Author name: financialfreedomllc20

With every startup or business idea, there comes a dream to scale it to the moon. I am a journalist with two small startups under my belt. Being in the startup world for years, I have been on both sides of the spectrum. On one hand, I have mentored many startups due to my association with incubators and accelerators, and on the other hand, I have done extensive research into possible resources, mentors, guides, investors, and backers that I, personally can utilize for my own startups.

When you are a programmer, the reality of your idea is just behind some lines of code; but, if you are a non-technical founder like me, things become difficult. What do you do?

You collaborate with entities like a startup studio.

The recent trend of startup studios is giving non-technical founders access to resources that help them “build” their idea. These resources can be in the form of mentorship, specialized teams, and technical leadership as well.

If you have never heard of a startup studio then here is what you need to know. It is a setup that is built to enable and support other startups. It can also be called a startup factory. The three aspects that define a startup studio are:

– internally generated ideas,

– the singular goal of supporting other startups,

– and a proper infrastructure of idea enabling resources.

The question is, does it help?

Companies such as Dollar Shave Club came out of the Science startup studio in Santa Monica, California, and prove to be a good case study for what’s possible.

As a non-technical founder, collaborating with a startup studio can provide you with the following benefits:

1. It can act as your CTO/Co-Founder

Startup studios are more invested in your business than a web design agency. This is because startup studios build you from the ground up, they help you launch the idea and watch it grow. Hence, they are motivated to provide guidance, support, and resources for a longer period of time.

Startup studios also act as your co-founder and CTO to “build” your product and later also work on the growth of your startup and devise strategies for the future. The key interest of any startup studio is the success and growth of their startups, its valuations, and its future.

2. It helps to create blueprints or prototypes

In the startup world, if you are stepping in with just a passionate idea without proper resources, guidance, or backup. There is little chance that your startup will succeed.

However, with a startup studio, you can raise your success rate significantly. It is because they provide an almost foolproof blueprint on how to launch and develop your idea. With the help of a startup studio, you can build a prototype you can use to move forward with your idea, validate it, do risk analysis, or calculate possible lacks and failures.

3. It can help you validate product/market fit

When you come up with an idea, initially that is all it is. No matter how great, how innovative, or problem solving an idea is, it is just… an idea. Until you roll up your sleeves and work on it. Once you get started on bringing your idea to a reality that’s when the first pool of obstacles, failures, and problems arrive. This is the first test of your endurance and the validity of your idea.

With a startup studio, you can do just that. You can take your idea, create a prototype, launch it, and validate if it can withhold in the real world.

4. It gives you access to idea pools

Startup studios go through several businesses, ideas, potential startups on an everyday basis. Their exposure, to new ideas, technologies, and possibilities, is immense. The individuals in the studio are also tech-savvy and innovative which leads to even more solutions and ideas.

It is a high possibility that when growing your startup you will reach a dead-end, a failure, a u-turn, or crossroads. When faced with such situations, you can bounce ideas, discuss, evaluate, and analyze each opportunity or solution with the startup studio. The diverse set of mindsets will allow you to make a suitable pivot for the future of your company.

5. It lets you tap into a pool of resources

With a startup studio, you have easy access to tech-savvy, diverse minded, experienced, professionals. A startup studio has a team of designers, developers, marketers, and administrative staff for the early-stage startups they are associated with.

Having access to a pool of resources, startups can get all the help they need in launching their idea without hiring and thus, saving the expense of salaries during its prototype phase.

Conclusion

While a studio startup can be highly impactful for non-technical founders, it can be highly beneficial and enabling for technical founders as well. To run a business you need a whole team of experts and enablers, a startup can not be a one-man show. To thrive, every startup requires collaboration, loyalty, sharing of ideas, resources, and a team to lean on. So whether you are a non-techincal or a technical founder joining a venture-capital-backed studio will absolutely enable growth opportunities.

“No more romanticizing about how cool it is to be an entrepreneur. It’s a struggle to save your company’s life – and your own skin – every day of the week.”

— Spencer Fry, co-founder of CarbonMade

The post How Collaborating With a Startup Studio Can Save Non-Technical Founders appeared first on Startup Digest Blog.

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Smart leaders understand how powerful having different personality types in the workplace can be. Personality tests like Myers-Briggs and Enneagram can measure a person’s specific personality traits in multiple ways. Many companies have begun using these evaluations to help them better understand potential and current employees, providing them with valuable insights they may not have obtained any other way.

As with all approaches, however, there are a number of positives and negatives to using personality tests. To help us understand the extent to which employers should rely on personality tests for their recruitment or employee development efforts, we asked 13 entrepreneurs from Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC) the following question:

What’s one pro or one con for using personality tests for recruiting and/or developing employees? Why?

