Loading...
Answers
MenuWhat are your tips for gaining advisory/board positions?
I am looking to share my startup, VC, and marketing/branding skills with other companies and executive staffs. What is a good way to get in front of those looking for advisors/board members, apart from those scammy-looking fee-based services?
Answers
Approach it as if you were applying for a position in an organization. You will want to find the right industry, the right management team, the right opening on the board [either governance or advisory], the right person to help you. Next create a statement that says why you on this board. Then sell it.
Thank you for your great question. As a professional you should be connecting with others through the different local opportunities that bring together the business and not-for-profit communities to which you are interested in sharing your skills and knowledge. Also, generally to serve in a governance capacity on a Board as a Board of Director or in an advisory role it is an application process with an organization. Once you establish yourself with a Board opportunity at the local level, then people become more aware of your ability to lead and your specific expertise. I'm a phone call away if you need to have a chat!
To get a position in the advisory board you need to understand the advisory boards and its economics inside out. At its simplest, advisory boards are groups of subject matter experts providing a company's leadership team with guidance on company vision, innovation, risk management, and profitability. A 2014 Canadian study by the Business Development Bank of Canada polled over 1,000 small and medium-sized enterprises to reveal that only 6% of SMEs have access to an advisory board, yet 80% indicated that they'd set up an advisory board again. Productivity was also 18% higher for those with advisory boards.
The company should always provide something—whether it be paying for meals, travels, an honorarium, or even offering equity at some juncture. Start-ups should pay $100 to $500 per meeting, host a meal, and cover any incidental costs. A global survey conducted by the Advisory Board Architects found that 15% of private company boards paid no compensation, 25% paid only cash, 43% only equity, and 17% paid cash and equity.
There is a specific objective and internal resources are not equipped to execute. A company with specific needs such as acquiring, selling the company, entering a new market, or raising capital can benefit from an advisory board. When a company showcases its advisors, it demonstrates that it is surrounding itself with key opinion leaders and that these leaders are invested in their success. The leadership team has skill gaps. The company plateaued or is in a rut. If a company feels too entrenched in each set of processes and product offerings, it could benefit from an advisory board's fresh insights.
Besides if you do have any questions give me a call: https://clarity.fm/joy-brotonath
Related Questions
-
How can I be a good startup advisor/mentor?
I was born a maker, and I've been an Entrepreneur for six years now (and a wannabe for much longer before that) and I think the worst advice I've got was from people who had never taken a step of the journey. People with academic (or other) credentials who advise you based on theory and completely miss the point of entrepreneurship. They know about the theory of sales funnels and marketing strategies and much more but they've never made a cold call. Or a sale for that matter. The best advice I received was from my godfather, who is an entrepreneur and salesman. That advice was simple, brutal and actionable: "If you can't sell it to a customer, how do you expect to sell it to a salesman ?". That made me realize that you don't stand a chance at success if you can't convince anyone. A good startup advisor understands all of the field he's advising about and knows what a startup is. He knows how to apply his knowledge to the constraints a startup faces and how to deliver that wisdom in regular words to support the startup's decision process.LU
-
What are the best strategies for a company to attract & compensate formal advisors on a board? What normal? Is it money, or equity - etc?
Mark is correct that the best advisors should have skin in the game but that advice is applicable only when you and your business are obviously investable. I've engaged advisors at times when I knew I wasn't ready to ask for their money and I've often begun advisory relationships in the earliest of stages where I like in and believe in the entrepreneur and the idea but they don't yet meet my investment criteria. Also, the old adage is true: Ask for advice, and you might just end-up with the person offering or even asking to invest. This has happened to me again on both sides of the table. In terms of compensation, I have a chart that spells out specific advisor expectations and stage-appropriate equity based compensation that I can email anyone who DM's me here through Clarity. Mark's answer is lower than I would accept for a start-up that isn't well funded. But anything above 1% would be really unusual and would have to be a really, really hands-on advisor or partial contributor as a team member. It should never be money on a retainer basis. I now have several people who call me regularly through Clarity to talk through specific things but other than that, it wouldn't be reasonable to expect cash compensation in a formal advisory role. And I would personally be vary of that because if they're not taking equity, then they really, much to Mark's point, have any skin in the game. I have a standard template that I use as an advisor (it was originally given to me by a company I advise) and I know use it with my own advisors, so happy to pass a stripped version of that agreement as it's the best one I've seen and is clearest for both parties. Just DM here via Clarity if you want it.TW
-
What does a good advisor bring to the table for a startup?
A good advisor can help a startup in various ways. Here I describe what I do: I work quite a bit with pre-angel/pre-seed/pre-accelerator US-based tech startups (or sometimes even executives/scientists/technologists in corporate jobs toying with a startup idea that they'd consider leaving their jobs for), and have done this now for well over a decade while founding/growing my own companies. Most of these founders come to me from hearing about me from another founder, so I am assuming that founders are finding some value in their interactions with me. At this early-stage in the game, one of the key things I try to do is to separate founders' assumptions about various aspects of the business from facts that they have validated. Another thing founders find useful is examples/ideas of how other startups solved a similar business problem in a creative manner (my voracious reading helps a lot here.) Finally, I also try to take the devil's advocate position on key assertions that the founders make (e.g. why are they & their product uniquely suited to tackle this problem in face of competition) in order to point out counterarguments with the eventual goal of helping them strengthen their case. My engagements with founders tend to take the form of intense 30-75 minute brainstorming sessions (1-3 sessions), which typically provide them with enough food for thought to start executing on various fronts. A small percentage of these startups continue to make great progress over a period of 3-9 months and keep me in the loop via brief email updates. Those ones, I help by providing them critical feedback on their pitch decks (multiple iterations until I think that it is crisp and powerful) and then bring on the radars of my early-stage investor contacts (US-based).MB
-
What are the best incentives a startup can offer to an advisor or to an angel investor that will guide the company with the fundraising process?
Having been in the position as an advisor, this is what I think an advisor expects: a. Equity Ownership. This depends upon how much involved an advisor into the start-up. b. A flat fee and a percentage pie on every transaction the stat-up makes(Not the profit margin) c. At my early stage, all I want is a testimonial from start-up n how I helped this business. In my early stages of adviosrship, I want good customer testimonials. This is a win-win situation for both of us. I get to learn from him many things which I couldn't have done myself. d. It is strategic importance to my own idea and I would love this company to scale and raise the funding and in this case I would expect a contract from the company which I helped.TK
-
What is your best piece of advice for a first-time startup CEO?
Surround yourself with people who have done it before. Not consultants, not coaches, people who have walked the path you are embarking on. The good news is that the startup community is the most helpful business community of any industry, by miles. I'd be happy to do a call to help you figure out how and where to identify these supporters and champions. Good luck!TW
the startups.com platform
Copyright © 2025 Startups.com. All rights reserved.