Promoting an inclusive entrepreneurship experience requires a unique solution for early-stage startup founders. In this post, we will focus on Xelera’s first and most important feature: the journey and the way it provides a simple and intuitive guide for early-stage founders.

As discussed on previous posts, Xelera is offering an innovative solution for entrepreneurs developing their startup. The solution is accessible, affordable, and flexible.

In the next couple of posts we will explain the various features of this unique solution:

1. the structured entrepreneurship journey.
2. the continuous feedback.
3. the guidance and help provided by our international network of business and entrepreneurship experts.

The Journey – a Guide to Startup Development

Developing a startup is a confusing task. Most early-stage entrepreneurs choose their development path based on intuition. If they are lucky, they might base it on sporadic advice given by friends and family.

Therefore, many early-stage entrepreneurs are looking for structured and methodological process that will show them the way to build a business out of their idea.

To answer this need, we developed our startup development journey (‘the journey’ for short). The journey is an 8 step process guiding for early-stage entrepreneurs from idea to investment ready.

Xelera’s Journey

1. Conceptualization – putting structure into the idea and preparing it for further investigation, validation and development.
2. Validation and investigation – reaching problem/market fit by testing the key assumptions related to the idea and analyzing the opportunity through market research.
3. Proof of Concept – testing the feasibility of the offered product/service through a prototype and “live” experiments.
4. Go-to-Market – creating a plan to reach potential customers and convert them into paying ones.
5. Business Planning – forming the solution offered by the startup, creating sustainable business model and strategic plan.
6. Startup Economics – calculating the economic opportunity and budgetary requirements of the idea.
7. Pilot – putting the product/service to the customers’ test through a lean Minimum Viable Product. Gathering valuable feedback from customers and improving the product.
8. Fundraising – getting the startup ready for investment. The founder Creates all the materials required for fundraising, and researches potential investors in the industry.

Throughout the journey, the founder comes across various assignments based on professional frameworks and canvases. In addition, founders can submit these assignments for review and feedback (more on feedback in our next posts).

In conclusion, the journey offers early-stage founders an structured and methodological process to follow and make developing their startup easier.

Some of you might say – “wait a minute! developing a startup can’t be EASY“, and you are right. It is not.

The journey alone does not guarantee success. It should be coupled by a lean startup mindset.

The Lean Startup Methodology

The lean startup methodology is an approach that has been and is being used by many successful entrepreneurs worldwide.

Simply put, it is tried, tested and becoming the gold standard approach for entrepreneurship. In addition, the lean startup methodology helps founders increase the certainty level of their projects and reduce the risk associated to it. A detailed explanation about the lean startup methodology must start with the definition of a startup:

Indeed, this uncertainty is one with the nature of the startup: creating a product/service in conditions of uncertainty involves making assumptions. Lot’s of them. These assumptions may be related to the most basic concepts of the startup (such as the problem it solves, or the solution it offers) or to the business model the startup uses.

The risk associated with the startup is a direct result the uncertain nature of the assumptions upon which it is based. Assumptions about human condition, human behavior or technological feasibility.

A Scientific-like Approach to Entrepreneurship

Since we are dealing with assumption based projects, the best way to reduce uncertainty (and risk) is to prove these assumptions true or change them.

Through the lean startup’s scientific-like process of “build-test-learn”, which we embrace, founders make assumptions about their startups, create an experiment to test their assumptions, and change/keep them according to the results they inferred.

Above all, this cyclic process is done over and over again by startup founders with the purpose of validating all of the assumptions they make. Namely, reaching problem-market fit (i.e. proving that the problem they are solving is one that needs solving and that the solution they offer is feasible) and product-market fit (i.e. proving that there is a demand for their solution in the market and that it makes sense in commercial and economical terms to all involved stakeholders).

By combining the lean startup principles with Xelera’s startup development journey, the founders work their way through validating different startup-related assumptions, increase the certainty level of their projects and de-risk their startups, and make sure no entrepreneurial or commercial topics are left aside.

The bigger picture

How does the journey fit Xelera’s bigger mission of creating an accessible, affordable and flexible entrepreneurship experience?

Offered online and through an affordable subscription model – our journey means every aspiring entrepreneur in the world can start working on his/her idea with a click of a button. No pre-requisites or an exhausting application process. Just sign up and start developing any time and from anywhere.

The next blog post will focus on the feedback and its importance for entrepreneurs.

Sign-up now and start your free 14 days trial.