Google for Startups Immersion: Black Founders

Monday 7th September - Program Kick-Off, Pitches & AMA with Jewel Burks Solomon, Head of Google for Startups US

The first edition of the Google for Startups Immersion: Black Founders program is starting next week and we hope you are as excited as we are to kick it off! The program will kick-off with a welcome session on September 7th where you’ll have the opportunity to hear from Google for Startups Head of the UK Marta Krupinska (three times founder) and learn about the inspiring journey of Jewel Burks Solomon, Head of Google for Startups US (founder and VC). You will hear more about the program framework, agenda and all resources available to you by the program team and ultimately, you will meet your cohort - 12 brilliantly founded startups by 18 impressive founders. 

The kickoff day will be split into two parts:

• 2pm-3pm (BST): Introduction to GFS and Q&A with Jewel Burkes Solomon
• 3pm-3:30pm (BST): Break 3:30pm-4:30pm (BST): Meet your cohort: startup pitches!

Tuesday 8th September - OKR Workshop with LJ Erwin

Welcome to your first workshop on setting the right goals with OKRs!

Studies have shown that committing to a goal can help improve employee performance. Furthermore, research reveals that setting challenging and specific goals can further enhance employee engagement in attaining those goals. In practice, using OKRs is different from other goal-setting techniques because it allows us to set very ambitious goals. This workshop will help your startup learn the foundations of the OKRs methodology and create your own OKRs to help your startup prioritise work, gain focus, and stretch outside of your comfort zone. You will learn how to create your own startup’s OKRs for the upcoming quarters, and you will review together with a Googler based on Google’s best practices for goal-setting. It is more important than ever to make sure to shift your focus to the right objectives and adjust your key results in accordance with the current circumstances and your specific business challenges.

The session will be led by LJ Erwin - Chief Of Staff, YouTube TV, Sports, Video Infrastructure & Identity. This session will set you up for success on the GFS program. Please review the following OKR framework resources prior to the workshop to familiarise yourself with the concept and ask any outstanding questions. 

Thursday 10th September - OKR Followup with LJ Erwin

Welcome to the OKR recap session

we hope you've managed to hone in on your OKRs over the past couple of days! In this session we will recap, review and share our OKRs with the rest of the cohort, to get valuable feedback. The session will be split into the following:

Introductions (10 minutes):

• meet the advisors
• recap on what we learned on Tuesday

Breakout Sessions (60 minutes /w 10 minute break - 4 startups per session):

• Each team will present and review their OKRs
• Feedback from the group (please take notes)

Recap Session (15 minutes):

• Review of the main takeaways from the breakout sessions
• Sharing of additional resources
• Guidance on what's next for your OKRs

Similar to the first workshop, this session will be led by LJ Erwin, with two additional OKR advisors - Marta Krupinska and Mariama Boumanjal. If you have any questions in the run up to the session, please reach out.

Friday 11th September - Founder Friday Standups

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

All Week - Mentor Matching Week

By now you have been connected with both of your mentors. Please use this week to schedule time to meet your mentors, talk through your OKRs, and plan out how they can help support your business over the duration of the program. This is a critical component of the program, and it's both your mentors and your responsibility to organise regular meetups throughout the program.

If there are any issues with connecting with your mentor, please reach out to the programs team.

Tuesday 15th September - VP speaker session with US cohort: Torrence Boone, VP of Global Client Partnerships

Torrence Boone will join us to share his personal experience as a black leader of a large growth organization in a casual, Ask-Me-Anything lunchtime session.

Torrence is responsible for driving Google’s strategy and multi-billion dollar business across a portfolio of the world’s largest global advertisers, spanning the tech, health/beauty and CPG verticals. In this capacity, he leads a team focused on large scale global strategic partnerships that deploy diverse Google products and platforms to achieve business transformation and breakthrough marketing results. Torrence also co-leads Google's New York office.

Prior to Google, Torrence held senior agency leadership positions with WPP & Publicis. Before his tenure in advertising, Torrence was a senior manager at Bain & Company, where he advised a broad range of clients on corporate and business unit strategy, mergers and acquisitions, new product development, and interactive strategy.

Wednesday 16th September - VP speaker session with US cohort: Bonita Stewart, VP of Global Partnerships

Bonita Stewart, VP of Global Partnerships. Bonita Stewart will join us to share her personal experience as a black leader of a large growth organization in a casual, Ask-Me-Anything lunchtime session.

