Month: December 2025

The blind spot of the growth entrepreneur

As an avid reader of De Tijd, I draw daily inspiration from the sharp analyses of our entrepreneurial landscape. The column De Waarde van Morgen (WAW) presents us with beautiful startups every week. Young, energetic teams, often built around one or two visionary founders.

In that phase everything is clear. The founders are the company. Their passion is the product. Their values are the culture. But then growth arrives.

The article about the Rising Star Monitor from Vlerick and Deloitte exposes a painful truth. Belgian scale-ups score brilliantly on product (70 percent), but weakly on organization (35 to 50 percent).

This is no coincidence. It is a symptom of a fundamental problem. The transition from founder DNA to organizational DNA.

Many entrepreneurs see organization as bureaucracy that distracts from the product.

They think: I have a good product, it will sell itself. But that is an illusion. Your product is built, sold and supported by people.

DNA is people. If you are not aware of that, you cannot manage it. And if you do not manage it, you leave a huge part of your growth potential unused.

The Fundamental Difference. Startup versus Scale-up DNA

Let us zoom in on that difference. That is where the key lies.

The Startup Phase. The WAW phase

In a startup, the DNA is implicit. The team is small. Everyone sits in the same room. The founder makes all the important decisions. New people learn by osmosis. They look at the founder and copy what they see.

In this phase, the product is the DNA. The identity of the founder and the product are one. The values and structure at the moment of founding are burned into the organization (Stinchcombe, 1965). The founder is the blueprint. What they do, how they make decisions, which customers they accept, how they deal with problems, that is the culture.

This works because in a small group everything is tangible. The psychological contract between founder and employees is relational and emotional. We are doing this together. We are pioneers (Rousseau, 1989). Everyone feels the same energy, the same ambition, the same values.

The Scale-up Phase. The Rising Star Problem

Here the dynamics change fundamentally. Management layers are added. The founder no longer sees everyone. New people join for a job, not necessarily for a mission. Osmosis no longer works. You cannot personally mentor everyone.

And this is where the real crisis emerges. Not a technical crisis, the product is still good, but an organizational crisis. This is what Greiner (1972) describes as the autonomy crisis. The founder can no longer control everything, but does not dare to let go because they fear that quality will dilute. They remain stuck in product focus and direct control.

The problem is that the skills required to start the company—product passion, detail control, intuitive decision-making—are at odds with what is needed to scale—delegating, building processes, institutionalizing values. Wasserman (2003 and 2012) calls this the Founder’s Dilemma. The founder must choose between:

• King (retain control)
• Rich (truly grow)

Many Belgian entrepreneurs unconsciously choose King, which limits their growth.

The Vlerick research confirms this problem exactly. Founders remain stuck in the directive phase, product focus, and fail to make the step towards delegation and organizational design.

DNA Is not soft stuff. It Is hard business

Many growth companies find terms such as DNA or culture vague. They prefer to focus on features, sales targets and cash flow.

But let us turn that around:

Who builds those features? People who do or do not understand what the customer really needs. That is DNA.

Who hits those sales targets? People who do or do not strike the right tone with prospects. That is DNA.

Who guards cash flow? People who do or do not dare to intervene when things go wrong. That is DNA.

Your product or service, the way you position it in the market, how you deal with customers, it is all directly connected to who you are as an organization. This is not a mystical idea. It is simply organizational reality.

What you do not see is often because you do not measure it. But it is there. Your human capital, the unique way your people work together, how they think, which values they share—that is your real competitive advantage (Barney, 1991).

Your product is easy to copy. Your culture is not.

If the founder drops out, or simply is not in the room, what happens then?

• In a company without articulated DNA: people guess or do nothing. Quality drops.
• In a company with articulated DNA: people know how we do things here. Quality remains high.

The Vlerick research suggests that Belgian companies underestimate this. They optimize the product, but neglect the engine that creates the product: the people and their shared values.

