TOPIC PROFILES

For each topic, the “Topic profiles” sheet identifies assertions denoted “core” and assertions denoted “elaborating”. Core assertions are those that had a loading equal to or greater than 0.50 at every run with K = 30, K =40, K =45, and K = 50. The core assertions were used to define what the topic is about. The “elaborating assertions” had a loading in some but not in all of the runs examined.

USE CASES

There are a number of use cases for which the corpus and topic profiles may apply. These include:

i) Apply topic model to address the needs of an industry segment

ii) Apply topic model to produce course content

iii) Apply topic model to develop an index that can be used to track performance of new companies that wish to scale

iv) Apply topic model to make explicit a particular domain (e.g. AI and ML powered remote devices for health diagnostics)

v) Apply topic model to define a part of the domain and relate the part to the other parts of the domain (see Bailetti-Tanev and Bailetti-Craigen articles in the February 2020 issue of TIM Review for examples)

vi) Apply topic model to produce course outlines

vii) Apply topic model to provide experiential learning experiences to students or practitioners

viii) Apply topic model to sharpen our understanding of a domain (e.g., Environment and Innovation noted in Category C above)

ix) Apply topic model to do research (e.g., stability of topics, user understanding of topics, keywords and assertions

x) Apply topic model to better understand the external environment (e.g., who is interested in applying AI to scale companies)

xi) Apply topic model to match buyers and sellers

xii) Apply topic model to examine takeaways

xiii) Apply topic model to examine competitive offers

xiv) Apply topic model to organize notes extracted from reading article or books

xv) use the topic model to visualize data and information

 

W-TOOL

Professor Micheal Weiss (Micheal.weiss@carleton.ca) has developed the tool we used to perform the analysis. We are very grateful for his contribution to this project.

To perform the analysis, the researchers used the W-tool, which can be found at W-tool.

To use the tool, one must submit a corpus (in this case the SERS corpus assertions); stop words (see the stop words spreadsheet) – these are words that are not meaningful to topic identification; and concepts (see the sheet denoted Concepts), where we identify phrases that capture a specific concept that we wish to highlight.

 

