to perform each activity (equipment, people, knowledge, etc.).
3. Then look at each activity and decide whether it’s something you will do in house or outsource to a strategic partner.
You'll save yourself a lot of time and grief if you don’t try to do everything yourself, especially if your expertise is the product or technology and not business. Remember, that valley of death is long and hard to navigate. You’d better understand where you’re going and how you’re going to get there or you may end up with a product but no business to support it.