Unconscious Incompetence. Why your growth stagnates

If you are not aware of your DNA, you are flying on automatic pilot. At the beginning, that works because the founder is on top of everything.

But as you grow, it stops working.

Without awareness of your DNA, you hire people based on skills (can they code?), and not on values (do they understand our customer obsession?). You get mercenaries instead of allies.

This leads to fragmentation. The company splits into teams that do different things in different ways. Your product becomes inconsistent. Your customer experience diverges.

Everyone feels that something is off. Innovation stagnates. People leave because they no longer know why we are doing this (Gibson and Birkinshaw, 2004).

This is exactly what we see at Companyonwise. Entrepreneurs come in with growth pains. Processes jam. The team does not run smoothly. They think they need better software. But almost always the root cause is deeper. They have not succeeded in translating implicit founder DNA into explicit organizational DNA that new people can adopt.

Practical Case. Awareness as a lever

For many service companies, growth is a trap. More people often means more noise. Jo Roseleth of Moore understood that growth is only sustainable if the core remains identical, even when he is not in the room.

By consciously working on DNA, something fundamental changed. It was no longer Jo’s vision. It became a shared compass.

This is crucial in the scale-up phase. You must move from leader-led to culture-led. The founder pulls the cart versus the DNA pulls the cart.

This institutionalization is exactly what Schein (1985 and 2010) describes as necessary for a culture to survive beyond the founder. Values must be anchored in systems:

• how you hire people
• how you reward them
• which behavior you tolerate
• where you invest your money

In the IT world, technology changes every two years. If you hang your identity on your product—we do Java—you are vulnerable.

InfoSupport understood that their real strength lies in their people. By making their DNA explicit, they created an anchor point for new employees. Technology changes. Their approach does not.

This makes them agile in a way that competitors without strong DNA cannot match. Their internal identity (who we are) becomes the stable point from which they adjust their external image (what we do) (Hatch and Schultz, 2002).

Filling in the blind spot

The Vlerick research shows that governance is often a weak point. That is logical. If your DNA is not explicit, how can you create rules that make sense? You end up with bureaucracy. Rules for the sake of rules.

But if you realize that DNA is people, governance becomes something else. It becomes agreements that stimulate our best behavior.

Many entrepreneurs think that governance equals limitation. That it restricts innovation. The opposite is true.

If everyone understands:

• how we treat customers
• how we handle mistakes
• what our principles are

then you do not have less freedom. You have more freedom (Schwartz and Davis, 1981).

Your people know where the boundaries are. They do not have to guess every day what is acceptable. They decide faster. They take risks because they know it fits within your values. This is probably the way to scale without losing your soul.

Wake Up and manage your people

The point is not that your product is unimportant. The point is that in the scale-up phase, your product is an outcome.

An outcome of:

• the people you hire
• the values you reward
• the behavior you tolerate

Belgian growth companies leave growth on the table because they manage the output (the product) instead of the input (the DNA and the people).

If you become aware of this, your entire view on growth changes.

You hire differently (on DNA fit, not only skills).

You manage differently (on values, not only targets).

You grow differently (from strength, not from chaos).

At Companyonwise we help entrepreneurs make that crucial shift. From unconsciously competent to consciously competent. From the intuitive founder to the scalable organization. So that you no longer navigate in the dark, but with a razor-sharp compass carried by everyone.

Because in the end, business is simple. DNA is people. And people make the difference.