A.1	CROSS BORDER	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A150	Adopt scalable and agile organizational structures and processes to contract local and cross border freelance workers
		A015	Attain positions in cross border networks which provide access to privileged information
		A206	Build a financial infrastructure that supports cross border money transactions
		A023	Build operational cross border capabilities early
		A084	Coordinate, evaluate and share knowledge between headquarters, cross border units and among the units themselves
		A179	Set up internal processes to manage and arbitrage local and cross border workforces
		A300	To migrate the local, develop a replicable formula to repeat what worked in one local in many others identify dimensions describing a local and what locals can be easily migrated attract customers to invest in the development of localized offers and engage the right local people
		A290	Promote the company s achievements to date e.g., awards, high profile endorsements from established companies, sales, alliances, interactions with potential customers around prototypes strength of company s scaling mater plan and the company s potential to create local jobs, contribute to social goals and objectives, advance existing knowledge, and provide technological breakthroughs and patents
		A052	Enable locals to succeed because of new company
		A065	Improve links, interactions and shared purpose with locals in each region the company operates
		A099	Simultaneously develop global learning capabilities, cross border flexibility, and global competitiveness
		A204	Develop, validate and implement a model to cost effectively support cross border business
		A056	Enter a different geographical market by partnering with or purchasing local companies
A.2	CYBERATTACK	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0. 45	A044	Develop and implement a governance model to scale, raise capital, protect against cyberattacks, and leverages business communities	A191	Make a member of the top management team responsible for the execution of a plan to respond to large scale threats such as pandemics, economic crises and broad cyberattacks
		A283	Embed in networks with high concentrations of venture capital
		A316	To defend against automated cyberattack campaigns, apply automated detection, response and remediation
		A137	Provide investors with long term liquidity to enable distribution of funds to their capital providers
A.3	DATA	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A183	Integrate, assemble, interpret and analyze data sources so as to scale and diversify company data
		A186	Centralize data for the use of all company functions
		A188	Sell in new domains where the company assets, capabilities and data can be easily moved to create value
		A182	Use data as the foundation for how the company operates and makes decisions
		A093	Scale out, i.e., i Spread workload across more, smaller organizations ii Use less expensive resources to accommodate variable workloads iii Host data across several organizations iv Increase input output alignment v Learn faster vi Take advantage of cheaper, smaller systems and vi Improve resilience
A.4	ECOMMERCE	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0. 45	A236	Apply ecommerce to provide customers with buying options that are quick, convenient, and user friendly
		A209	Deploy efficient ecommerce technologies and automation to reduce company costs and lower prices of offers
		A046	Develop and sell offers that are hard to replicate, original, fit successful commercialization patterns, and ride an external trend
		A241	Provide vendors and suppliers with the real time analytics on views and sales required to boost their sales and profits
		A239	Attract traffic and new customers by targeting and retargeting users from search engines, referrals, adds and social media
A.5	GOVERNANCE	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0. 45	A168	As the new company grows, increase the number of external individuals that serve on its board of directors and board of advisors	A104	The top management team must commit to a scaling master plan strategy , a hierarchy and a flow of communications external and internal to the company structure , and a set of behaviors culture to achieve scaling objectives
		A155	Diversify company top management team, as well as the members of your board of directors and your board of advisors, in terms of their networks, experience raising funds and access to potential partners	A172	Before seeking funding to scale value, ensure that the company founders are prepared to relinquish control of the CEO position and or the company board of directors to new talent that will accelerate value creation
		A194	Appoint independent directors to the board of directors
		A201	Define the duration of each director to serve on the board of directors and ensure the directors hold staggered terms of office
		A197	Evaluate the performance of the board of directors periodically
		A202	Prevent conflicts between the interests of the company and the members of the board of directors
		A195	To attract and retain talented directors, focus the board of directors on company strategy
A.6	INVESTOR	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A135	Align communication with investors on company risks, opportunities, and economics for successful fundraising rounds	A153	Assess desired company valuation relative to investor valuations of similar companies
		A026	Champion the opportunity with confidence	A167	Turn to accelerators, crowdfunding, and friends and family for early stage investors
		A081	Offer investors higher returns, shorter time to payoffs and lower risks relative to other opportunities
		A166	Develop investor value propositions describing the path to value creation in return for investors funds and confidence
		A074	Maintain connections with large and varied investor networks
		A136	Increase investor participation by effectively managing regulatory uncertainty
		A164	Translate your message into values and priorities that the targeted investors can readily relate and understand
		A132	Conduct detailed due diligence when selecting investors
		A192	Act on the opportunities that exist in the midst of every crisis
		A162	Understand who your potential investors are, what they want to know, and what investment opportunities they look for before pursuing a binding agreement
		A214	Adapt company opportunities based on feedback from customers and investors
		A173	Select venture capital investors based on the fit between investor networks and experience and company need for specialization and industry knowledge
A.7	RESOURCES	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A002	Access resources required to scale at relatively low cost or for free by creating benefits for the resource owners that they cannot create alone	A005	Align interests of investors, the company top management team, and its owners
		A075	Make decisions on how to best deploy a combination of external and internal resources to create high value, not just decisions about the use of the resources the company owns, while complying with cultural, legal, regulatory, and other relevant norms	A022	Build and deploy unique and difficult to imitate skills and capabilities to select, combine, and use the resource combinations that create and capture high company value
