Why is there a need for this process, in a startup? Arent’ startups supposed to Hack-It, Jugaad-a-thon it, Frugally Innovate, be Agile? And at the same time we also hear the statement, “9 out of 10 Startups will fail”.  Or of late, have been hearing about stats such as why do most Indian Startups close within 5 years. Lets try to turn that tide and improve the odds. Lets build to last !! (taken from a famous strategy book, i always like referring to and like the title because its not about exits, its about building something tangible and long term. Thats my personal take on starting up)

Lets try, by adding some semblance of method to the Startup madness and agility, by considering the Bell Mason Diagnostic as a Business Plan Evaluation Aid (BPEA) for your startup. The Bell Mason has been used by the Authors of the Model, to evaluate Technology Startups since the late 90’s (and has been used around the world to evaluate about a 2000+ ventures).

I came across an interesting statistic from a study, “Venture capitalists reported devoting 8 to 12 minutes on average to evaluate a business plan (Sandberg 1986). Much of the evaluation is purely intuitive, despite the existence of several decision aids, which might be expected to aid both efficiency and consistency in the decision-making process.” 

So if you are able to prepare yourself to provide the VC or Angel with the best information about your startup and a story line that is compelling, you might just get funded. And perhaps that is what differentiates that one startup that makes it?

Another interesting story from the recently concluded Google IO, 2017. I remember one of the top executives from Google making the presentation and talked about how they had been “preparing” for this presentation from a long time. Well its Google, they dont need to do it, they can Just Do It too? Right? 

Same is the case, with Apple, when we have heard, read and seen the great presentations made by Steve Jobs for every single presentation for a new product launch, like the iPhone Launch. 

Let there be planning and evaluation at each stage of your journey, after all you might either have the time in the Elevator to Pitch or have 8 to 12 minutes, make them count.

The Bell – Mason Diagnostic (BMD) – A Startup Evaluation Model

The BMD, consists of the following aspects that every venture, startup or intraventure can evaluate themselves on.

1 The Founding Premise

The the BMD Model’s founding premise is

“You dont need to understand the Technology to ask the basic business questions” 

2 The Four Diagnostics

The BMD model is built on the following 4 Diagnostics that each company/ project needs to do, depending on the current Stage of their startup/ venture or intraventure

1. Space: 12 standard dimensions of any venture
2. Time: 4 Stages of company development
3. Quantification: Questions under each dimension to evaluate the company
4. Visualisation: The graph showing the current status of the company based on the stage of company development

The 12 Dimensions of the Bell Mason Diagnostic are: 

12 Dimensions of the Bell – Mason Diagnostic (BMD)

1. Technology Engineering
2. Product
3. Service Delivery/ Manufacturing
4. Business Plan
5. Marketing
6. Sales
7. CEO
8. Team
9. Board of Directors
10. Cash
11. Financeable
12. Control

• Product: Technology/engineering, manufacturing and product
• Market: Business plan and marketing and sales
• People: CEO, top-level team, and board of directors
• Finance/ Control: Cash, financeability, and operations/control

2. Time: The 4 Stages of Growth
The 4 Stages of Growth for every Startup or Venture or Intraventure according to the Bell Mason Diagnostic are: 

1. Concept (0 to 12 months) – Discovery
2. Seed (3 to 12 months) – Definition
3. Product Development (12 to 48 months) – Development
4. Market Development (24 to 48 months) – Deployment

There is a more updated definition of the Startup Stages that can be found here >> http://www.bellmasongroup.com/approach/

BELL MASON DIAGNOSTIC – STAGES

You can also review the 5D Delivery Process that I have written about here:  http://blog.hcitexpert.com/p/5d-service-delivery-framework.html

3. Quantification:
The quantification process involves asking a series of questions to oneself for your own company or to the startup being evaluated. Each of these questions are based on the 4 Stages, the 12 Dimensions. Each of the questions has a simple rating 1, 2, or 3. Each of these ratings can be attributed with a weighted score to arrive at the efficacy of a company or an idea. This is the way the startups can codify their work using a best practices approach to starting up.

4. Visualisation:
Once the Founding Team has answered and presented their idea within the purview of these stages and dimensions, the results are plotted onto the radar chart. 

Each of the sections of the radar chart, corresponds to a dimension of the BMD and depending upon the outcome of the questions under each of the dimensions, helps the person evaluating the proposal to identify the steps ahead.

Identify the Stage of your startup: Based on the Stage your startup is at, The Bell Mason Diagnostic presents the various dimensions that you need to focus on. 

These dimensions are relevant for that stage of your company (venture or intraventure). Each of these dimensions comes with a series of questions that need to be reviewed and answered by the startup team (project, venture, intraventure). The focus areas for each startup stage are defined by the following radar chart.

[2]: Source: How Bell Mason Diagnostic measures the companies – https://www.finsia.com/docs/default-source/jassa-new/jassa-1996/warning-bells-or-sound-of-success-.pdf?sfvrsn=2

You can event do a quick run through each of the dimensions relevant for the current state of your startup and rate each of the dimensions with a score of 1 to 5. That will help you identify if you are able to move your startup from one stage to the next. It also helps the startup to evaluate what are the tasks they need to perform to move from one stage to the next.

For instance, at the concept stage the BMD shows that the Startup needs to evaluate the following dimensions: technology, business plan, CEO, cash and financeability. [2]

Another important aspect of the Bell Mason Diagnostic, is to help the startup identify the equity they can give out at that stage of the startup. Using this method the founders can understand the finance they would need, the type of finance they can go for and the amount of equity they should be able to give away at each of the stages 

Source: http://www.bellmasongroup.com/approach/

Here is an Update, got an interesting update from Mr. Raj Grover, shared by him on the Fundraising for Indian Startups on what aspects should be covered in a startup pitch