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Advisor Role - Advice needed on communicating a transition from startup Director to Advisor

Adelle168·Aug 17, 2020
Posted in:AdviceCareer Growth
I was recently furloughed from my role as Director of Product at an early stage start-up. I still have a great relationship with the Founders and want to become an Advisor for the company, how should I approach this conversation, frame the value I can bring and clarify the benefits I should be receiving?
Carol210·Aug 18, 2020
Start by writing out all the contributions you feel that you could make in the role of an advisor and frame out what you want to say in the form of an e-mail so that you can deliver the message either verbally or in writing. Once you have it drafted, test it out on a few trusted friends, family members or people in your network and get some feedback and practice. Try to think through what would be going on in the founders' heads and how they might perceive this and what their challenges/concerns are so you can be ready to address them. It is also helpful to get feedback from the people you're testing it on with regards to how they perceive your proposal and what might be going on in their heads. With regards to the benefits, I would start by approaching it as a brainstorming exercise where you think through what the ideal situation for you would be, if absolutely everything could go your way. Write down all the forms of benefits you would be open to receiving in bullet form and try to get creative here - imagine that nothing is off limits. Once you have your full list, you can draft that into your proposal and share with the founders that these are some ideas you have, but also mention that you're open to discussing other ideas that might work for them too. In this way, you're expanding it out to more possibilities than you could've come up with on your own.Good luck!
Adelle168·Aug 23, 2020
@carol210 This is helpful! Really like the suggestion of a proposal, this way I can be super clear and create boundaries between my previous role and the role of an Advisor. Most Advisor research I've done indicates compensation in the form of equity. But since I already have good equity, do you know if it's out of line to request monetary benefits as an Advisor?
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