Bonita C. Stewart, joined Google in 2006 and her career spans three decades leading multi-billion dollar operations, accelerating digital technology adoption and driving business transformation for major corporations in the IT, automotive and technology fields. Currently, as VP, Global Partnerships she oversees the largest US publishers across Media/Entertainment, News/Publishing, Mobile apps, Search and Commerce. Widely hailed for her astute leadership, in 2014 Crain’s named her a Woman to Watch in Tech. Ms. Stewart also pioneered the concept for Howard West, a computer science immersion program for historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), powered by Google. Stewart received her BA with honors from Howard University and MBA from Harvard Business School. Ms. Stewart serves on the Deckers [NYSE:DECK] and Pluralsight [NASDAQ:PS] boards

Friday 18th September - Founder Friday Standups

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

Tuesday 22nd September - Product Roadmap with Sol Chea

This session will be focused on Product Roadmaps, defining what they are, what purpose/audience do they serve and going through practical examples of how to build and evolve your roadmap from scratch.

Who will be facilitating: Sol Chea is a Technical Lead for Project Loon which started as part of Google X, and uses balloons to provide Internet to remote regions and during disaster recovery efforts. In addition, he has over 15 years of engineering experience ranging from building B2B/B2C products for billions of users to building engineering teams from the ground up. 

Thursday 24th September - Leading Tech Teams with Madeleine Clue

We are excited to welcome Madeleine Clute who will be joining us to speak about Leading Tech teams. Madeleine is a Senior Software Engineer/Manager at Google, has spent 5 years in New York City and 1 year in Sydney. Her current work focuses on Data Center Fiber Optic Cable Deployment Automation and has previously worked in the Google Maps and Cloud IoT teams. This session will cover the following topics:

• Setting the right expectations with your team
• Ensuring quality work (without micromanaging)
• Effective communication. and;
• Other tips for leading your tech teams. 

Thursday 24th September - Speaker session with US cohort: Marian Croak, VP of Site Reliability Engineering

Marian Croak, VP of Site Reliability Engineering. Marian Croak will join us to share her personal experience as a leader of a large technical organization in a casual, Ask-Me-Anything lunchtime session.  

Marian Rogers Croak is a Vice President of Engineering at Google. She has previously served as Senior Vice President of Research and Development at ATT Labs. She is credited as a developer of Voice over IP creating most of methods and features that both improved its reliability and ushered in its nearly universal adoption.  

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

Thursday 1st October - Google Diversity Workshop with Dinesh Chahlia

We are pleased to invite you to the Google Diversity training workshop hosted by Dinesh Chahlia a Technical Lead Manager at Google. This session will focus on Diversity and Inclusion in your businesses and how to build inclusive products by fostering an inclusive work culture. The session will touch on the following topics:

• What does diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) mean to you?
• What have you found most valuable about DEI training in the past?
• What are you already doing to build a more inclusive business?
• What are some challenges and concerns that your team or customers face with regards to DEI?
• What might you be overlooking with your current product or service?
• How could a culture of diversity, equity and inclusion help your business? 

This session doesn't have all the answers. We encourage you to come with questions, thoughts and share your experiences with the rest of the cohort.

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

Tuesday 6th October - Sales Academy: Compelling solutions

Welcome to your first Sales Academy session: Compelling Solutions.

Sales Academy is designed to provide startup founders with essential sales skills and practices that they can implement immediately to acquire new customers and partnerships and secure funding. In this module, you'll learn and practice how to communicate your products and services in a way that aligns with your audience's objectives, so you're able to close more business.The primary facilitators for all Sales Academy sessions will be:

Ross Robinson: Ross is an entrepreneur and sales coach. He has started and sold multiple businesses, sold enterprise solutions, been a top producer in SaaS selling, and even did door-to-door sales early in his career. Ross has worked actively with Google and Google partners since 2014. He has lived in Europe and South America and loves hanging out with his wife and four children. When Ross isn’t working, you’ll often find him hiking, camping or woodworking.

AK Ikwuakor (“Coach AK”): a former professional athlete turned entrepreneur, business strategist, and Executive Coach. AK has worked with students, professional athletes, coaches, governmental agencies, business leaders, and community-based organizations in the areas of sports diplomacy, leadership development, athlete performance, fashion, VR, global education, and business coaching. AK is also an established speaker and is currently a member of Google’s Master Faculty.

