Launching a startup is an exciting journey, but it can also be a daunting endeavor that comes with its share of uncertainties. This is where having access to the wisdom and experience of a mentor can prove advantageous; they provide valuable guidance and support that can aid in accelerating your startup’s growth, help you overcome hurdles, and transform potential roadblocks into opportunities for innovation.
In this article, we'll explore how mentorship can be the key to unlocking your startup's full potential. To provide a comprehensive on-the-ground perspective, we spoke with mentors from our Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) program: GIA Jakarta mentor Anung Mahatma, GIA Manila mentor Jay Fajardo, and GIA San Francisco mentor Bow Rodgers.
Why Your Startup Needs A Mentor
Mentorship can be a game-changer for startups, offering tangible benefits that can aid you in forging your path to success. Having embarked on their own entrepreneurial journeys, mentors are uniquely equipped to guide startups as their knowledge is derived from real-world experiences.
As your startup progresses, you’ll inevitably run into different challenges along the way. Our Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) program mentors have identified some key obstacles to watch out for:
1. Intense Competition
To establish a strong presence within an increasingly saturated market, GIA Jakarta mentor Anung Mahatma, General Manager at PT Lloyd Pharma Indonesia, emphasizes the need for startups to expedite their time-to-market and carve out a distinct niche that sets them apart from their competitors.
2. Pressure to Generate Revenue
This challenge has been amplified on a global scale due to recent geopolitical events impacting the economy, notes GIA Manila mentor Jay Fajardo, Executive Director at Ideaspace Ventures. Startups face mounting pressure to quickly gain revenue traction by achieving product-market fit, maintaining strong unit economics, and minimizing operational costs.
3. Unpredictable Markets
Fajardo observes that startups often struggle to foresee real-world factors, like the unpredictability of consumer behavior and practical hurdles presented by local bureaucracy and market conditions. Much to their detriment, founders tend to overlook these ostensibly minor details.
To help anticipate and overcome these challenges, mentors offer industry insights and provide tailored strategic advice, through which startups acquire the acumen to refine business models, enhance product development, and devise effective market strategies. Mentors can also open doors to extensive networks, accelerating your startup’s growth trajectory.
According to GIA San Francisco mentor Bow Rodgers, Executive in Residence at Plug and Play, the most valuable contribution mentors can make to startups is to simplify their business model and guide them in directing resources toward objectives that offer the highest returns. He once assisted a startup in crafting a value proposition that unified its disparate technologies and strengths into a cohesive business model. This focused business model provided immediate manpower resources for early-stage companies, ultimately enabling the startup to secure $13 million in funding.
Similarly, Mahatma believes that a mentor’s role is to provide clear direction and detailed guidance at every step to aid them in creating a roadmap to success. His experience includes mentoring a startup in optimizing cost efficiency during the R&D formulation process. Together, they developed a system that moved beyond a trial-and-error approach, allowing the startup to calculate potential risks in terms of cost and time before conducting trials. This innovation significantly reduced the likelihood of costly failures.
Direct Market Access
If you’re looking to expand your startup to international markets, the importance of direct market access cannot be overstated. This immersive approach provides insights into the local business environment, consumer behavior, and cultural nuances that are impossible to fully grasp through secondary research alone.
By engaging directly with the market, you can make more informed decisions and strategic adjustments, ensuring a smoother and more successful market entry. From helping your startup adapt to meet local needs to fostering trust with potential partners and clients, there is truly no substitute for the practical knowledge gained from being on the ground and experiencing the market dynamics firsthand.
The Power of Networking
Networking is a cornerstone of the startup ecosystem, particularly when venturing into foreign markets where having the right connections empowers startups to gain support, visibility, and credibility within a new industry. Our GIA program facilitates this process by providing participants with direct market access for a week. There, founders have various opportunities to network through office hours, in-person meetings and networking mixers with influential corporates, conglomerates, government agencies and venture capitalists.
Encouraging founders to take every chance to connect with the community, Fajardo stresses its singular importance and references Albert-László Barabási's book, The Formula. Barabási, a Hungarian-American physicist best known for his work in Network Science and social dynamics, posits that a key predictor of future success is one's ability to actively work on expanding their network. With an extensive network, you can enhance your startup’s brand equity and increase the likelihood of encountering serendipitous opportunities.
As established figures within their respective industries, mentors can introduce you to valuable contacts that can elevate your startup’s growth potential, such as potential investors, partners, and clients.
Leveraging Market Access Programs
Understanding the nuances of international markets can be challenging for newcomers. This is where our mentors play a crucial role–with a wealth of firsthand experience in these regions, they can provide strategic advice on navigating local regulations, cultural differences, and market dynamics.
To tap into the expertise of mentors, explore market access programs such as our Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) program, which features over 120 mentors from a variety of backgrounds.
Finding the Right Mentor
The ideal mentor can provide invaluable insights, support, and connections, but finding this match can sometimes be tricky. We’ve come up with some tips to help you simplify this process:
1. Identify Your Startup’s Needs
Before seeking a mentor, identify the specific skills, knowledge, or connections that would be most beneficial to your startup.
2. Research Potential Mentor’s Background
Through professional networks like LinkedIn and industry events, look for mentors with experience and expertise relevant to your industry or business challenges.