Pro: They serve as great conversation tools

Personality tests are not a one-size-fits-all tool to identify and recruit employees, but they can be great conversation tools for existing and new staff. When used in addition to staff training and growth tools, personality tests can serve as a tool to discuss aspects of your team members’ behavior or their sense of self, helping them to open up and discover more about themselves. —Darby Cox, Darby Cox LLC

Pro: They can help match people to jobs they’d enjoy

Personality tests can be extremely beneficial in the hiring and development process for employees. I’ve found the DISC personality test to be beneficial for matching people with jobs they’d enjoy and likely be successful at. It also allows you to communicate with others more effectively, as it gives you a better understanding of how people process information. —Kevin Getch, Webfor

 

Pro: They can eliminate unqualified candidates

I think that you can use personality tests when recruiting employees, but that’s about it. Red flag questions on the test can help you eliminate people who are not qualified, which helps you save time and money. You’ll also improve the chances of hiring someone who will fit into their new role. —John Brackett, Smash Balloon LLC

 

Pro: They may offer better perspective on past experiences

Personality tests are useful in hiring because they can test what people will do in specific situations, so you can get a true perspective on their past experiences. Candidates will tell you great stories about how they handled certain situations, but a personality test will give you better insight into why they behaved that way since most people can’t fake their responses. —Josh Kohlbach, Wholesale Suite

Pro: They can identify how employees can be integrated into the team

Understanding how someone operates best is just as important as the education and skill set they carry. The Gallup CliftonStrengths assessment is a great test to gauge where a candidate stands in their natural state and how they will integrate into your existing team. It can be used to identify what candidates and personalities will fill gaps in the company culture that you might have. —Matthew Podolsky, Florida Law Advisers, P.A.

Pro: They may be more relevant to an employee’s inner self

I think personality tests are interesting and possibly useful, but they are also limited, especially when it comes to the workplace. They are fairly abstract and probably indicate more about an employee’s inner self and potential than how someone is actually going to perform on a day-to-day basis. You can use them, but also look at more measurable factors, such as what people have actually done. —Kalin Kassabov, ProTexting

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Con: They are not a final testimony of character

The important thing to remember with the Myers-Briggs or Enneagram tests is that they are not ironclad reports that give you a final testimony of a person’s character. They are meant to help you understand what a person’s preferences are. This will enable you to help people find work and tasks that they’ll love to do, which will help you create a great workplace with high productivity. —Syed Balkhi, WPBeginner

Con: They could set employers up to be biased

I think a significant con of using personality tests for recruiting is it sets you up to be biased. You may attribute a candidate’s behavior and words to what the test says, rather than actively listening to people. It’s important to be aware that you could misjudge a person. Keep an open mind and rely on your experience to help you understand a candidate’s fit with your business. —Blair Williams, MemberPress

Con: It’s possible they will generate false positives

I don’t like personality tests because they’re not always accurate and often measure a person’s state of mind at the time they take the test. Many people aren’t comfortable during the hiring process, so you’re getting a false positive. If you insist on using these tests, make them only one factor in your hiring decision. —Thomas Griffin, OptinMonster

 

Con: They risk pigeonholing employees to generic norms

A personality test pigeonholes employees to standards and norms that apply to a trend of people, but should not be used to judge the individual. The risk with these tests is that we seek to derive too much data about a person, and instead they should just be an indicator as to strategies and ways to manage and motivate individuals to improve. They should be used to provide a guiding checkpoint and start more conversation. —Nicole Munoz, Nicole Munoz Consulting, Inc.

Con: They fail to sum up an individual as a whole

The main con of using a personality test is that it fails to sum up an individual as a whole. People are complex and it takes more than a test or a few tests to understand what they would be like to work with. You’re better off contacting their references to get the most accurate, current information about how they are in the workplace. —Jared Atchison, WPForms

 

Con: They don’t truly show if an employee is a good fit

One con of using a personality test for recruiting employees is that it will not accurately tell you if the employee is a good fit for the position. Personality tests are good, but you have to combine them with other tests. Listening to the candidate and seeing how they react and handle a stressful situation is just as important. —Alfredo Atanacio, Uassist.ME

 

Con: It could offer an inaccurate reflection of their personality

One con would be that people may try to guess what you want them to say, so it could turn out to be an inaccurate reflection of that person’s true personality. Then you are tempering your interactions, goals, etc. off information that is not relatable to the person. —Brad Burns, Wayne Contracting

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That’s a criticism, of course. A report, study or testimony that’s all anecdote with no data carries little in the way of actionable information.

On the other hand, if you want to change people’s minds, “all data and no anecdote” isn’t going to get you very far.

We act on what we understand, we understand what fits into our worldview and we remember what we act on.