Immersed in designing their start-ups, focussed on the task at hand, entrepreneurs sometimes forget to take time out, to stand back from their project and take a close look at their relationships with the stakeholders of their project. And yet, isn’t this relationship a true driver of the success of the entrepreneurial project?
At VentureLab, we highlight the importance of assertiveness in business: being capable of giving constructive and powerful feedback to project stakeholders. To begin the learning process, we emphasise the importance of mutual assessment. After 6 months of incubation, the young entrepreneur and the Entrepreneur in Residence mentoring them sit down together and, with the assistance of a team member as facilitator, openly express their feelings and feedback about their mutual relationship.
Although everyone is convinced of the usefulness of this assessment in the young entrepreneur’s career, the process can prove difficult for them. Obviously, when you are 20, it isn’t always easy to express your feelings or differences of opinion to an Entrepreneur in Residence, too often considered by the young person as an authority figure.
In this context, educating and equipping young entrepreneurs with the tools to provide feedback, in particular through training given internally, seemed essential to us. Indeed, whether they are dealing with the Entrepreneur in Residence or with future clients or partners, it is only by means of frank communication that young entrepreneurs will be able to maintain good relationships, to continue to construct and thus achieve their objectives.