3. Assess Fit
Rodgers recommends interviewing the mentor to ensure that you can communicate effectively with each other and that there is genuine interest in you and your company.
With these steps, you’ll gain a better understanding of areas where your mentor can make the most significant impact, allowing you to better align your needs with their capabilities to make for a constructive and effective mentorship.
Cultivating A Successful Mentor-Mentee Relationship
Individuals may have different interpretations of what constitutes success. To ensure that your goals are aligned with your mentor’s, Rodgers suggests setting key performance indicators (KPIs) together to track progress along your startup’s growth objectives roadmap. While industries might vary, the core needs of most startups are generally similar. It is essential to establish a clear foundation, focusing on key elements such as the Problem, Solution, Business Model, Market Size, Competition, Team, Roadmap, and Ask.
If your startup is new to mentorship, Fajardo advises respecting your mentor’s input while simultaneously making sure to incorporate your own experiences and domain knowledge. Though startups tend to gravitate towards one primary mentor in later stages based on factors like chemistry and communication styles, it is nonetheless beneficial to seek counsel from multiple mentors for a more balanced perspective.
Apply for our Global Innovation Alliance Program Today
Mentorship can be pivotal to your startup's growth by providing personalized advice and helping you navigate challenges. This is especially true if you’re looking to expand internationally–a mentor can assist in bridging cultural gaps, adapting your strategies to new environments, and establishing meaningful connections.
If you’re ready to explore new markets like Manila, San Francisco, or Jakarta, consider joining our Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) programs. Supported by Enterprise Singapore and in partnership with the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA), the GIA initiative offers a unique chance to elevate your startup onto the global stage. Our programs provide comprehensive support, including market immersion, expert mentorship, and valuable networking opportunities to help you tackle challenges and seize new growth avenues.
Excited to take your startup global? Discover how our GIA program can guide your expansion journey and connect you with key industry players. Explore our Global Innovation Alliance programs and apply today. Applications are open for Jakarta (Batch 10), Manila (Batch 8), and San Francisco (Batch 3).
About Our Mentors
1. Anung Mahatma (GIA Jakarta)
Anung Mahatma is the General Manager at PT Lloyd Pharma Indonesia. His expertise lies in the pharmaceutical industry, encompassing both pharmaceutical and cosmetics manufacturing.
His decision to become a GIA Jakarta mentor stemmed from witnessing the struggles startups encounter in establishing networks and securing client deals. Noticing how bureaucratic and procedural obstacles often hinder their progress, he was motivated to leverage his industry knowledge and experience to startups overcome barriers and achieve their business goals.
2. Jay Fajardo (GIA Manila)
Jay Fajardo is the Executive Director of Ideaspace Ventures, a Manila-based venture capital investing in early-stage tech startups in mobility, healthcare, fintech, energy, digital infrastructure, and media. He also leads QBO Innovation, Ideaspace’s consulting unit, collaborating with various stakeholders to foster and support the Philippine innovation ecosystem.
As a GIA Manila mentor, he enjoys being a guiding figure for inbound startups, providing them with insights about the Philippine ecosystem and educating them about the local regulatory and administrative framework. He believes that the Philippines’ young, English-speaking, and digitally savvy consumer base offers a distinct advantage in Southeast Asia, providing unique opportunities for growth and innovation.
His tech entrepreneur journey began in 1983. A self-taught coder, he created and sold applications while still in high school. Later, he became a software development consultant for SMEs and large enterprises. In 1996 during the advent of Web 1.0, he was appointed Technology Director at Businessworld Online, where he developed CODEX, an early web search engine for Philippine financial data. In 1998, he co-founded Pacific Sun, specializing in IP telephony networks. By 2002, he launched Airborne Access, which became the largest Wi-Fi hotspot network in the Philippines and was eventually acquired by PLDT/Smart in 2008. In 2009, he founded Proudcloud to build applications for startups and initiated Roofcamp, a community for tech innovators. Fajardo’s diverse experience in technology and business led him to take on CTO and CEO roles in numerous tech startups.
3. Bow Rodgers (GIA San Francisco)
Bow Rodgers is an Executive in Residence at Plug and Play. Driven by his passion for adding value in every endeavor, he took on the role of mentor, drawing from his extensive real-world startup experience to make a significant impact in Plug and Play’s accelerator programs.
As a C-level executive and serial entrepreneur with a proven track record in funding and scaling early-stage companies, his extensive experience spans roles such as Group President at Sprint Telecommunications, launching the Macintosh Office at Apple Computer, and securing funding from Microsoft for his startup, Human Engineered Software. With CEO and COO roles at both early-stage and enterprise corporations, Bow has evaluated over 15,000 funding pitches and mentored more than 100 startups. Additionally, as founder and CEO of Vet-Tech, Inc., he has successfully guided U.S. Veteran entrepreneurs in building and funding their ventures through the Vet-Tech network.
The Global Innovation Alliance (GIA) is an initiative of Enterprise Singapore (ESG), in partnership with IMDA. Comprising a network of Singapore and overseas partners in major innovation hubs and key demand markets, GIA programs focus on technology and innovation. Plug and Play is Singapore’s GIA Partner in San Francisco, Jakarta, and Manila. Find out more about our GIA program here.
