In this session, Mentors will analyze your existing names and branding, and discuss how to develop a good name for your business, how to develop an enduring brand, and the basics of great user interface design. Founders will also share their pitch and existing branding to Mentors for continued feedback and refinement.

Assignments

Below are just a few of the 10-15 assignments you’ll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours: 

Standard Founder Assignments

1. Competitor Branding - Analyze and compare the name and branding of at least 15 companies with a competing offering, in a related industry, or with a similar value proposition in a different industry.
2. Naming Words - Brainstorm at least 50 short nouns and adjectives that evoke the characteristics of your main customer problem.
3. Name Brainstorming - Use combinations of your naming words to develop a series of business names for the review of your peers and Directors.
4. Name Research - Research the availability of the combined words as a domain name and list the ones that are most available.

Advanced Founder Assignments

1. Branding Expert - Leverage the FI Network to set up meetings with industry experts about your final name, your customer problem, archetype, and any existing brand materials for feedback.
2. Close Sales - Follow-up on your previous sales activities, and measure the time allocated, conversion rates, financial spending and other metrics for each activity. Your goal is to convert new sales and show quantifiable traction before the Mentor Idea Review. 
3. Design Specification - Evaluate the design and branding feedback from your peers, Mentors, and expert meetings, and begin fixing the issues by creating a Design Specification. If you don’t have an internal design resource, find someone that can complete the job in 2 weeks. 
4. Idea Review Pitch Deck - Finalize your 3-minute pitch deck for the Mentor Idea Review, using our templates and guidelines. Practice the pitch at least five times with your peers, and revise it based on feedback. Upload a final video on the assignment page.  

This is the first big checkpoint in the program to determine each Founder’s progress. During the Mentor Idea Review, every founder will present their customer problem and progress to a panel of FI Mentors for extensive review. Founders will receive a rating, and receive feedback on the validity of their idea, their customer problem, market size, the soundness of their revenue model, and more. 

Assignments

After the Mentor Idea Review, all assignments are Standard, and Founders receive a larger number of custom "Special Assignments" based on their specific challenges. 

1. Corporate Materials - Update your 3 minute pitch deck based on the Mentor Idea Review Feedback, and include a new and updated one page executive summary using our template.
2. Law Firm Identification - If you don’t already have a law firm, identify at least two local law firm candidates that have experience working with startups, and recruit one for your startup using our process and guidelines.
3. Advisor Candidates - You will create an advisory board in the next 5 weeks, so start by developing a target list of new advisor candidates based off you identified needs and gaps in knowledge/ connections. 
4. Advisor Outreach - Leverage the FI network to get introductions to your targets where necessary, and follow our templated process to make progress on your advisory board.  
5. Sales Follow-up - Continue to work on securing sales or commitments for revenue. For B2B solutions, get as many contracts or letters of intent as possible. For B2C solutions, aggressively your revenue (or submitted information indicating they will pay you).
6. Sales Plan - Based on the needs of your financial model and sales follow-up research, develop a plan to build and grow your revenues over the next three months.
7. Financial Model - Develop a simple financial model based on our template that focuses on expenses (“burn”) to understand your cash needs. Develop a revenue forecast for 12 months and factor in timing considerations from your sales follow-up work.
8. Business Calendar - Create a calendar to track all of your relevant business due dates, regulatory filings, and other obligations and related events.

Similar to the Mentor Idea Review, the Mentor Progress Review is the second major test in the program. In this session, Founders will focus on presenting their progress and traction to a panel of Mentors for a detailed review. Mentors will evaluate Founders based on their progress, their go-to-market plan, the company’s scalability, and more.

Assignments

Below are just a few of the 10-15 assignments you’ll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours: 

1. Investor Pitch Deck - Create an expanded, 12-slide pitch deck incorporating any feedback from the Mentor Progress Review, using our templates. 
2. Growth - Make progress on your growth goals, and examine or adjust how your strategy and the system to keep yourself accountable is performing.
3. Product - Make progress on your next product release, and outline and address any of the setbacks that you have faced with your project team.
4. Hiring Needs - Score the progress of each member of your project team on a 1 to 10 scale, including yourself, and set up plans to improve those that are struggling. 
5. Finalize Advisory Board - Set up your advisory board with startup, industry, technology or marketing advisors, and set up a one hour conference call with all of the them, which will be your first quarterly advisory board meeting.
6. Bookkeeping - Start regular bookkeeping processes if you have not already, and implement tools, accounts, and monthly processes to manage it moving forward.
7. Accountant Interviews - If you don’t have an accountant already, begin interviewing potential organizations using our processes. You will need a startup-friendly accountant to understand your unique needs.
8. Financial Model Update - Review and update your financial model with the work done to date. Adjust the revenue projections based on your growth thus far, and evaluate the need and requirements for external funding. 

