Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in business development but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Mike Dias, Founder & CEO of ScaleUp Valley, located in SanFrancisco, CA, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

ScaleUp Valley is a coaching and advisory boutique. We help CEOs and Leadership Teams to scale from 1 to 100M ARR and from 50 to 500 employees by implementing a leadership framework - including OKRs - that provides clarity of vision and world-class execution for category winners. Only 4% of all companies get to $1M in Annual Recurring Revenue. We help that 4% become the 0.4% who get to $10M and the 0.04% who get to $100M.

Tell us about yourself

I saw my parents having a hard time as CEOs, and I have understood how tough it is to scale a company. I have succeeded a founder as professional CEO and got my first CEO experience and confirmed how much it demands from the leader to drive a company. It became my passion, and I have decided to found ScaleUp Valley to help CEOs and Leadership teams scale from $1 to 100M in revenue across North America, Europe, LATAM, and Asia.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

I have helped to scale 1 IPO, 1 Decacorn, and 4 Unicorns in a decade of ScaleUp Valley. I know that I had a lot of luck but also a lot of belief in the vision.

What's one of the hardest things that comes with being a business owner?

Being loyal to your vision and believing in myself and my team until the business started to tick. The first three years were really hard as I needed to build a brand and expand almost from day 1.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Provide Clarity of Vision to your team by involving them in building a reverse engineering vision from the future to the present.
  2. Always be working on your talent and pipeline of candidates. Ensure that you have the right people in the right seats. A world-class team is critical to success.
  3. If you have clarity of vision and a world-class team, you will have world-class execution. Get out of their way and let them thrive! Recognise their talent.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: http://www.scaleupvalley.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scaleupvalley
Twitter: https://twitter.com/scaleup_valley
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikescaleup/


If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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