There is a rapidly growing number of support groups and organizations that fit into the category of accelerator or incubator. What is the value one of the core metrics many accelerators use today ‘Alumni’ success and what does success mean? That success metric can be a funding event, exit, or some other significant milestone that has been made public. Each has a different value but the purpose is to say something positive about the accelerator which is, for many, a key ‘metric’ used to report back to those that back the program.
Why is it a metric at all? After all, shouldn’t accelerator/incubators be focused on making money? The role of accelerators in Canada according to Mark MacLoed:
…these programs are not meant to help investors discover the next giant. They are there to help investors and mentors identify, nurture and develop talent. In smaller markets like Canada’s, we are sorely lacking in proven, been there, got the t-shirt talent.
I generally agree with Mark as the purpose of all these programs is to build a funnel of qualified talent which has a value to those that back the accelerator. That could include investors and/or the government (the tax payer). I will add that what happens with all this support is self guided experiential ’business education’ but that is another blog post.
When an accelerator releases something that states “congrats to cohort company x on raising money from y” how should future applicants weigh those releases when the company is an alumni of more than one program? How should the people that support these organizations value those announcements?
As a recruiting and reporting tool I can certainly see the value in getting the organizations name out there. The problem is that it starts to sound like a ‘party round’ where so many people have been involved in some way it is impossible to say who made the difference. The truth is they all helped. The value for any one organization is not as high as it would be if the company only worked within a tiny controlled system. That simply isn’t happening and that is a good thing. It takes an early stage business ecosystem to build more frequent and bigger success which includes all points between here and the valley.
This is something very similar to the education system where every school at all stages of education can share in celebrating success of their alumni. If a higher concentration of success is coming from a particular school then that won’t go unnoticed and it should be supported and enhanced.
What I hope will happen peacefully and relatively unnoticed by the entrepreneur is that the organizations that have more success grow, those that low success fail, and new ideas are injected into the process as everyone keeps learning.