Ingénieurs & entrepreneurs :quelques réflexions

(à casser… ;-) )

Ir. Roald Sieberath9.10.2014 - OpenSkills @ TheLabs.be

Disclaimer

Roald SieberathFormationIngénieur civil en informatiqueBusiness : Solvay IACE,Stanford EPGC, Louvain MBA

and business

Entrepreneur

Startup coach

StarTech (by WSL & ASE)

Ingénieurs…

Pourtant…

Quel ingénieur ?

(Alain Fayolle, EM Lyon)

Type A

Type B

Type C

Type D

Type X

Type Y

Startup vs. Large Company

Entrepreneur

• Rêve ou cauchemar ?• “Mythe romantique de l’entrepreneur”

Ingénieur <> entrepreneur

Myth : Investors will love my idea !

Reality

Technical Adoption /Traction Monetize

manager <> entrepreneur

Myth : a startup is a company, smaller

And should be managed in a similar way

Reality

A startup is a different animal

A company solves a known problemA startup solves an unknown

problem

Management science is not (as) relevant

Facteurs positifs

• Rigueur (?)

• Fast learner

• Travail en équipe

• Ingenire = trouver une solution

• Construire un modèle ; exécuter

Engineer lies…“Everyone loves ‘cool ideas’ and new technology.”

“I need to go-it alone to assure quality and elegance.”

“Marketing is fluff and selling is black magic.”

“We need to get functionality maximized before we focus on customers.”

“A good engineer hates unpredictability and risk.”

“We can’t worry about making money until we get it built.”

“Outside funding causes loss of control and undue pressure to deliver.”

Entrepreneur challenges

“Comfortable with uncertainty”

Pitch

Tinker

Get out of the building

Product dev => customer dev

37

Build It And They Will Come

• Only true for life and death products– i.e. Biotech Cancer Cure– Issues are development risks and distribution,

not customer acceptance• Not true for most other products– Software, Consumer, Web– Issues are customer acceptance and market

adoption

38

IfStartups Fail from a Lack of customers

not Product Development Failure

Then Why Do we have:• process to manage product development

• no process to manage customer development

Stop thinking, start doing !

Conclusion / Question ouverte :

Etre entrepreneur MALGRÉ ingénieur ?