Growth Hacking and Lean Canvas with a couple of examples from Catalysts, how we've been growing our team size and revenues with project and product business, joint ventures, startups, etc.
2. Growth Hacking
Do whatever is necessary to effectuate growth
Do it consciously, i.e. “scientific approach”
• Predict
• Observe / Measure
Check out introductory slides if you are completely fresh on the topic, e.g.
http://www.slideshare.net/mattangriffel/growth-hacking
5. Bootstrapped & Self-Funded
Growing exponentially since 2005
Doubling every 2 to 2.5 years
Around 140 Employees at the moment:
• 75 in Linz (Austria)
• 40 in Wien (Austria)
• 25 in Cluj (Romania)
6. Growth in Multiple Dimensions
1. Team Size the global war for talent
2. Products / Startups / Joint Ventures hockey stick growth
3. Project Business just linear growth, not relevant for this
talk
7. Growth Hacking for Team Size
Organizing Europe’s largest coding contests (since 2007, 23
times so far)
Many of the best software developers have joined Catalysts
Catalysts has become the best known software development
company in Austria.
Catalysts Coding Contests (web, fb)
• More than 900 participants in May 2015 (2 locations: Linz
and Cluj)
• Nearly 900 participants in Nov 2015 (only 1 location:
Vienna)
• More than 1,100 participants expected for April 2016 (2
locations again)
8. Growth Hacking for Team Size
>1,000 Applications per Year through
• Catalysts Coding Contests
• Catalysts Talent Quest (employee referral programme)
Internships (i.e. 0.5 per permanent team member)
• 20-30 short internships (2-4 weeks) during February
(lecture free)
• 40-50 long internships (4-14 weeks) during the summer
Ambassador Programme (for former interns / employees)
9. The Softer Side
• Best employer in Austria (Kununu)
• Handbook for New Employees (web)
• Personal Coach for each new team member
• Catalysts Society
• Evening Dinners (with partners)
• Gaming Nights (fb)
• FUNtastic Team Events (blog)
• Hair dresser in the office (blog)
• Bike repair service (blog)
11. What’s a Lean Canvas
A fine enough structure
A fine enough process
A common language
A body of knowledge
A practical approach
12. How to?
Brainstorm ideas
Work one lean canvas per idea
Scrutinize each canvas (gives you red
areas)
Focus your creativity on the red areas
Proceed with
• Problem Interview
• Solution Interview
• MVP Interview
13. Template on
Google Drive
The structure from the book
With the relevant figures
With a lot of explanatory
text
Make a copy
Share it with your team
Collaborate to build your
canvases
http://media.catalysts.cc/media/v0ZwT6
15. Reach Out to Me!
Dr. Christoph Steindl
steindl@catalysts.cc
+43 664 5419941
http://www.linkedin.com/in/christophsteindl
https://www.xing.com/hp/Christoph_ Steindl/
https://www.facebook.com/csteindl
callto://csteindl
16. References
Lean
• “Running Lean” by Ash Maurya, B006UKFFE0
• Template on Google Drive: http://media.catalysts.cc/media/v0ZwT6
• “Business Model Generation” by Alexander Osterwalder, B00BD6RFFS
• “The Lean Startup” by Eric Ries, 0670921602
• “Lean Analytics” by Alistair Croll, B00AG66LTM
• “How to Measure Anything” by Douglas Hubbard, B00INUYS2U
Growth Hacking:
• Introductory Slides, e.g. http://www.slideshare.net/mattangriffel/growth-hacking
• “Pirate Metrics” by Dave McClure, http://de.slideshare.net/dmc500hats/startup-metrics-for-pirates-long-version
• “The Referral Engine” by John Jantsch, B003NX75HM
• “Hooked” by Nir Eyal, B00NW01MKM
• Growth Hacker TV, https://www.growthhacker.tv
Many more on our shelves on GoodReads (https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/41937025-catalysts)
Editor's Notes
Hello, my name is Christoph Steindl.
I want to share some of my experience.
10 years ago I have founded Catalysts.
By now, Catalysts is well established in Austria as one of the best software development companies.
We are around 140 highly skilled software developers:
75 in Linz (Austria)
40 in Vienna (Austria)
25 in Cluj (Romania)
We’ve been doubling in size every 2 to 2.5 years so far.
We have bootstrapped Catalysts without external funding. We are fully self-funded.
Catalysts has been voted best employer in Austria for a couple of years already (based on more than 150 anonymous ratings on kununu).
We’ve been organizing the Catalysts Coding Contests for years, the largest coding contests in Europe.
We are an accelerator for Startups.
At the moment we are invested in 10 companies.
But maybe I should spend a few more words on what we do.
Catalysts develops and operates individual software solutions in three main areas:
Large Agile Software Development
Machine Learning & Big Data
High Performance Computing
You can check out the explanation videos.
Growth hacking since 2005, i.e. 5 years before the term “Growth Hacking” has been coined.
We are around 140 highly skilled software developers:
75 in Linz (Austria)
40 in Vienna (Austria)
25 in Cluj (Romania)
We’ve been doubling in size every 2 to 2.5 years so far.
We have bootstrapped Catalysts without external funding. We are fully self-funded.
Catalysts has been voted best employer in Austria for a couple of years already (based on >150 anonymous ratings on kununu).
We’ve been organizing the Catalysts Coding Contests for years, the largest coding contests in Europe.
We are an incubator or accelerator for Startups.
At the moment we are invested in around 10 companies.
Left side:
Gives us regular cashflows
Gives us visibility
Gives us credibility
Gives us breadth and depth
Makes us independent
If my talk was interesting, let me know.
If you have something to share with me – I’m happy to learn.
Please reach out to me.
You can reach me by email, phone or social media.
I didn’t add detailed citations on each slide.
So please check out the following books to find the material from which I’ve taken ideas for my presentation.