		A305	Build resource interfaces compliant with standards to enhance compatibility with complementary resources	A055	Enforce policies and procedures for resource combination, production and coordination, information search and gathering, bargaining, and accountability
		A029	Combine company resources with those of other resource owners to create value that cannot be created by your company alone
		A027	Combine resources that make your company distinct to resource owners and pay for themselves
		A091	Provide returns that leave the most important resource owners better off than they would have if they had not contributed to the company
		A073	Maintain close relationships with resource owners that advance the core technology underpinning the most important assets of the company
		A308	Ensure that company resources and external resources are compatible and scale synergistically
		A028	Combine two or more resources to create value that exceeds the sum of the value created from each resource separately
		A144	Incorporate how high value created from selection, combination and deployment resource decisions will be distributed to resource owners into the scaling master plan
		A297	Contribute to the creation of public goods such as open source code, standards and test beds
		A110	Validate selection, combination and deployment resource decisions for scaling are complementary
		A024	Build company wide capability to combine diverse resources and deploy them in a profitable way
		A013	Arrange and apply resources from different regions early, rapidly and securely
		A012	Arrange and deploy differently existing company resources
		A086	Orchestrate a community comprised of the owners of the resources required to scale
A.8	SALES	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A278	To avoid sources of salespeople dissatisfaction with their jobs, clarify salesperson role and expectations eliminate conflicting role tasks incentivize salespeople sufficiently ensure strong leadership is in place train and support ensure role on team is a good fit to personality type and cultural imprint of person filling it	A087	Pay more attention to online sales than to physical brick and mortar store sales relative to competitors
		A261	To motivate your salespeople to perform at a high level, clarify roles and expectations for each team member make sure role and incentives don t conflict assign each salesperson objectives to grow and manage existing customer base set salesperson performance objectives based on measurable metrics under salesperson s control and compensate each salesperson with money and prizes for meeting agreed targets and objectives
		A275	Hire experienced salespeople who have personality characteristics that will win sales emotional intelligence, optimism, resilience, self drive, creativity, and humour
		A263	Observe and provide feedback on actions of salespeople to encourage improved performance
		A276	Train salespeople to increase capabilities in tactical skills, creativity, absorptive capacity, emotional intelligence, and application of applied theory
		A259	To lead the company s salespeople, embody the behaviours you wish others to adopt, motivate salespeople to perform at a high level, encourage the development of cultural norms which will enhance company performance
A.9	SECURE OFFER	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A216	Seek partners to accelerate scaling, expand company offers, and provide access to new revenue sources	A003	Adapt offers to each market
		A038	Continuously train individuals in cybersecurity to i Improve cybersecurity operations and ii Positively contribute to the company cybersecurity culture	A060	Evolve channels from platforms, to directly sell and then use agents
		A101	To start a business, create an offer to solve a specific problem in a specific market segment, ensure that the offer fits the market, and validate that your business model is scalable and profitable	A080	Provide a variety of complementary offers to each market
		A010	Apply processes that make offers easier to understand, produce and deliver	A096	Sell online using a variety of online and offline promotional channels
		A145	Expand information about the company, its offers, its achievements, and its affiliations	A097	Sell offers that the target market perceives better than available alternatives
		A271	Instill a sense of purpose by pursuing a compelling vision for the company in the future	A108	Use scientific and technological advances to develop innovative offers
		A314	To heighten cybersecurity, apply zero trust frameworks	A147	Broaden company offers
		A032	Concurrently sell existing company offers, a compelling image of the company that will exist in the future, and the benefits of the unique information you collect	A218	Introduce new offers often, monitor changes in sales closely, and remove offers that do not sell quickly
		A009	Apply processes that continuously improve the cybersecurity of the company as well as its offers, channels, and resources	A219	Configure online and offline channels as complementing assets
		A102	Strengthen cybersecurity attributes of offers compared to competitors	A296	Use cultural tools and identity claims such as images, symbols, and language to strengthen company s image
				A301	To disseminate the global, increase communications with global agents, and learn from global agents how to improve the global offer
				A310	Ensure offers are scalable and meet rigorous reliability metrics
				A034	Continuously improve individuals, operations and infrastructures to advance and deliver a portfolio of innovative offers
				A112	Work with partners that are well connected and respected in the networks of importance to the success of the company
				A244	Constantly increase average order value through discounted bundles, enable upsell on check out, set a free delivery threshold, offer cash backs, enhance personalized recommendations, and create loyalty programs based on spending tiers
				A311	Provide platforms that are client centric and highly customizable
				A317	Operate a platform that is simple to use, attracts a very large market, and enables the company to control the quality of the offers traded on the platform
				A319	Use platforms and software that can cost effectively enable your company to scale early and rapidly without losing control of your operations, marketing, and development programs
				A321	Enable partners to leverage your company s platform to make money
				A016	Attain stakeholder trust by improving cybersecurity of the company and its partners
				A320	Use data obtained from third party platforms to adjust your company s offers
A.10	SCALING MASTER PLAN	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A011	Appoint a talented person as chief scale officer to champion the scaling master plan
		A268	Adopt technology that allows you to identify, assimilate, transform, and manage external knowledge that directly aligns with scaling master plan outcomes
		A148	Hire scale experienced talented people to build capabilities to design and implement the scaling master plan
		A063	Hire scale experienced talented people to implement the scaling master plan
		A092	Relentlessly advance the scaling master plan even if employees and processes get in the way
		A077	Prioritize the preparation and implementation of the scaling master plan
		A089	Prepare a scaling master plan in the initial stages of the company lifecycle
