part 2
Acceleration Most enterprises are unable to overcome their early stages towards becoming a sustainable business. This is an even greater challenge in a business that seeks social impact and is conducted by entrepreneurs who face situations of vulnerability themselves: in these cases, an eventual failure is not only an individual affair, but also affects the groups that would come to be benefited by the initiative. Acceleration programs exist precisely to support entrepreneurs as they increase their chance of reaching a point of sustainability. The intention is to make the journey there more brief and feasible, overcoming challenges quickly and reducing any waste of resources and efforts. Therefore, in the Acceleration stage, we proposed a sequence of exercises to increase the colabs’ awareness of their enterprises and support the necessary choices and decisions to format them. For example, the MVP (minimum viable product) allows you to test the public acceptance and potential impact of a project, enabling course corrections and reducing any time and effort invested in inconsistent ideas. After creating it, the colabs tested it at an event. Other tools used were audience research, theory of change, and Canvas, a strategic planning tool that can be used to design new or existing business models.
42
“The Acceleration stage at Colaboradora was one of the most important steps for my business. I used to do a lot of things out of impulse, with no rationale, not giving them any further thought. After the class with Niva, I finally discovered who I was talking to - in other words, who my clients were. That made all the difference and still does.” CAMILA ARAÚJO, Chinua Acessórios
At this stage, our project development assistant, Hanna Pereira, came into action, after becoming part of Colaboradora’s team to assist the entrepreneurs as they carried out the activities. In our experience, this role was decisive, as it provided individual support to participants who were not familiar with the tools offered. The Acceleration stage ended with a pitch by the colabs to a panel and their peers, which encouraged them to master the ins and outs of their projects and the narrative to present them concisely. On that day, they received qualified feedback that contributed to making better decisions in the next steps. Colaboradora - ENTERPRISES FOR CHANGE
