Report from Job Generation II - May 2010

Speakers:Will Porteous, General Partner, RRE Ventures
Paul Borgese, Digital Strategist, AP
Graham Lawlor, Ultra Light Start-Ups

Hosted by Alan Brody

 

[Job Generation is covered again on NY1.]

Job Generation II unfolded yesterday at Herrick, Feinstein, LLP on Park Ave. Now with a revised format and your host Alan Brody, back at the helm, this event moved at a quick pace showcasing new business ideas and interesting executive crossfire.
Job Gen is where Executives have the chance pitch Entrepreneurs with their ability to manage, rethink, grow, finance or otherwise get a Start-Up off the ground.
There is always a VC in residence - in this case Will Porteous of RRE Ventures - and a couple of sidekicks, Graham Lawlor, Founder of Ultralight Startups and Paul Borgese, a digital strategist with Associated Press.
This new format moves quickly with entrepreneurs not only being able to tell their story to the investment community but also to find out what a brain trust of savvy execs would make of their enterprises. For most of them it was invaluable advice.
How many Start-Ups understand the true value of their company? How many know how to position it or who to sell their services or products to. Our savvy group weighed in with enough good insight to improve their chances of growing their businesses and raising capital.
We began with a quick story from Tommaso Trionfi of Lusyte who helped a social media start-up, running out of money, to raise what today is an unheard of amount of money - close to $1 million - simply by spending time with them and reshaping their business plan.
On that note we moved into our presenters:
Bahar Gidwani of CSRhub.com was advised to become a kind of Moodies of socially responsible companies and consider bringing on a famous spokesperson in lieu of or as a way to raise money.
Paul Orlando of chatfe.com, a voice chat system, was advised to take the enterprise route - selling it to companies that need to call up for internal advice between employees.
Autoslash’s Jonathan Weinberg, a discount car rental booking service was advised to find a travel partner.
Dora Tarver’s e-projectmanager.com ran into some crossfire from execs who saw her as competing with the giant Project Manger’s Institute. But execs in the audience saw a difference picture and were encouraged by her 16,000 project manager subscribers worldwide. Adding a social media angle seemed like an obvious and potentially lucrative route.
ConeXus’s Hunter Cohen, a kind of behavioral targeting method by tracking social media relationships, was advised to find a media partner - no small task.
The executives on the panel voted the Most Valuable Players were:
Dan Cohen, as Chief Executive Officer, clearthink.com
Laura McCann Ramsey, as Chief Marketing Officer. Wsywygllc.com
Other participants included: Bill Reinisch, XIV River; Martha Lorini, Bill Simon and Paul Wegener, waveberg.com

Job Generation - Like an Investor-in-Residence Program?

According to the New York Times, VC’s spend thousands on Investor-In-Residence programs. Job Generation makes it happen in front of you - and for a fraction of the price. By putting seasoned execs in front of Start-Ups to see what VCs think make them more investible we are doing much the same thing – but the for the benefit of the public.

Sign up for our first Job Gen iEvening event on March 18.

What is Job Generation?

Last week we taped the pilot of “Job Generation” and in March we will roll out our first live events.

So what is Job Generation? It is a variation on Start-Up Presentations to Investors except that we include senior executives seeking leadership positions in the conversation.

The bigger picture – the part that is creating the buzz - is that new business ideas tend to come from young start-ups with little capital and less experience. They are usually energized by real world interaction with savvy execs but are too busy chasing investors to do that.

This is a uniquely informative experience because it brings savvy executives into the conversation at an early stage. Too often these executives are chasing after the same entrenched jobs that everyone else is after - so by putting these two generations of business execs face to face along with VCs, we see a variety of possibilities will occurring: employment, consulting, joint ventures and investment.

More than a "Job Interview"
Job Generation is about about more than savvy execs being interviewed by young Entrepreneur about running their companies. It is telescoping the process than made companies like Google, Apple and Microsoft great - when they raised enough money they hired senior execs that took them to the top. We are starting the conversation now hat these execs are available as a way to increase their chances of raising money or building sales.

Polaroid goes Facebook - Lesson from the Job Generation Pilot

In the first Job Generation, a former exec from Polaroid – a great fallen American business presents to Pixable, a company that generates photobooks from Facebook – where he notes that although the technology is different, the customer base is almost exactly the same, young women. The Pixable founders agree and they want to hire this exec. The VC on the other hand, would prefer they hire an exec with operations experience. The net result is a blend of consulting and strategic rethinking and maybe a hire or a consulting opportunity…….

In this environment have seen roll-ups, consulting arrangement and joint ventures or alliances of one kind or another. After all, only a tiny number of start-ups are investible – somewhere between 2 – 10%. So, to a large extent this is an exploration of what happens to the rest of those start-ups. Often, these are concepts that need further sales or business development provided through a joint venture context. By taking this conversation beyond the purely start-up funding conversation, we allow many more business opportunities to flourish. When business grow through sales, investors find them!

Business Discovery

One thing we learn about what the CEOs bring to the table when they talk to Entrepreneurs is a deeper understanding of the true nature of their businesses. We also have VCs at the table to help the parties understand what each can do to increase the value proposition and make them more investible.

Starting in March we will be doing a regular series of Job Generation events. In addition, all iBreakfasts going forward will still have the typical informative content but will also feature this interaction between Start-Ups and experienced execs as part of the warm-up session.

The Theory Behind Job Generation: Raising the Investibility Quotient

For those who have experienced our “Hierarchy of Start-Ups” presentation, you’ll know the most investible class of start-ups, at lest in sheer numbers re those who have these key attributes:

• 10 Years or more of domain experience in a field

• Identify and industry-specific problem

• Have a team with the solution that the mother company doesn't value

• Have an existing relationship with the natural buyers

If this is you, your check is in the mail! Most start-ups aren't like this but we find that putting them together with savvy execs can get them much closer to this fundability zone - and that is the basic goal of Job Generation.