Reference list

• Barney, J. B. (1991). Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage. Journal of Management, 17(1), 99-120.
• Becker, B., & Gerhart, B. (1996). The impact of human resource management on organizational performance: Progress and prospects. Academy of Management Journal, 39(4), 779-801.
• Davila, T., & Foster, G. (2007). Management control systems in early-stage startup companies. The Accounting Review, 82(4), 907-937.
• DiMaggio, P. J., & Powell, W. W. (1983). The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147-160.
• Gerhart, B., & Feng, J. (2021). The resource-based view of the firm, human resources, and human capital: Progress and prospects. Journal of Management, 47(7), 1796-1819.
• Gibson, C. B., & Birkinshaw, J. (2004). The antecedents, consequences, and mediating role of organizational ambidexterity. Academy of Management Journal, 47(2), 209-226.
• Greiner, L. E. (1972). Evolution and revolution as organizations grow. Harvard Business Review, 50(4), 37-46.
• Hambrick, D. C., & Mason, P. A. (1984). Upper echelons: The organization as a reflection of its top managers. Academy of Management Review, 9(2), 193-206.
• Hatch, M. J., & Schultz, M. (2002). The dynamics of organizational identity. Human Relations, 55(8), 989-1018.
• Morrison, E. W., & Robinson, S. L. (1997). When employees feel betrayed: A model of how psychological contract violation develops. Academy of Management Review, 22(1), 226-256.
• Niesen, W., Van Hootegem, A., Handaja, Y., Battistelli, A., & De Witte, H. (2018). Quantitative and qualitative job insecurity and idea generation: The mediating role of psychological contract breach. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 59(2), 161-171.
• O’Reilly III, C. A., & Tushman, M. L. (2004). The ambidextrous organization. Harvard Business Review, 82(4), 74-81.
• Rousseau, D. M. (1989). Psychological and implied contracts in organizations. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal, 2(2), 121-139.
• Schein, E. H. (1985). Organizational Culture and Leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
• Schein, E. H. (2010). Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
• Schwartz, H., & Davis, S. M. (1981). Matching corporate culture and business strategy. Organizational Dynamics, 10(1), 30-48.
• Stinchcombe, A. L. (1965). Social structure and organizations. In J. G. March (Ed.), Handbook of Organizations (pp. 142-193). Chicago: Rand McNally.
• Teece, D. J. (2007). Explicating dynamic capabilities: The nature and microfoundations of sustainable enterprise performance. Strategic Management Journal, 28(13), 1319-1350.
• Wasserman, N. (2003). Founder-CEO succession and the paradox of entrepreneurial success. Organization Science, 14(2), 149-172.
• Wasserman, N. (2012). The Founder’s Dilemmas: Anticipating and Avoiding the Pitfalls That Can Sink a Startup. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• www.companyonwise.be

Every week, De Tijd publishes their WAW section: Where Ambitions become Reality.

A showcase of young Belgian companies that grow, innovate and win customers without resources, without budget, without massive teams. These startups do not appear in the newspaper by accident. They generate revenue. They show traction. They make choices that stand out.

I look at these companies with curiosity. How do they win their first customers? How do they grow beyond their first ten, fifty, one hundred deals? How do they pivot without crashing? And above all: what can I learn from this, what can I bring to the clients I work with?

That is why I invite WAW-founders for cockpit conversations. Side by side in the cockpit. We talk about their challenges, their choices, their turbulence. What works? What does not? Why? I have now spoken with WAW companies such as BiometriQ, Belgotap, Nascent, Borro and FiftyFivePlus.

What stands out is that these young companies, starting from zero and with minimal resources, make courageous choices, take action, pivot, focus and grow. Without unnecessary fuss. Every conversation with them was a WOW-experience.

This blog shares seven lessons from those cockpit conversations, complemented by insights from 119 WAW startups I analysed.

Lesson 1: The founder sells. Always

No sales director, but founders who open doors themselves

In my conversation with Nicolas from FiftyFivePlus, this surfaced immediately: he makes the calls himself. He starts the conversation himself. Not because he cannot afford a sales team, but because personal contact is his strongest lever. His target group, people 55 and older, value direct contact. They want to talk to someone who understands them, not to someone reading a script.

At BiometriQ it is no different. The data-driven nutrition platform grew to 300 dietitians in Belgium and the Netherlands through direct relationships. No marketing automation. No lead generation campaigns. Just founders who start the conversation themselves, co-create and build trust. The flywheel runs on personal contact.

