Lead and manage persistent high growth
Despite a good starting point, many scaleups have difficulty sustaining their growth. Over time, about 2/3 of scaleups either lose their steep growth or start shrinking.
Scaleups face many challenges on the road to successful scaling:
- Scarcity of leaders with the ability and skills to manage rapid growth
- Recruiting and developing talent with the skills and mindset to thrive in a fast-changing context
- Getting more out of the core: maximizing and streamlining the current business
- Developing the next phase of growth: new propositions and accessing new markets to maintain momentum
- Professionalizing and ramping up various functional areas and specialized knowledge
- Attracting appropriate growth capital and developing a clear understanding of finance options
- Creating a collective growth ambition in an expanding company
Our unique value proposition
We help you and the team to bring the company to the next level: showing persistent high growth.
- Tap into our unique, practical, & scientifically validated content. We know the guru-text books on scaling. And we go beyond them. Based upon a decade of leadership training and our internationally renowned scientific research, we offer unique content and proven methods for entrepreneurs to excel and sustain steep growth paths over time.
- Team up with a broad variety of industry-leading practitioners. Field experts from leading companies offer mentoring and share their knowledge in masterclasses on finance & funding, professionalization of functions, internationalization, risk & compliance, M&A, and circular investments. As such, you can deep-dive into what matters most for you now.
- Learn by doing & mentoring, and develop your company & team. The program combines peer learning, exercises, mentoring, masterclasses, and modules. They help you to work on your company in an experiential way and develop a tailor-made plan to bring your company and team to the next stage of growth.
- Join our great diverse scaleup community. The Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship is the leading centre for entrepreneurship in Europe. Join the academic network of Erasmus University Rotterdam, and the different practitioner scale-up networks of the program’s partners. That is how we create opportunities to support each other to develop to the next level.
For whom
Find out if this programme is interesting for youAre you an ambitious entrepreneur struggling to scale persistently by driving and managing high growth? Then the Build to Scale programme is designed for you. This course caters to motivated scaleup entrepreneurs who want to work on their personal and business growth.
- The programme is tailored for scaleups growing fast and want to sustain this steep growth path over time.
- Your company has at least 25 employees and/or 2.5 million annual revenue
- Your company grows at least 20% in FTE and/or revenue per year
Course information
Find out more about the content of the programmeThe 12-week programme consists of a dynamic mix of practical and technical masterclasses, real-life business cases and workshops that address company-specific challenges and plans for improvement. During three interactive, one-day modules, you will learn from peers and leading professors from Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University. In between the modules, field experts from industry leading companies (Rabobank, KPMG, Deloitte and WeGrow) will facilitate team assignments and provide coaching to create your growth plan. During the masterclass day, you will gain insights from these leading experts on key themes that arise in scaling. The programme will result in a tailor-made and futureproof growth plan to bring your scaleup and team to the next growth stage, which you will present during the final graduation day.
Curriculum
Our curriculum is based on a decade of unique scientific research into persistent high-growth companies. In three modules, participants gain theoretical knowledge and insights on scaling successfully while also learning valuable skills that are put into practice immediately. Each module focuses on a different but inter-related aspect of managing high-growth: maximizing your core, reorganizing to scale and creating a winning team. During the masterclass day, we provide you with the latest expertise on key themes that arise during your scaleup’s growth trajectory. We round off the programme with a graduation day, during which participants present their own company-specific and futureproof growth plan.
Content of the modules
Find out more about the modulesDuring three one-day modules, you will gain theoretical knowledge and insights, as well as practical skills that help you to build your scaleup and move to the next growth stage.
Module 1: Maximize your Core
Many scaleups fall behind because they are not able to maximize their core. They diversify too much and lack a clear focus on developing and nurturing the most relevant growth-driving competencies and capabilities. During this module, we look at which underlying growth-driving competencies and capabilities can fuel consistent growth in your business. By identifying additional activities and competencies that can strengthen network effects, you can start building your growth platform.
