I’m investing in Future of Work and Learning startups. One of the most fundamental problems of the majority of B2B startups in the learning space is that employers perceive their solutions as „nice-to-haves”:

The employers don’t feel the immediate urgency to solve the problem these startups are tackling.

A popular example: When you ask corporates, most of them will agree that their leaders are not trained well enough in leadership skills. They will even admit that they could unlock a lot of potential when training their leaders better.

But when it comes to spending money on startups with leadership training solutions, things change quickly: The problem is most often not pressing enough to get it into the top priorities list for budget allocation. And the other problem is that it’s hard to measure the impact of measures and solutions.

This is a common issue in all sorts of upskilling. Same with coaching – we all know that actually everyone needs a personal coach. But the effects of paying a personal coach for an employee are for most companies not tangible enough to perceive it as an urgent problem to solve and pay for.

Unfortunately, this is not an issue exclusive to the Future of Work and Learning space. It’s one of the most common underlying sales problems in many B2B areas.

And VCs know this. This is why they will challenge you on how urgent the problem your solution solves is for your buyer.

It can quickly turn into a make or break of your case – not only for your fundraising but your very core business.

Be prepared for VCs challenging you on the urgency dimension. As long as you can reasonably defend it, try your best to show why the problem you’re solving is so urgent. And why it will then lead to a high willingness to pay.

Urgent problems are often those that will lead to painful losses; losses that hurt a lot if someone can’t find a solution quickly. And ideally, you can measure the outcomes.

Think of an industry where you need to fulfill certain compliance rules. If you don’t fulfill them, you simply can’t operate. That’s urgency where a solution to fulfill those rules as quickly as possible will be in a great position. And most often, you can measure compliance-related outcomes; which is great, too.

Or think of another industry where companies can’t serve their customers anymore because they can’t find talent. That’s a very urgent problem.

As a founder, I’ve worked on too many ideas that were perceived as nice-to-haves, leading to existential risks for the business.

If you can’t argue reasonably why your solution is solving an urgent problem that comes with a high willingness to pay for a solution, then I would advice you to think about opportunities to narrow down or pivot your solution and/or your value proposition towards solving more urgent problems.

It’s very urgent, for your fundraising as well as your core business.