On Tuesday, June 25th, the Jewish National Fund hosted an entrepreneur speaker series titled, “How to Ethically Scale High Growth Companies.” at The LAB Miami, featuring Maxeme Tuchman, CEO & Founder of Caribu, Felipe Sommer, Co-Founder of Nearpod, Sam Gorenstein, Co-Founder & Executive Chef of Hospitality Capital Partners, and moderated by Brian Rosenzweig, Co-Founder & Managing Partner of JANVEST Capital Partners.
All successful companies begin as start-ups at some point. Experience and time is what narrows the difference between a small business and an economically profitable company. However, other factors like timing, hard work, innovation and having the right team are key elements.
Brian Rosenzweig, Co-founder of JANVEST Capital Partners, is a leading venture capitalist who invests in dynamic emerging technology businesses in Israel. He discussed, among other entrepreneurs, how to effectively scale high growth businesses. Nearpod, a mobile platform that empowers educators to create learning experiences that engages and inspire millions of students around the world is influenced by director of customer success, Melisa Bebchik. Alongside Bebchik is CEO and Co-founder of Caribu Inc., Maxeme Tuchman. Caribu Inc. is an educational technology company that helps parents, extended family and mentors read and draw with children when they´re not in the same location. Samuel Gorenstein, is a notorious and highly praised Chef; he has been named as a top chef in Forbes in its annual “30 Under 30,” and twice nominated Rising Star by the James Beard Foundation. Gorenstein has also been named one of the top Latino chefs by Poder Magazine and first winner of the Food Network´s culinary competition show “Kitchen Inferno.” Bebchik, Tuchman and Gorenstein cohesively agree on the importance of determining various factors in order to scale your business. They all followed these points of success to market their business and ultimately expand company growth:
1. Choosing the right strategy
A tactful strategy is crucial for any company to succeed. First of all, know the type of product or service you are offering. You can have an excellent product, but if you don’t know how to manage it, you won’t produce profits, but on the contrary, produce losses. A good strategy is one that lets the company generate profit, in which fans of the product or service arise; the one that puts the whole team on the same page and that grows as the company grows.
2. Investing in people, innovation and technology
In order for a company to succeed, it is important for all members of the team to feel motivated and useful within the company. Investing in employees ́ happiness is investing in employer branding, public relations, talent recruitment, innovation, agility and productivity. By investing in employees, companies are able to retain and attract top talents who are loyal and have more fulfilling work/life balance, which for the company, means success. When employees feel valued and passionate about their job, they will dig deep to make the business prosper.
Furthermore, another key to success as Gorenstein said is always to be innovating within the technology sector. Experts agree that innovation allows companies to be more competitive as well as to adapt more easily to changes through the development of technology. However, in the current high paced environment, investment in technology has become a necessity and must be integrated as an essential part of the business for it to grow. Overall, the key is to invest in the resources that will help the company today (people, innovation and technology) and scale operations as the business continues to grow.
3. Customer success
“The concept of customer success is changing”, added Bebchik, “We don’t want to retain the customer and that’s it”. The point of customer success is to not only make the customer feel happy but also make the employees feel as though they have an impact. Customer acquisition still remains to be very important in all businesses. However, focusing on your existing customers is key for customer success, as their perception can make or break a business. Delivering quality experiences, products and services, as well as making every effort to delight buyers, is the way to achieving customer success.
By Ina Murube