Module 2: Reorganize to Scale
When scaling your business model, you should make sure that the organization can deal with a growing amount of work in an efficient, cost-effective manner. This module will look at what it means to scale organizational resources and activities, and reorganize activities and roles to move your organization forward in a focused and strategic way. We will dive into how you can optimize local activities and share best practices and resources across distinct organizational units and teams.
Module 3: Create a Winning Team
In a high-growth scaleup your role as a (co)founder will inevitably change. During this module, we help you answer the most pressing questions about your role, and those of your team in a high-growth context. What complementarities does the leadership team need, and how to create unity? When is an additional managerial layer needed, and how to select the best people? With the most recent insights from psychology, we enable you to cope with resistance to change in your scaleup and help you create a growth story that inspires and activates your team and customers.
Teaching Method
Read more about our learning approachThe programme consists of peer learning interactions, exercises, mentoring, masterclasses, and interactive modules, resulting in a dynamic and diverse learning experience. Our content is based on a decade of unique scientific research in persistent high growth companies. Combined with masterclasses from field experts and mentoring we help you to readily apply the content of the programme to your own context to boost your scaleup’s growth.
Tailor-made, futureproof growth plan
During the programme, you will develop your company-specific growth plan with the help and coaching of our field experts from industry leading companies. This growth plan will be your guiding roadmap to put the knowledge and skills you gained during the programme into action.
Our inspiring learning environment
The programme takes place at the Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship campus in the Rotterdam Science Tower. The campus is home to a network of entrepreneurs, academics and creatives that collaborate in an innovative open area. This entrepreneurial learning environment is the perfect place to work on your scaleup’s growth path.
Faculty
See which academics and practitioners facilitate this programmeTop academics and industry-leading practitioners as facilitators
Renowned academics from Erasmus University’s Rotterdam School of Management facilitate the programme in partnership with industry experts from Rabobank, KPMG, Deloitte and WeGrow. During the tutorials, team coaches from these industry-leading companies mediate the feedback exchange on parts of your growth plan.
Justin Jansen is a professor of corporate entrepreneurship at RSM. His award-winning research and publications provide new perspectives into the roles of leadership, start-ups, organisational ambidexterity, corporate entrepreneurship, and new developments to improve long-term viability and performance. Professor Jansen has been named one of the most influential scientific minds worldwide by Thomson Reuters and one of the top-100 leading professors in the field of entrepreneurship. He is a Senior Fellow at the Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship.
Tom J.M. Mom is a professor of Strategic Growth and Implementation in the Department of Strategic Management & Entrepreneurship at RSM. His research interests include new business development & corporate growth, scaling-up, ambidexterity, strategic renewal, and strategy execution. He is the academic director of RSM’s Executive-MBA and a Senior Fellow at the Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship. He also co-authored the 2021 bestseller management book ‘Naar een gezond groeibedrijf in vijf stappen’.
Ferdinand Jaspers is adjunct faculty of Entrepreneurship at the Rotterdam School of Management and a programme director at the Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship. His teaching and consultancy activities focus on innovative leadership, new business development, and entrepreneurial startup and growth. Based on his expertise at the intersection of strategy, innovation and entrepreneurship, he teaches courses, masterclasses and boot camps on corporate entrepreneurship, innovation excellence and entrepreneurial culture.
Dates and fees
Read more about the upcoming programmeDates
The Build to Scale programme is taught in English, and comprises three modules, a masterclass day and a graduation day on dates to be announced soon.
Sessions will start at 09:00 and end at 17:00. Lunch is included for each of the days.
Fees
€ 6,950 excl. 21% VAT for the three modules; masterclasses after the three modules; mentoring and coaching from industry experts on your company-specific growth plan; access to the online learning system; course books & materials; lunches, and social activities. Price per company with a maximum of two participants per company.
For partners
Are you already a partner of our mentors and experts (Rabobank, KPMG, Kadans, and WeGrow)? Reach out to them to sign up for the programme with a special offer.
Location
The programme takes place at our Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship campus in Rotterdam:
Rotterdam Science Tower, 11th floor
Marconistraat 16
3029 AK Rotterdam
Read more about how to reach our campus here.
Our partners
