The Startup Way: How Modern Companies Use Entrepreneurial Management to Transform Culture and Drive Long-Term Growth

by Eric Ries

A growth board, then, has these same three responsibilities: To be the single point of corporate accountability for an internal startup. Some growth boards are bespoke and designed to serve only one team. Others are long-lived and/or service many teams at once. Some even intentionally bring cohorts of teams through the board at the same time, as in a startup accelerator. Regardless of its form, every growth board should aim to be the venue for pivot-or-persevere decisions for the internal startups it oversees. The best boards are able to push founders to think deeply about their progress and question whether they really have achieved validated learning or just wishful thinking. This is different from a stage-gate (“go/kill”) review and is not effective if adversarial or imperious.