You see this pattern across the entire WAW list. Not a single startup talks about hiring a VP Sales in year one. They talk about founders winning their first ten, fifty, one hundred customers themselves. HighSail? The co-founders brought in the first customers themselves. Maurice & Nora? The founders spoke directly with seniors and young families.

This is not a “because they have no budget yet” story. This is strategy. Founder-led sales creates authenticity, direct feedback and speed that no sales team can match.

Rackham’s research on consultative selling has shown this for decades: the best salesperson is the one who truly listens to the customer, not the one who follows a script (Rackham 1988).

What mature companies can learn:
Let your leadership sell again. Minimum one customer conversation per month. Not for show, but to learn. Christensen’s jobs-to-be-done theory is built on understanding what customers are really trying to solve (Christensen et al. 2016). You do not learn that from a dashboard. You learn it by sitting next to your customer.

Action:
Schedule a customer conversation next week. Not via sales. Just sit, listen and feel where the friction is.

Lesson 2: Bootstrapping is not poverty. It is discipline

72% of WAW startups report no external funding

In my conversation with Borro, this hit hard: every euro counts. They grew out of cash flow, not funding. That forces choices. No features no one uses. No team of twenty before you have your first customers. No projects that continue “because we already invested in them.”

Of the 119 WAW startups, 72% report no external funding. That does not mean they have no money. It means they earn it themselves. Beego makes 335,000 euros net profit. Ray Care 0.7 million euros. Souvereyns 0.8 million euros operating profit. They grow from cash flow, not funding.

Vanacker’s research on bootstrapping shows it clearly: companies that grow from cash flow stay lean and pragmatic (Vanacker et al. 2011). They build what works, not what looks cool.

What mature companies can learn:
Introduce a “bootstrap mindset” in one business unit. Give them a limited budget and ask: grow from this. No extra resources until they show traction. It will discipline, focus and accelerate.

Action:
Pick one project. Three months. Limited budget. Prove it works or stop.

Lesson 3: Sharp focus on who you do serve (and who you don’t)

Uncompromising choices create trust

Nicolas from FiftyFivePlus made a choice that feels radical: he serves only people aged 55 and over. Period. No attempt to be “for everyone.” This sharp choice requires courage but creates trust. With customers and with the target group itself. Nicolas shared how difficult it can be to say no to projects outside his target group, but how that clarity is a lever. If you try to be everything for everyone, you end up being important to no one.

Belgotap shows the same pattern: local drinks in reusable packaging. Not for everyone, but for a specific group that values sustainability and local products. That focus makes their story powerful.

This aligns with Morris, Schindehutte and LaForge’s research on entrepreneurial marketing: successful startups win through customer intimacy and proactive opportunity recognition, not by pretending to be bigger than they are (Morris, Schindehutte and LaForge 2002). They choose a niche, serve it excellently, and only then grow further.

What mature companies can learn:
Stop with “we serve everyone” or “we focus on SMEs.” Start with “we serve this specific group, and for them we are the best choice.” That clarity builds trust and strengthens your story.

Action:
Identify your ideal customer. Not in broad terms, but in sharp criteria. And dare to say no to the rest.

Lesson 4: Pivot based on customer contact, not strategy sessions

Adjust within weeks, not after months of boardroom debate

In my conversation with Nascent, this became clear: they test, receive feedback, adjust. Within weeks. Not after months of strategy meetings. They are in the cockpit with the customer. They feel the turbulence in real time.

Of the 119 WAW startups, 7.6% explicitly pivoted. But what stands out is how: within weeks of customer feedback, not after months of internal analysis. Beego shifted from consumers to governments to companies. Qontact.ai emerged because the founders noticed that contact center agents barely receive feedback. Maurice & Nora discovered that young families have just as much need for flexible care as seniors.

