The purpose of this article is to share my learnings and unlearnings, with the expectation that some will be of value to you. This email was 100% written by me – not by AI.  When you send me an email, my response is 100% written by me.

My biggest learnings in the past three months:

• The three greatest risks to your company’s success and survival are the talent of: the controlling shareholders, the board of directors, and the CEO/C-Suite. The talent pool as a whole must be competitive differentiated.
• It is impossible to predict or forecast the future. Scenario planning helps your company prepare for the unexpected. Basing all your decisions, plans, and actions on a single, assumed to be perfect, forecast will likely result in failure.
• Your business strategy is about making an integrated set of choices that compels desired customer and ecosystem member actions. Your business strategy, company purpose, and North Star metric are all inter-related.
• Most companies will: fail, disappear, or provide poor returns to their investors.
• The core reason that employees and investors will support you is because they understand “What’s in it for them”.

Sharing my learnings

My website (https://koorandassociates.org/) contains my points-of-view regarding key issues and questions regarding value creation and growth in for-profit businesses. Each point-of-view is a brief article designed to enable discussion among founders, owners, shareholders, investors, CEOs, boards of directors, and advisory boards. I do not address not-for-profits, government, or other non-profit oriented organizations.

 Below are links to my website containing: new and revised points-of-view since my last update in March.

Links to my points-of-view articles:

What is your business strategy? V2

Your business strategy is about making an integrated set of choices that compels desired customer and ecosystem member actions. Your business strategy, company purpose, and North Star metric are all inter-related.

https://koorandassociates.org/strategy-and-strategic-planning/what-is-your-business-strategy/

What are the three greatest risks to your company?

The three greatest risks to your company’s success and survival are the talent of: the controlling shareholders, the board of directors, and the CEO/C-Suite.

The talent as a whole must be competitively differentiated.  This does not mean that every single person in the talent pool must be better than all of the competition. Company success requires a team.

https://koorandassociates.org/avoiding-business-failure/what-are-the-three-greatest-risks-to-your-company/

Your company will fail. V2

Most companies will: fail, disappear, or provide poor returns to their investors.

https://koorandassociates.org/avoiding-business-failure/your-company-will-fail-v1/

Why should employees and investors support you?

The core reason for support is that people understand “what’s in it for them”. Support is emotional.

https://koorandassociates.org/creating-business-value/why-should-employees-and-investors-support-you/

Scenario planning – what is it?

It is impossible to predict or forecast the future.

Scenario planning is a process to prepare to succeed in a broad range of futures. It is not an attempt to predict a single outcome.

https://koorandassociates.org/strategy-and-strategic-planning/scenario-planning-what-is-it/

What is a business model canvas? V4

The purpose of your business model canvas is to provide an easy to understand one page framework which communicates who your customers are, why they buy from you, and how you make a profit

https://koorandassociates.org/the-startup-journey/what-is-a-business-model/

Personal Update:

• Preparing for this summer’s startup mentoring at the University of Toronto Department of Engineering. The approach was based on weekly advisory board meetings.
• Continued as Board Director at a private company.
• Continued as a Patient Family Advisor at Sunnybrook Hospital.
• Continued my long-term fundraising for the Geoff Carr Fellowship at Lupus Ontario. Over the past 18 years family, friends, neighbours, and colleagues have contributed almost $270,000. You can use the donation link later in this update
• Continued with the Angel Capital Association in the US.
• Continued to share with you, and on my website, some of what I’ve learned and unlearned, with the intent that some of you will find value. The learnings and unlearnings are applicable to any size company, ranging from early-stage startups to large global enterprises.

I continue to focus my time to maximize the value and impact of my two professional purposes: #1 Enabling current and emerging business leaders to succeed, #2 Enabling business leaders to have a positive impact on society.