We had an existing trusted connection with one of the MESA principles and needed help with strategy, product planning and our approach to strategic thinking. This was driven by a realization that we had ongoing portions of our business that didn’t have adequate processes, planning, and execution.

How do we scale and put good processes in place for product management and what role should it play in our business. MESA put us on a regular schedule to help organize our thinking and to address this issue preventing it from staying on the back burner. The Fast Learning concept was a great new idea to help us execute on new business ideas. Having mentors with a larger organizational perspective helped us better understand what was needed for more focused company direction. As principals we didn’t have significant mentoring in the past and having this available with the MESA organization was very valuable.

Getting a better understanding of our business and where we were trying to go with it. We always came out energized from the monthly, in-person sessions where we spent a few hours in face-to-face collaboration; this was our favorite part.

MESA helps you organize your thinking to establish your priorities and it gives you an experienced senior level view on areas of your business where you might have blind spots. It was helpful that one of the MESA initiated goals was to structure governance; i.e. for the company to have another voice that would challenge us and hold us accountable. This enabled us to start working on the business rather than in the business.

Energizing, challenging, motivating, a reality check, critical thinking.

The collaboration at the MESA Social events is valuable, do it quarterly, and push it more. It’s good for entrepreneurs to have the opportunity to hear and discuss what others were involved with. Additional value would have been the possibility for a longer engagement, i.e. some sort of post-graduation involvement. Perhaps this could take the form of a post-graduation MESA lite option.