Research on customer intimacy underscores that organisations prioritising direct customer feedback adapt and innovate faster (Moenaert and Robben 2022). Mature companies often have too many layers between leadership and the customer. Feedback arrives filtered, summarised, translated. By the time decisions are made, the market has moved on.

What mature companies can learn:
Make direct customer conversations mandatory for the leadership team. At least once per month. Not via reports. Just sit, listen, feel.

Action:
Stop projects that do not produce customer feedback within three weeks. No debate. Just stop.

Lesson 5: Purpose as DNA, not PR

Sustainability is their business, not their marketing

Belgotap is the perfect example. They make local drinks in reusable packaging. That is not their marketing layer. That is their business. Sustainability is in the DNA of their product, their story, their choices.

Of the 119 WAW startups, 14.3% explicitly focus on sustainability, climate or health. That seems modest, but the impact is bigger. These founders build purpose-driven companies where impact is as important as profitability. Yokuu makes probiotic cleaning products. ClimateCamp helps companies collaborate with suppliers on CO2 reduction. Loop Earplugs, Brauzz. All built on sustainability as business model, not marketing.

Recent research shows Gen Z and millennials weigh environmental and social criteria more strongly in purchase and investment decisions than older generations (Advane ESG 2024, SGAnalytics 2025). Morgan Stanley predicts Gen Z will surpass millennials by 2034 (Morgan Stanley 2024). ESG is not a nice-to-have. It is a business necessity.

What mature companies can learn:
The new generation of customers expects you to take a position. Neutrality is no longer an option. Companies that take climate action, diversity and transparency seriously win talent, customers and market share (Greco Services 2024, BearingPoint 2025).

Action:
Choose what you stand for. Impact over neutrality. Build it into your DNA, not your marketing.

Lesson 6: Ecosystem as growth accelerator

Network opens doors, trust closes deals

BiometriQ is a textbook example. They built an ecosystem of more than 300 dietitians in Belgium and the Netherlands through personal contact and co-creation. The flywheel runs on trust. Every dietitian becomes an ambassador. Every customer a reference. No mass recruitment but ecosystem development through relationships.

Granovetter’s “strength of weak ties” theory fits here: new opportunities often come not from your closest contacts but from broader, weaker ties that open other circles (Granovetter 1973). These founders understand that networking is not about handing out business cards. It is about real relationships, mutual value and trust.

Prahalad and Ramaswamy’s research on co-creation shows that value does not emerge in the factory but in use with the customer (Prahalad and Ramaswamy 2004). Co-creation with professionals ensures the product evolves with the market, not behind it.

What mature companies can learn:
Map your network not as contacts, but as relationships. Who would actually help you if you asked? Invest your time there. The rest is noise.

Action:
Bring your twenty best customers together for product development or market validation. Not as a test panel, but as co-creators.

Lesson 7: Six months from idea to customer

Speed comes from clarity, not haste

In my conversation with Borro, this was clear: they knew what they solved, for whom, and how. No long business cases. No year-long strategy. Just build, test, launch. Within six months from idea to first customers.

Maurice & Nora tested for a few months, launched, and had one hundred families and seniors as customers within months. Qontact.ai was founded in 2024 and is already running a pilot with Eneco. Eagl was founded in April 2025, immediately raised 825,000 euros and already has seven employees.

Teece’s dynamic capabilities framework emphasises that successful firms in uncertain environments do not keep planning, but use sensing, seizing and transforming quickly (Teece, Peteraf and Leih 2016). These startups read the market in real time and act immediately.

Mature companies are slower. Projects take eighteen months. Approvals go through four layers. By the time something is live, the need has changed.

What mature companies can learn:
Create one project with a three-month deadline from idea to market. Force decisions. Remove unnecessary checks. Give autonomy.

Action:
Choose one project. Three months from idea to market. Force choices. Remove checks. Give autonomy.

