Can your start up have too many advisors?

Question

Is it better to have as many talented people on the case as possible, or can you get into a "too many cooks" situation? I'd be interested to hear other's perspectives and experience with this.

Kolton · Accepted Answer

I've seen this with portfolio companies of smaller stage / LMM PE firms as well that are relatively new. They sometimes get the notion that more expertise is often better, where typically a natural pecking order will develop and there will only be 2-4 individuals max that are truly giving actional feedback / opinion. The rest will either turn into 'yes-men' based on experience and/or confidence in the subject matter, or find it not worth their time and become unmotivated / inactive.

I think there is a sweet spot to be had for overall operating advisors, but this can get a bit blurry if you're bringing on one expert per job function too (i.e. an IT specialist, a Supply Chain expert et cetera)

This is actually a portion of what we have in development now and are trying to solve, connecting the best experts for specific functions to help a recently acquired / recently scaled company grow. Fascinating problem and look into general human dynamics. Great question!

Rosie Higgins · Answer

@kmkmkm thanks! That's really interesting. I agree there must be a sweet spot somewhere. Maybe it could sometimes help to work with advisors separately rather than trying to form a team early on.

Can your start up have too many advisors?

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