By Uwin Lugoda
Enlisting the help of industry leaders as mentors has become a staple in the life cycle of most startups, due to their experiences and knowledge of the market. This need for guidance and advice has only increased during the recent Covid-19 pandemic, as many startups face newer challenges and have to navigate through a massive change in consumer behavior. Seeing this need, Hatch, a local co-working space for innovation, growth, and collaboration based in Colombo, has now launched Hatch Open House, a free mentorship programme that connects mentors with startup founders to provide guidance and insight to grow their startup. The programme first began on 20 March, alongside the lockdown in Sri Lanka, as an extension of Hatch’s pre-existing monitoring programme, which launched in 2019, with a pool of 40 mentors from both the local and international markets.
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Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva[/caption]
“As a hub for all things startup and a creative space for work, Hatch aims to transform the business culture in Sri Lanka, by providing genuine opportunities for entrepreneurs to experiment ideas, acquire knowledge, and share lessons. We set up an environment and network for businesses to thrive together as a community, and since the outbreak, we began offering its services online to the larger network of entrepreneurs who needed support during the uncertain times,” said Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva, speaking to The Sunday Morning Business. She explained that this mentor programme mainly addresses issues faced by startups during Covid-19, covering a wide array of topics like branding, marketing, finance, management, and strategic aspects of startups. Furthermore, she stated that the most frequent calls for support were on the topics of sales during the pandemic, customer retention, cost and financial management, how to manage teams working from home, what to focus on in terms of branding and storytelling during the pandemic, social media marketing and advertising, taxation relaxations, and many more issues that are unique to each startup. According to Hatch Programme and Community Associate Sasmini Bandara, the Hatch Open House programme has currently supported 54 startups and has had 104 sessions during the three months of lockdown. She went on to state that the mentors that took part in the sessions are a part of the Hatch Mentor Network and they bring in experience from a local as well as international context with some mentors residing in the US, Singapore, and Qatar as well. These mentors include, Ernst & Young Partner Roshini Fernando, CoralBlack Managing Director Sara Steffensen, Calcey Technologies Founder Mangala Karunaratne, abas ERP Director of Sales Asia Pacific Geethal Fernando, Patamar Capital Principal Satchith Kurukulasuriya, and many more. One of the mentors, Shanuki de Alwis who is a brand purpose consultant, skills coach, and a speaker, said that this has been an excellent way for her to provide customised individual guidance, that she has gained from working with a variety of startups and being exposed to their business models. Furthermore, other mentors such as the Founder of We Are Designers, a creative design agency providing digital solutions, Joe Lenora stated that since the sessions are virtual, he felt that more startups could take part in them, and was also able to learn about new trends in each industry. Further, Bandara noted: “The 25 mentors featured in Open House are experts from diverse fields ranging from IT, fintech, apparel, advertising and communications, hospitality, retail, services, HR, and legal.” She stated that at the start of the online mentoring sessions, participation of startups stood at an average of four to five per week, but now it has gone up, seeing participation of at least nine to 10 startups a week.
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Hatch Programme and Community Associate Sasmini Bandara[/caption]
Bandara explained that this programme has currently accommodated startups from industries ranging from construction, technology, fintech and financial services, hospitality, tourism, advertising, and communications to fashion, apparel, and event management. She stated that these startups have gone on to show measurable results of the programme, with some rebranding their businesses and changing their marketing strategies. “We set up better ways to communicate with our customers through Instagram and began the development of our website for a quicker purchasing process. We also improved our brand guidelines to stay true to our vision and ensure that we are perceived appropriately by our target market,” said Zainab Miskin who runs Lilac Kuküns, a curated gifting service based in Colombo. According to the CEO of Fipbox, a fintech startup, Kalana Meneripitiya, they gained insights about emerging markets and were able to optimise their growth strategy to pivot from their initial business strategy. Hatch Open House has also recently collaborated with The Good Life Accelerator to bring in international mentors into the Open House programme from Germany to guide sustainable businesses in Sri Lanka. According to Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva, it hosts mentors who are located in Singapore, the US, and Qatar who have been part of the Hatch Mentor Network and have been guiding startups since its inception. Bandara stated that they initially faced challenges when starting things off virtually and when putting a system in place to co-ordinate, since this programme was initiated as a response to an unexpected turn of events. “We had to act fast in order to make these virtual sessions successful. It was an all new concept to initiate but the startups and mentors got adapted to the system so well and made our work a lot easier,” she said. She added that they also found it challenging to match the high demand from the mentees and mentors, but managed to address this by allocating extra hours of their schedules on some days. She went on to explain that they faced other challenges including co-ordinating around 11 sessions per day on some weeks within an eight-hour time window. Bandara stated that this type of programme is very helpful to the startup ecosystem in Sri Lanka, as most startups depend on one-on-one mentoring sessions in the long run. She stated that these sessions were their quick response to the world Covid has created, and by acting quickly, they were able to help 54 startups with multiple sessions to resolve the challenges they had in various areas of business. "There are measurable results where some startups were able to identify their weaknesses and strengths as well. We believe contributing to the growth of the startups and improving the skills that they already have is a big support that Hatch can provide to the startups and entrepreneurs in our ecosystem during Covid-19," she noted. Bandara stated that startups can easily sign on to the free programme via Hatch's social media accounts on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, by directly messaging Hatch with their name, email address, and contact number.
Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva[/caption]
“As a hub for all things startup and a creative space for work, Hatch aims to transform the business culture in Sri Lanka, by providing genuine opportunities for entrepreneurs to experiment ideas, acquire knowledge, and share lessons. We set up an environment and network for businesses to thrive together as a community, and since the outbreak, we began offering its services online to the larger network of entrepreneurs who needed support during the uncertain times,” said Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva, speaking to The Sunday Morning Business. She explained that this mentor programme mainly addresses issues faced by startups during Covid-19, covering a wide array of topics like branding, marketing, finance, management, and strategic aspects of startups. Furthermore, she stated that the most frequent calls for support were on the topics of sales during the pandemic, customer retention, cost and financial management, how to manage teams working from home, what to focus on in terms of branding and storytelling during the pandemic, social media marketing and advertising, taxation relaxations, and many more issues that are unique to each startup. According to Hatch Programme and Community Associate Sasmini Bandara, the Hatch Open House programme has currently supported 54 startups and has had 104 sessions during the three months of lockdown. She went on to state that the mentors that took part in the sessions are a part of the Hatch Mentor Network and they bring in experience from a local as well as international context with some mentors residing in the US, Singapore, and Qatar as well. These mentors include, Ernst & Young Partner Roshini Fernando, CoralBlack Managing Director Sara Steffensen, Calcey Technologies Founder Mangala Karunaratne, abas ERP Director of Sales Asia Pacific Geethal Fernando, Patamar Capital Principal Satchith Kurukulasuriya, and many more. One of the mentors, Shanuki de Alwis who is a brand purpose consultant, skills coach, and a speaker, said that this has been an excellent way for her to provide customised individual guidance, that she has gained from working with a variety of startups and being exposed to their business models. Furthermore, other mentors such as the Founder of We Are Designers, a creative design agency providing digital solutions, Joe Lenora stated that since the sessions are virtual, he felt that more startups could take part in them, and was also able to learn about new trends in each industry. Further, Bandara noted: “The 25 mentors featured in Open House are experts from diverse fields ranging from IT, fintech, apparel, advertising and communications, hospitality, retail, services, HR, and legal.” She stated that at the start of the online mentoring sessions, participation of startups stood at an average of four to five per week, but now it has gone up, seeing participation of at least nine to 10 startups a week.
[caption id="attachment_88998" align="alignright" width="200"] Hatch Programme and Community Associate Sasmini Bandara[/caption]
Bandara explained that this programme has currently accommodated startups from industries ranging from construction, technology, fintech and financial services, hospitality, tourism, advertising, and communications to fashion, apparel, and event management. She stated that these startups have gone on to show measurable results of the programme, with some rebranding their businesses and changing their marketing strategies. “We set up better ways to communicate with our customers through Instagram and began the development of our website for a quicker purchasing process. We also improved our brand guidelines to stay true to our vision and ensure that we are perceived appropriately by our target market,” said Zainab Miskin who runs Lilac Kuküns, a curated gifting service based in Colombo. According to the CEO of Fipbox, a fintech startup, Kalana Meneripitiya, they gained insights about emerging markets and were able to optimise their growth strategy to pivot from their initial business strategy. Hatch Open House has also recently collaborated with The Good Life Accelerator to bring in international mentors into the Open House programme from Germany to guide sustainable businesses in Sri Lanka. According to Hatch CEO Randhula De Silva, it hosts mentors who are located in Singapore, the US, and Qatar who have been part of the Hatch Mentor Network and have been guiding startups since its inception. Bandara stated that they initially faced challenges when starting things off virtually and when putting a system in place to co-ordinate, since this programme was initiated as a response to an unexpected turn of events. “We had to act fast in order to make these virtual sessions successful. It was an all new concept to initiate but the startups and mentors got adapted to the system so well and made our work a lot easier,” she said. She added that they also found it challenging to match the high demand from the mentees and mentors, but managed to address this by allocating extra hours of their schedules on some days. She went on to explain that they faced other challenges including co-ordinating around 11 sessions per day on some weeks within an eight-hour time window. Bandara stated that this type of programme is very helpful to the startup ecosystem in Sri Lanka, as most startups depend on one-on-one mentoring sessions in the long run. She stated that these sessions were their quick response to the world Covid has created, and by acting quickly, they were able to help 54 startups with multiple sessions to resolve the challenges they had in various areas of business. "There are measurable results where some startups were able to identify their weaknesses and strengths as well. We believe contributing to the growth of the startups and improving the skills that they already have is a big support that Hatch can provide to the startups and entrepreneurs in our ecosystem during Covid-19," she noted. Bandara stated that startups can easily sign on to the free programme via Hatch's social media accounts on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, by directly messaging Hatch with their name, email address, and contact number.