Slides as presented at TheFamily Workshop in Berlin on 21 March 2017

1. 20 things to do to prepare
your team for scaling up
Stephan von Perger
TheFamily Berlin - 21 March 2017

2. Everything you think you will need to do later on,
get someone else to help you get it done right away.
@vonperger 2017

3. My journey into tech
?
@vonperger 2017

4. 5 steps to get your team ready for growth
A. Set the stage right
B. Measure and track
C. Grow step by step
D. Build the team
E. Let go and get help
@vonperger 2017

5. A. Set the stage right
1. Define clear standards across the company
(e.g. file names, team folders, working hours)
2. Set up weekly meetings and stick to them or remove
3. Design team structure and vision for the company, e.g. via OKRs
@vonperger 2017

6. File naming - Define it early on
2017 03 21 Facebook Series A slides v7.pdf
2017 03 Twitter 5 year plan SvP v11.xlsx
@vonperger 2017

7. OKRs - kick it off when making initial hires
OKRs: defined per quarter, public across the company intranet
Objectives: ambitious + a bit uncomfortable (“Launch public iOS Beta”)
Key Results: measurable (“Onboard 100 beta users”)
• Google grades each KR using 0 – 1 scale at the end of a quarter
• People/teams can idealistically achieve a grade of 0.6 – 0.7
• Company, Departments, Teams, Individuals should have somehow connected OKRs
• Not the same as employee evaluations
• Great video: https://www.gv.com/lib/how-google-sets-goals-objectives-and-key-results-okrs
@vonperger 2017

8. B. Measure and track
4. Define a few KPIs and circulate them weekly
5. Define and track funnel of users incl. key experiences
6. Implement NPS (Net Promoter Score)
7. Produce cohort analyses
(period-on-period retention as well as payback)
8. Set up tracking solution to automate data collection e.g. Mixpanel
@vonperger 2017

9. Funnel - Calculate drop off % & map key experience
points
Sample customer funnel
0
25
50
75
100
Visits Signup Email Confirmation Initial Post Initial Like Week 1 active
10 91523
62
100
-38% -63% -35% -33% -10%
Drop off
vs previous step:
@vonperger 2017

10. Net Promoter Score - produce time series to see
evolution in product development
• Widely accepted measure of customer satisfaction
• Simple question with response options 0-10:
“How likely is it that you would recommend our product to a friend or
colleague?”
• Responses 7-8 are considered passives
• NPS calculation: % detractors (0-6) - % promoters (9-10)
• NPS of 50 or more is good
@vonperger 2017

11. Payback by period vs initial invest
Cohort analyses - Show activity & payback
@vonperger 2017
Period-on-period retention, %
-€400
-€300
-€200
-€100
€0
Month 0 Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
Profitability
2016-12 2017-01 2017-02 2017-03
Cohort Month 0 Month 1 Month 2 Month 3
2016-12 100% 30% 25% 20%
2017-01 100% 35% 30%
2017-02 100% 40%
2017-03 100%

12. C. Grow step by step
9. Don’t build it before testing with simple SaaS tools
10. Constantly recalibrate your KPIs
11. Run weekly (growth) experiments as A/B tests
12. Show ability to scale via smart experiments, not spending more
@vonperger 2017

13. SaaS tools - use them to test new processes
@vonperger 2017
Typeform - easily collect user input
Zapier - automate actions e.g. emails, data entry
Airtable - Spreadsheet that works like a database

14. Scaling experiments - show that you are ready
@vonperger 2017
Examples:
• Concentrate your marketing spend in one week on only one day to show what
would be possible with 7x spend
• Pressure test your Operations setup by offering a heavy discount on 1 single
day

15. D. Build a team
13. Grow the team carefully using a structured process
14. Don’t hire too many interns yourself (but let your team hire them)
15. Monthly social events on team and company level (founder should
own this) + strategy offsite with founders / management
16. Make it unique with funny names for events, meetings etc
@vonperger 2017

16. Structured hiring process
@vonperger 2017
1. Clearly define the objectives of a given role before writing the job description
2. Infer must-haves and nice-to-haves from the objectives:
• Technical competencies
• Problem solving skills
• People skills
• Cultural preferences
3. Define and use a checklist during the interviews

17. E. Let go and let others help you
17. Build culture of smart delegation where people can make mistakes
(especially if you normally want to do everything yourself like me)
18. Seek mentors / experts for each critical area (and pay them)
19. Use paid SaaS tools vs build yourself XLS
20. Leave the team behind and it will be fine
@vonperger 2017

18. Focus, focus, focus.
@vonperger 2017

19. Thank you!
Stephan von Perger
stephan.vonperger@gmail.com
@vonperger
medium.com/@vonperger