You have successfully taken your business from stage zero to the first stage. Now you have a product live in the market, some customers, maybe a couple of partners, and even a financier. What next? It is now time to move the business to the next stage – thousands of customers, millions of dollars in revenue, a larger team, maybe more financiers, and so on.

Note first that there is no saying how long the startup stage would or should last. It can be a year, two years, five years, or even more. It is evident to everyone on the team when it is time to move on to the growth stage.

Here are three skills you need to grow your business from the launch stage to become a successful company.

Sales

You must work on sales to grow revenue from hundreds of thousands into millions. Get more customers, increase your market share, expand into new areas, and boost sales. You will need the skills to execute these at the growth stage.

Customer service

This is closely linked to the former. As you onboard new customers, you must develop a customer service culture that will keep your customers glued to you. There will be constant competition with other brands upping their game to give as much or even more than you do. It may require you to upgrade your solution to keep up. They become your evangelists if you can keep your customers happy and satisfied.

Team building and people management

You will work with a larger team than you did at the beginning. Depending on your model, this may be completely remote, physical, or hybrid. It will take more from you to manage a team of 100 people than to manage a group of 10. That is why I mentioned in a previous post that one person might not have all the skills, but in some cases, they do. You may be good at building and working very well with a team of 10 people, but not a group of 100.

One thing you should keep in mind is creating a sense of mission that brings them together. A lot at this stage will depend on the culture you built with a more minor team. How you develop and treat your team members is very important.

There are other skills you will need as you gradually grow your business from the launch stage to become a successful company. Things like risk management, resource management, and so on. Most of them may have team members with that expertise, but you have to be directly involved in sales and people management. You should know what is going on with your sales team at every point because the business is going nowhere if there are no sales.

Many have written that Obi and Kwankwaso do not have nationwide political structures like Tinubu and Atiku to win the Nigerian presidency next year.  This is my response:

My Response: Mobile internet is reducing information asymmetry as more voters can bypass the filters and intermediaries to get information from the sources. The existence of information asymmetry makes market systems imperfect.  In politics, it does the same thing – imperfect electoral systems.

But in 2023, Nigeria will have the first mobile internet era election. This is the first app utility-anchored national election. I am not arguing that decades-old political  structures are not important, my point is that disintermediation (cutting out intermediaries) is evident, and general voters have access to more information about candidates now, to make decisions independently, out of the influence of political bundlers and brokers.

The Ezes, Obas, Amanyanabos and Emirs influenced many past elections through zone defense and zone offense (as in football) via block voting, being custodians of information; the village head determined the candidates for most villagers.

In 2023, that will not happen because they do not have exclusivity on the information about candidates. This makes the paths wide open for candidates because the Best Message will WIN depending on how INEC behaves. The power of aggregation construct is now strong. 

Indeed, the greatest danger is using old tools to model new systems. Think of when many Wall Street experts predicted that Tesla would go bankrupt, using models developed for Ford, Toyota and GM, for a car company that has unleashed new vistas of innovation.

If you use old political tools to evaluate new political systems, you will lose. President Trump did rallies during the pandemic and modeled his acceptability based on the crowd-size when Biden did none. After the elections and results counted, he realized that new technologies and evolving engaging patterns have changed many things and early voting made many of those rallies useless; some precincts had voted in excess of 50% before his rallies!

Young People, if anyone tells you that your candidate has no chance; ignore him or her.  Indeed, if tech changes markets, it can change politics in Nigeria. The most valued financial institution in Nigeria is Flutterwave. Its market cap can buy GTBank* and Zenith Bank combined. It took Kuda bank 3 years to hit a milestone which took Wema bank more than 70 years. It is 0-0 at full time and they are getting into sudden-death extra time, with every candidate positioned to score that first goal to win it.

Continue to work for your candidate, and forget anyone who thinks because he is a “structural engineer” from the school of Nigerian politics, that only his party has an edge. If INEC does it work, this election is the most OPEN.

Comment on Feed

Comment 1: What is the ratio of people on internet to people without internet?,what is the ratio of youth that partake in election, compared to the old people that vote massively,Prof if you don’t have political structure in Nigeria forget about winning an Election.

My Response: Your model is that when those young people have no jobs, schools are closed, trapped in cities because insecurity will not even allow them to visit homes, they cannot tell those parents how their liberations will come. You think those young people cannot explain to their parents while the price of rice is high. Who would you trust? A local politician who comes every 4 years or your son/daughter with better information?

Edo State government election showed the evolution of awareness in Nigerian politics: the governor built structures in APC but was cut-out, he moved to PDP and was able to win despite the low capacity of PDP which over years he had actually worked to dismantle. APC, from state to national, could not overcome the people’s structures. Osun is also an example.

I am not saying that Obi or Kwankwaso has it; my point is that new structural engineers in Nigerian politics will graduate in 2023.

Comment 2: Your comment has banked heavily on past political structures but fails to recognize Three powerful game changers

1. More than half of registered voters have never participated in any election in Nigeria due to perceived lack of enthusiasm in candidates. This has changed as daily realities show that majority of Nigerians are enthusiastic about voting in 2023. Who do you think they will Vote for? The people that’s never elicited their enthusiasm or the new players they find more credible?
2. Information decimation in Nigeria politics depended heavily on political parties and their structures. That’s changed. Internet has changed it. Electorates now relate directly with candidates and the youths who are online freely speak to their aged parents and relations about who to vote for.
3. New Voters have massively keyed into the System. I’ve Never voted before in any election in Nigeria. But this time around, I registered and I have collected my PVC because I see better choice of candidates in 2023 that made me take the sacrifice to register and collect my PVC and I’m going to Vote. And millions of Nigerians like me did same. Do you think we’re going to vote for PDP or APC that’s Never elicited in us the motivation to participate in ELECTIONS?

Do you know How many people I have mobilized to register and collect their PVCs?

Do you know How Many aged people I talk to everyday about credible Candidates to Vote for in 2023

Do You know that there are millions of first time PVC owners doing same as I’m doing and we’re doing it heartily and not because of payment from any Party

You didn’t take these three powerful game changers into account in your hypothesis

This election is Very open