Wednesday 7th & Thursday 8th October - Leadership 1:1s with Craig O'Boyle

Your first introduction to Craig O'Boyle, our exclusive executive coach who will be working with you over the next month. The 1:1s will cover the following:

• Agreement on ways of working / coaching approach for the GFS sessions
• What these sessions are/are not
• Focus on the founder:
  • Top Values as a leader/in business
  • Finding your Authentic Leadership style
  • What you want to get out of this Google Coaching 

Thursday 8th October - AMA with CFO of Azimo Tatiana Okhotina

Welcome to this Ask Me Anything (AMA) with Tatiana Okhotina, CFO of Azimo.

In this session, Tatiana will speak about Finance for Founders.- things founders should know and think about. We encourage you to prepare questions in advance, but we will look to touch on the following areas (not limited to):

• Employee options scheme
• Cap table management
• Working capital management
• Fundraising
• Raising debt using
• ML in accounting
• Treasury management 
• Scalability and international expansion
• Data and data tools 

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

Tuesday 13th October - Sales Academy: Closing and Creating Traction

Welcome to your second Sales Academy session: Closing & Creating Traction.

Sales Academy is designed to provide startup founders with essential sales skills and practices that they can implement immediately to acquire new customers and partnerships and secure funding.

In this module, you'll learn and practice techniques you can use to close and gain commitment. You'll also learn how to move deals off of the fence.

Wednesday 14th October - Group Leadership session 1 with Craig O'Boyle

Welcome to Session 1 - Connecting with your authentic leadership style.These sessions will be led by Leadership Coach and Head of Apps & Gaming Craig O'boyle. Here's an overview of what you should expect in this session:

• Welcome and designing this coaching alliance confidentiality, sharing stays in the room, no bad idea, include everything (5 mins)
• Introductions to the coaching space - Founder goals for group coaching, and sharing personal missions and values (9 mins)
• Sharing the personal leadership journeys - 30 mins (3 mins x 10 people) - what are the highlights, what stands out most? Will ask everyone to listen for indicators of values/most authentic self of leader who is sharing their journey (active listening)
• Roundtable - When you are showing up as your best self as a leader: With yourself, with your teams, with external audiences AND What can get in the way of showing up: Internal and external factors (20 mins)
• Roundtable - Connecting with your values / your authentic leader - How best to channel that? And one area that you would like to grow in as a leader for those around you? (20 mins)
• Debrief from session - what did we learn? What was useful? What has prompted more questions? (5 mins)

Homework for Group session 2 - Reflect on the biggest challenges and opportunities that you are currently facing for your start-up, covering both 1) personal growth (individual leadership) and 2) related to leadership of your team/external audiences. Identify three areas to prepare to share with the group and discuss as part of session 2.

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

All Week - 1:1 Checkins with Marta 

We are just over half way through the program! This is your opportunity to checkin with Marta on a 1:1 to speak about your business challenges and overall program experience so far.

Tuesday 20th October - Sales Academy: Creating scale and consistency

Welcome to your third Sales Academy session: Creating Scale and Consistency.

Sales Academy is designed to provide startup founders with essential sales skills and practices that they can implement immediately to acquire new customers and partnerships and secure funding.

In this module, you'll learn and practice frameworks you can use to drive consistency to support your growth. As the founder, you’ll learn to help others to sell with as much success as you.

Wednesday 21st October - Group Leadership Session 2 with Craig O'Boyle

Welcome to group session 2 - Understanding the individual leader and the link with the organisation. Here's what you will cover in this session:

• Debrief from homework - what kind of challenges and opportunities are top of mind? (15 mins)
• Roundtable - Unpacking the different roles we play within our teams - How to ensure we show up in the right ways? Some examples: CEO, Coach, Mentor, Decision Maker, Counsellor, Problem Solver, Friend (25 mins)
• The power of perspectives - Same scenarios / different perspectives, and how to use them to your advantage as a leader. What perspectives do you frequently tap into? (25 mins)
• Group exercise on influencing perspectives / choosing a different one to bring maximum benefit in your organisation (20 mins)
• Debrief from session - what did we learn? What was useful? What has prompted more questions? (5 mins)

Homework for Group session 3 - Reflect back on the times you have received feedback in your professional or personal life. Was it expected? How was it delivered? When was it useful? How did you act on it? Spend time journaling on what you can learn about yourself as a leader from those brief moments of feedback that were most useful. How do you collect feedback today in your role at your start-up? How do you act on it? Come prepared to share feedback and what you’ve learned about yourself from the feedback process to discuss as part of session 3.