From WAW to your WOW

These seven lessons do not come from theory but from conversations. Real conversations with founders who start from nothing, make choices, win customers and grow. BiometriQ, Belgotap, Nascent, Borro, FiftyFivePlus. They sit in the cockpit to share their story. Not to impress, but to learn. And they can inspire us.

Because that is the point. Many companies have resources, teams, budgets. But they often lose urgency, customer focus, courage. They end up in standstill. These startups show that focus, speed and customer proximity do not depend on size. They depend on choices.

Smith and Lewis’ research on organisational paradoxes shows that successful companies do not choose between stability and flexibility. They embrace both through “both/and” thinking (Smith and Lewis 2011).

These startups combine discipline (bootstrapping, focus) with flexibility (pivoting, adjusting). Mature companies can do the same.

Want to know how your company can apply these seven lessons?
Book a Take Off Briefing with Add Business. We analyse your situation, mirror it against WAW patterns and build an action plan you can use tomorrow.

No theory. No reports. Just action.
Contact: www.addbusiness.be

Sources

(Exact replication of your original list, now in English)

Data:

De Tijd WAW section, analysis of 119 startups (2024–2025)

Cockpit conversations:

Add Business conducted in-depth cockpit conversations with BiometriQ, Belgotap, Nascent, Borro and FiftyFivePlus on customer development, growth and commercial choices.

References

• Advane ESG. 2024. “The Rise of Gen Z: Shaping the Future of ESG Investing.” Accessed November 15, 2025.
  https://www.advaneesg.com.
• BearingPoint. 2025. “ESG and the Future of Corporate Strategy.” Accessed November 15, 2025. https://www.bearingpoint.com.
• Christensen, Clayton M., Taddy Hall, Karen Dillon and David S. Duncan. 2016. “Know Your Customers’ ‘Jobs to Be Done’.” Harvard Business Review 94 (9): 54–62.
• Edvardsson, Bo, Bård Tronvoll and Thorsten Gruber. 2011. “Expanding Understanding of Service Exchange and Value Co-Creation: A Social Construction Approach.” Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science 39 (2): 327–339.
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• Moenaert, Rudy and Henry Robben. 2022. The Customer Leader: A New Model for Creating Growth and Value. London: Kogan Page.
• Morgan Stanley. 2024. “Gen Z Investment Trends and ESG Priorities.” Accessed November 15, 2025. https://www.morganstanley.com.
• Morris, Michael H., Minet Schindehutte and Raymond W. LaForge. 2002. “Entrepreneurial Marketing.” Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice 10 (4): 1–19.
• Prahalad, C.K. and Venkat Ramaswamy. 2004. “Co-Creation Experiences.” Journal of Interactive Marketing 18 (3): 5–14.
• Rackham, Neil. 1988. SPIN Selling. McGraw-Hill.
• SeedBlink. 2024. “Belgium’s Social Enterprise Ecosystem.” Accessed November 15, 2025. https://www.seedblink.com.
• SGAnalytics. 2025. “Gen Z and ESG: The New Generation of Conscious Consumers.” Accessed November 15, 2025. https://www.sganalytics.com.
• Smith, Wendy K. and Marianne W. Lewis. 2011. “Toward a Theory of Paradox.” Academy of Management Review 36 (2): 381–403.
• Social Innovation Factory. 2023. “Belgium’s Impact Ecosystem.” Accessed November 15, 2025. https://www.socialinnovationfactory.be.
• Stokes, David. 2000. “Putting Entrepreneurship into Marketing.” Journal of Research in Marketing and Entrepreneurship 2 (1): 1–16.
• Teece, David, Margaret Peteraf and Sohvi Leih. 2016. “Dynamic Capabilities and Organizational Agility.” California Management Review 58 (4): 13–35.
• Vanacker, Tom, Sophie Manigart, Miguel Meuleman and Luc Sels. 2011. “A Longitudinal Study on Financial Bootstrapping and New Venture Growth.” Entrepreneurship and Regional Development 23 (9–10): 681–705.