The Journey of Start-Ups from Birth to Adulthood: Case Studies on Fundamental Transformations with Start-Ups as Traveling Organizations

Abstract

These days, almost all sorts of organization—especially well-established ones—want to be and act like start-ups, which means acting in an agile, innovative, way. Many organizations announce that they are starting the transformation to becoming like a start-up. But often, there is a certain lack of understanding about both the real character of a start-up and the setting and ecosystem it requires to become successful, as well as the huge transformations which each start-up must face over time. This article describes the lifecycle and the success factors of start-ups in terms of setting, people, ecosystem and the frequent “skinning” and transformations start-ups must go through. Additionally, the article shows how dramatic a total transformation of a well-established organization to a start-up would have to be, and how unlikely it is to achieve this neither for the full organization nor for parts of it. The realistic option for well-established organizations is to cooperate with start-ups, which is enough of a demanding transformation for them.

Appendix

The three main design principles for future organization and leadership according to the 3-P Model can be described in detail as follows:

• Sustainable purpose (the first pillar):

  The employees and teams in the organization, but also its key stakeholders in the entire ecosystem and business environment, must know what the organization stands for and what entrepreneurial value and societal contribution it creates. This includes the reciprocity of enterprises, public and social institutions, science, etc.

  The purpose must remain sustainable, reliable, and consistent, supported by leaders, employees, and stakeholders, lived by important representatives of the organization. The purpose aligns, convinces, and inspires the people involved in the joint endeavor, makes them confident, proud to be part of it and to contribute to it. Employees and team leaders can then take this overall purpose and translate it into what it means concretely for their teams and for them individually. Even—or especially—in crises, it proves its ability to provide orientation and energy, and to keep the organization together on its way.

• Traveling organization (the second pillar):

  Business consistency, strategic stability, and structural continuity with some episodic change project from time to time? This has long been an illusion in disruptive and crisis-ridden times. Now, we must understand that organizations are continuously on a journey, experiencing twists and turns, following their purpose or even striving for survival, always looking for the best way between poles, alternatives, and options. If the teams do not know what to expect around the next bend, they must take smaller steps and explore the terrain. Even if they do not know in advance what the best result will be they will achieve it: they believe in their motivation and ability to manage the journey and to rely on their agile mindset, self-reflection, readiness to embrace change, and willingness to deliver. People in a traveling organization are curious, open, courageous, keen to experiment, and they deal well with uncertainty, stress, unforeseen incidents—and they are empowered to take decisions swiftly by themselves and to operate on their own.

• Connecting resources (the third pillar):

  The organization has to be aware that impact, value, and efficiency, but also survival, need much connectivity: between humans, organizations, and ecosystems; between expertise and influence; between different political and social systems and cultures; between enterprises, scientific research, and public sector; between customer satisfaction and economic needs; between strategy, processes, and skills; between risk management and business continuity. This means managing connectivity, preventing unconnected structural silos, boxed competencies, and echo chambers, but inspiring and supporting multilateral behaviors and initiatives in global and local professional communities, balancing the various, often contradictory, interests between the stakeholders.

All three pillars are key assets of systemic dynamics and high organizational effectiveness: They provide orientation and inspiration, give fundamental impulses to start the journey and to connect the resources for joint success. The over 35 concrete use cases in book 1 and 2 show that at least 3 fundamental steps are needed for successful application:

• The perception, integration, or adaption of the 3-P Model as both a systemically effective and easy applicable approach into one’s meta-level mindset and knowledge about an organization.

• Understanding of the Three Pillars as sustainable organizational capabilities and strategic success factors that need to be supported by key people and developed throughout the organization.

• Tailored interpretation and application of the concrete impacts, demands, impulses of the 3-P Model and the Three Pillars in the concrete and unique situation of an organization (“what does 3-P mean concretely for us and which activities does it require?”)