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

All Week - Marketing 1:1 with GFS UK Marketing Lead Michael Cavanagh

Do you have any marketing challenges? Do you want to share ideas on how we can help elevate your business and brand? Michael will be booking 30 minute 1:1 sessions to discuss everything Marketing with you.

Tuesday 27th October - What Makes an Effective Founder with Jeremy Neuner

Startups face many existential risks. Tech risk, market risk, product risk, financial risk. But there is one risk which some research indicates is the biggest of all. It’s often invisible to founders. And painfully felt once they get deep in. Founders consistently underrate the human-related risks. “Engineering is easy. People are hard,” Sequoia Capital partner and former Google SVP famously once said.

In this session, we share what we’ve learned in helping hundreds of the most promising startup founders across the world deal with their toughest people challenges. The study contains compelling analysis, references from some of the most robust research done on these people issues, and, most importantly, practical tips. This is not meant to be the final word on what it takes to be an effective founder, so pull from this what is useful and nothing more. This session will be facilitated by Jeremy Neuner, Head of Google Launchpad San Francisco. 

Wednesday 28th October - Group Leadership Session 3 with Craig O'Boyle

Welcome to group session 3 - Charting your leadership journey from here, and committing to invest in it. Here's what you will cover in this session:

• Debrief from homework - what lessons can we share about the role of feedback and leadership? What has this brought top of mind for the group? (15 mins)
• Roundtable - Looking ahead to the leader I want to be in 10 year time, where I am at my most successful. Surrounded by teams, colleagues, partners, industry - what journey do I need to build on / grow as / develop in now to get there in future? (25 mins)
• Roundtable - Leadership blind spots as a Founder / C-level (25 mins)
• Working time - 10 mins - Making a start on personal commitments I will make to myself, and to my team, about evolving my role as a leader
• Debrief from session (2 mins each for debrief) - What commitments will each person take away - YES and NOs? What was useful? Where do I go from here (15 mins) 

Thursday 29th October - Mid-Point OKR checkins with Mariama & Oliver

In these 30 minute 1:1 sessions, we will take a look at your OKRs and your progress so far.

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

Tuesday 3rd November - Protecting the Team from Distractions with Lucero Tagle

While CEOs are typically seen as distracted by new ideas, the best ones create focus. They’re able to build momentum for the team which fuels even better performance and great morale. In this session we will explore techniques to protect the team from distractions. This session will be facilitated by Lucero Tagle, a Google Organisational Development Partner with expertise in aligning business strategy with talent management practices. We look forward to you joining us for this session.

Wednesday 4th November - Consistent Expectations of Co Founders with Tony McGaharan

Invisible and unmet expectations are at the heart of co-founder conflict. Our data suggests that founders tend to have a minimalist definition of their leadership role. Effective founders hold consistent expectations with themselves and co-founders 

This session will be led by Tony McGaharan a creative, collaborative and versatile leader with experience in learning and development, team development, leadership development, recruitment, project and program management. He is passionate about people development at all levels and an effective facilitator and coach. 

Thursday 5th & Friday 6th November - Final 1:1 Leadership sessions with Craig O'Boyle

END OF PROGRAMME DEBRIEF 121 - 30 MINS WITH EACH FOUNDER(S)

• What was learned?
• What was a surprise?
• What have you been inspired by?
• Do you feel that you are armed to continue your leadership development journey?
• How might success show up in your business from here?
• Support needs and how COB/GFS/Other recommended resources can assist 

Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis

Every Friday, we aim to come together with you, a cohort of brilliant founders from across the UK, France and the Netherlands. Founder Standup is a fundamental part of every single one of our programs as it connects founders into facilitated support networks in which they can candidly share their challenges, creatively problem solve, provide emotional support to one another and come up with solutions that will help their businesses survive and thrive in these times of rapid change. Our goal is to empower founders to help each other in a simple, replicable format, and create scalable support networks that will work together and pass the impact forward to others. This session will be led by Andy Davis.

• Exiting and Negotiation with Marta Krupinska
• Roundtable with Tom Hulme, General Partner at Google Ventures (GV)
• Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis
• Pitch Preparation 1:1s with Andy Davis

• Privacy Design Workshop
• Pre-Showcase Preparation with Andy Watts
• Friday Founder Standup with Andy Davis
• Pitch Preparation 1:1s with Andy Davis

• Pre-Showcase Preparation with Andy Watts
• Showcase Day
• Final Friday Founder Standups with GFS Team