In this session, Mentors will discuss how identify the roles needed to build a world-class company, how to develop a strategy to recruit, board and retain the best people for the roles, and more. Founders will also receive feedback from Mentors on their team plans and product progress. 

Assignments

Below are just a few of the 10-15 assignments you’ll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours: 

1. Outsourcing - Identify what roles you should outsource, and use your recent release work, sales, and program work to update or execute your hiring needs.
2. Candidates - Search for candidates to hire (including Co-Founders) by identifying everyone that you know who is appropriate, or leveraging the FI network, to fill the top two or three roles you are not planning to outsource.
3. Hiring Process - Develop a hiring and onboarding process using our guidelines to add team members into your organization, and begin executing on the process.
4. Test Projects - Develop at least one test project for each of your top two or three roles, which should create opportunities for a credible candidate to demonstrate their skills.
5. Advisor Review - Arrange a meeting or phone call with at least one of your advisors to discuss your outsourcing and hiring work. Present everything that you have done, and incorporate their feedback into your planning.
6. Recruiting Outreach - Based on the feedback from your advisors, create a list of events and activities that you will attend or undertake each week for the next three months to identify new candidates for the top two or three roles.
7. Time Allocation - Meticulously outline your “founder’s schedule” by allocating weekly blocks of time to address your core business activities, providing you with uninterrupted time to work on each activity.
8. (Optional) Founding Round Setup - If you don’t have sufficient capital to run the company for the next few months, then follow our guides to start a preparing documentation and research for a “Founding Round”.  

In this session, Mentors will discuss such topics as defining success for your company, the various tactics to grow a business, setting growth goals and milestones, communicating your startup’s growth progress and setbacks with stakeholders and advisors, and more. Mentors will also also provide Founders with feedback on their current growth and growth strategy. 

Assignments

Below are just a few of the 10-15 assignments you’ll complete through Working Groups and Office Hours:

1. Growth Plan Update - Review the performance of your growth goals and adjust your growth plan to improve your performance and accountability.
2. Sales - Push yourself for a second week to close new revenue or users, which may be signups, payments, a signed contract, a pre-payment or a signed letter of intent.
3. Growth Tactics - Work with your working group and advisors to brainstorm 15 new ideas to increase the top of your funnel and to accelerate the closing of sales, and provide a bulleted list of these Growth Tactics.
4. Pivot - Consider a pivot if you are not meeting your growth goals, sales, product or hiring progress targets. If you decide to Pivot, schedule a call with one of your Directors to discuss your proposed pivot in the business and do the same with your advisors.
5. Product - Work closely with your project team to make substantial progress on your next release, and work to ensure that each release takes about two weeks to complete.
6. Hiring - Review all of the candidates that have come through the various recruiting outreach channels and other activities, and identify the most effective channels.
7. Post-Program Schedule - Work with your cohort on a monthly meeting schedule where you will continue to meet, provide updates, and share learning on your progress. 
8. (Optional) Founding Round Follow-ups - Build your pipeline of potential “Founding Round” investors, meeting and securing commitments from at least one person. 

Graduating from the Founder Institute is an honor. The program is challenging, and the curriculum is demanding. In this final session, you will celebrate graduating with your peers, friends and family, as well as select Mentors who will discuss the important leadership qualities needed to run a successful company. You will also learn about all of the post-program resources and assistance that the Founder Institute provides.

Assignments

1. Accountability - Create a plan to keep yourself and the business accountable to your graduation plan and growth goals after the program.
2. Leadership - Analyze how you have grown as a startup leader during the program, highlighting the positives, negatives, and in which aspects you need to grow in the future. 
3. Vision - Review your original vision for the business, and describe why you are still excited to pursue the vision, and why your team and strategy are aligned to achieve it. 
4. Perseverance - Develop a system to press forward, stay focused and deliver value in the dark times inevitable to building a lasting business. 
5. Prioritization - Finalize your system to prioritize complex projects in equally complex situations, as well as your weekly routine and “Founder’s Schedule”.
6. Celebration - In addition to the FI celebration, plan a private group celebration with your peers. As a startup leader, it is important to celebrate all milestones and successes.