The Capital Mindset™ Pro Delivers Collaborative C-Suite Expertise for your Strategic Financing
This is - without question - our most powerful Service. Impactful results happen - EVERY time.
Access to Effective and Actionable Expertise Leads to Superior Outcomes - Every Time
During the financing process, every single aspect of your company is being heavily evaluated by institutional investors. A weakness in any one area can cause failure in the entire financing. Outsourced, siloed advice is not enough. You need collaborative and coordinated expertise from C-Suite professionals that have successfully navigated the financing process before.
Our team of cross-functional operating partners will explore each major function of your company that investors will diligence and critique.
This process will deliver the critical areas of optimization your company needs to attract institutional financing.
Who the Capital Mindset™ Pro is Designed For:
Whether you are an Entrepreneur/CEO managing a rapidly expanding growth-stage company, or the owner of a mature family business looking for growth financing/exit - there is a lot riding on your shoulders. Not only your future, but the future of your employees, their families, and your stakeholders all depend on your ability to successfully finance the company’s next phase of growth.
We often see a fundamental disconnect between investors and entrepreneurs. Investors expect entrepreneurs to be capital markets experts and completely understand their needs. However, this is simply not the case. The vast majority of entrepreneurs are NOT capital markets experts, and have little (if any) understanding of the needs and expectations of investors.
Knowing this, many companies seek the assistance of investment banks or fractional CFOs during the financing process. This can be a useful solution in some situations. However, in a great number of cases. growing companies need far more than than these professionals can offer.
Investors approach most companies in a binary fashion. They believe that either the business is ready for capital or not. As such, they reject 99%+ of the companies that they meet.
However, growing businesses are NOT binary. Many companies would attract more capital if key strategic improvements were made to the business, if entrepreneurs had deeper knowledge on how to more effectively target investors, and if management teams understood how to create the structural elements of a successful financing process.
Successful financings are achieved by tight collaboration between every single aspect of your company. Strategic financing is not a stand-alone, outsourced, separate component of your company. It is inextricably intertwined with each component of your business: finances, marketing, branding, revenue scaling, pricing, customer engagement, team, operations, etc.
A successful financing event is fully dependent upon all of these functions operating seamlessly and smoothly amongst each other. Unfortunately, in over thirty years of investing, we have witnessed far too many companies fall short of this goal.
Capital Mindset™ Pro was born of the frustration of watching otherwise viable companies fail to secure institutional financing - simply because entrepreneurs:
Did not understand the needs of the institutional investors that they were targeting
Were not aware that adjustments to the business were needed, and if implemented would lead to financing
Were unwilling or unaware of how to create and follow a disciplined Financing Process.
These are the challenges that the Capital Mindset™ Pro was designed to help entrepreneurs overcome.
The Capital Mindset™ Pro leads to impactful results and is a great solution for:
Any venture-focused growth-stage company: Series B and C Rounds, and beyond.
Mature businesses looking for growth capital from either Industry Strategic and/or Private Equity investors
Family businesses seeking either investors for the first time (ie. Private Equity, or Strategics), or are contemplating a potential path to exit
Companies with a highly-technical product or service (ie. science, engineering, hard tech, healthcare).
Goals of the Capital Mindset™ Pro:
Every financing journey is nuanced. Every Founder, Entrepreneur, CEO, and Business Owner has a business and opportunity set that is unique to them. Each situation requires a custom-designed strategy.
Over three decades of experience in investing, we have pretty much seen everything - fads, memes, bubbles, recessions (both great and small), funding markets that were wide open, and funding markets that were tightly shut. We have witnessed many failed financings. However, we don’t believe that ANY financing situation is impossible.
In our experience, challenging financings ALL suffer from one or several shortcomings in three key areas. First, something within the business is not well-aligned to the needs of the investor. Second, the company is likely either not targeting the correct investor community, or neglecting other key investor demographics. Third, there are weaknesses or deficits in how the management team is running the financing process.
None of these need to be fatal. The good news is that, with the appropriate planning and work, challenges in the business, incorrect investor targeting, and weaknesses in the capital raise process are all correctable.
The goal of Capital Mindset™ Pro is to step in and help entrepreneurs to overcome these challenges. We systematically guide companies through all three major phases of a successful financing. The goal is to correct weaknesses in each category - thus helping to make the company more attractive candidate for capital.
What makes the Capital Mindset™ Pro such a powerful service is the collaborative, cross-functional nature of the process. In order to create an effective financing campaign, you do not need the advice of a CFO, or a revenue consultant, or a marketing/branding expert - you need advice and collaboration with ALL of them. This is not about hiring a marketing/branding team, engaging a revenue scaling consultant, or working with a go-to-market specialist - it is bringing them all on in one collaborative team.
WE have this group - already assembled and ready to go. No silos, no groups pulling in different directions. ONE TEAM. ONE STRATEGY. ONE MESSAGE. We do the coordinating, so that you can continue to concentrate on our highest priority - growing the business.
Capital Mindset™ Pro follows the tools and processes utilized in the Capital Mindset™ Framework. Each company participant in the process is expected to have reviewed and have a working understanding of this Framework. The process will include reviews, discussions, and up-leveling of all of the elements of a successful financing process as listed below:
Capital Mindset Part #1: Business Progress Alignment
Product
Customer
Business Strategy
Revenue Execution
Industry and Competition
Capital Mindset Part #2: Effective Investor Positioning
Investor Feedback
Mapping the Company’s ‘Growth DNA’
Profiling Appropriate Investors
Targeted Collateral Creation
Investor Targeting
Capital Mindset Part #3 Structured Capital Markets Process
Organizational Goal Planning
Creating Team Roles
Relationship Management
Execution of Outreach Program
Process & Infrastructure Governance
Every company and every financing round is nuanced and unique to that situation. The strengths and weaknesses vary from company to company. As such, the areas of deep focus and project sequencing of Capital Mindset™ Pro will be customized to the particular needs of your company. However, a standard sequencing agenda is available upon request.
Session Result:
In this environment, getting expert assistance with a financing round is a necessity - not a luxury. The first 90 to 180 days of that process are critical. Taking time upfront to master each element of a successful financing process can save months of mistakes, wasted time, and significant cash burn.
Package:
Duration: Projects run between 90 and 180 days, depending upon the needs of the company [90-day commitment].
Cadence: Minimum of one meeting per week for the duration of the process.
Requirements:
Any participant in the process must have first reviewed the Capital Mindset™ Framework. Doing so helps to set expectations and understand the philosophy of the process.
Company must have already completed a Pathfinder session or a Capital Conviction Diagnostic session, prior to beginning the process (that cost will be rolled into the cost of the Capital Mindset™ Pro).
Please be prepared to share all available and relevant material (if any) beforehand: pitch deck, marketing material, financing round strategy, budget, financials, team roles and responsibilities, and any other material relevant to the process.
If your company is already working with an outsourced service provider (CFO, CMO, COO, etc.), it is useful to have those individuals involved in this process as well.
Cost: Capital Mindset™ Pro Projects run $8,500 to $20,000 per month, calibrated to the mix of strategy, content, and collaboration you need. Every dollar maps directly to measurable business outcomes.
Meaningful Solutions, Impactful Results.