		A047	Develop capabilities to cost effectively attain scaling master plan objectives
		A062	Hire talented people who have diverse thinking preferences
		A069	Lead a team that is innovative, talented, diverse, focused, committed, and fully understands what their responsibilities are and where they fit in with scaling master plan
		A078	Manage cross border units as operations that are interdependent in terms of information, investment and efficiencies and guided by the scaling master plan
		A072	Leverage resources from scale experienced talented people and gain their commitment to the company s scaling master plan
		A067	Incorporate investment in cybersecurity into the scaling master plan
A.11	STAKEHOLDER	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A286	Establish partnerships that increase the demand for products that complement the company s product	A045	Develop and sell products and services that address a problem, job to be done or a need that is widespread, growing, important, urgent, and manifests itself in diverse ways
		A138	Implement a stakeholder centric approach to satisfy stakeholder expectations in all markets	A307	Simplify the complementarity of the company products and services
				A154	Select stakeholders with many connections to potential partnerships, and experience across industries, technology, and scaling company value early
				A030	Communicate and demonstrate the importance the company places on the security of information acquired from and transferred between stakeholders
				A124	Continuously create new markets and serve broader stakeholder needs
				A306	Focus on company differentiators and build upon complementary products that satisfy company needs and are not part of the company competencies
				A225	Protect trade secrets by ensuring all company stakeholders are aware that it is forbidden to disclose or misuse company trade secrets
				A178	Enable freelance workers to become world class service providers
				A238	Provide customers an online catalog with detailed descriptions of offered products and services that helps them make purchasing decisions
				A245	Increase order fulfillment and delivery capacity through partnering with third party service providers and acquiring drop shipping facilities
				A008	Apply digital technology to brand, market, sell, and service customers more cost effectively than competitors
				A057	Expand brand coverage and eliminate intermediaries
				A220	Build a community around company brand, products and services, assemble community feedback and adapt
				A281	Brand the company and build the brand into one that has a strong market presence
A.12	VALUE PROPOSITION	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A122	Develop value propositions for key members of the value chain that align with key members value propositions as well as improve the competence of the value chain	A085	Optimize the value chain to reduce inventory costs to zero
		A240	Engage customers to produce testimonials, reviews and ratings that help new customers to make purchasing decisions with knowledge of other customers experiences	A103	Strengthen your company bargaining position among the members of the value chain upon which the company depends to scale
		A213	Adapt value propositions to changes in customer segments	A176	Unbundle the value chain and the jobs to be done within it to outsource lower value tasks to freelance workers and perform higher value tasks internally
		A106	Use an end to end solution that links procurement directly with end customers to eliminate or reduce inventory and the number of intermediaries between the company and customers
		A141	Collaborate with the company value chain to determine optimal offers that achieve customer fulfillment and enhance customer value
		A277	Train salespeople to absorb actionable market information, understand customers and competitors business models craft irresistible value propositions communicate customer value identify high value customers increase situational awareness use supportive technology learn from personal and team successes and failures and adapt to dynamic selling situations think on your feet
		A260	To embody behaviours you wish others to adopt, dedicate a portion of each day to grow customer base and actively search for new opportunities, focus efforts and conversations on how the company is going to create and deliver value to new and existing customers, craft irresistible customer value propositions that you and your salespeople can use to attract new customers, and set specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely objectives SMART that align company, customer, investor and partner interests and skills
		A042	Constantly monitor customers buying habits and deliver offers that are convenient, cater to customer demands, are secure and offer excellent customer experience
		A257	Customize ideal next steps to coordinate activities between new company and customer
		A280	Digitize as much of your company as you can to create value for customers, reduce costs, and increase security
		A118	Develop value propositions for employees that enhance employee satisfaction, psychological attachment, and behavioral commitment toward your company
		A284	Deliver better performance on the metrics that customers care about
		A041	Define the ideal target customers profiles and engage them relentlessly
		A036	Continuously improve value propositions based on results and feedback
		A246	Establish trust and positive rapport with your customers that leads to long term, mutually beneficial business relationships
		A025	Build internet based capabilities to acquire and retain customers during the initial stages of company lifecycle
		A127	Learn from value propositions of companies that have scaled early, rapidly and securely and use them to differentiate your company
		A274	Attract great people with high customer and high growth orientation
		A249	Always think from your customers perspective organizationally and personally
		A256	Listen to your customers, take their feedback seriously, and adjust operations as needed
		A253	Adjust your mood to match your customers moods and work to find common ground to build familiarity
		A131	Track changes in stakeholders value propositions and use the information to realign the value propositions
Category B
B.1	ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
	> 0.50	A304	Apply big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence to generate predictive analytics and enhance automation	A312	Apply big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence to infer cyberattack campaigns from cyberattack components
		A303	Enhance cybersecurity automation by using big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence	A177	Leverage automation artificial intelligence and large pool of freelance workers to increase productivity
		A180	Build company value using an artificial intelligence powered decision making factory
B.2	INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY	CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
				A223	Acquire, monitor and exploit intellectual property rights
				A230	To claim ownership of unregistered intellectual property rights, prove the rights exist and belong to the company
				A231	Trace ownership of company intellectual property
				A224	Consider selling or licensing the companys intellectual property
				A227	Internationalize your intellectual property
				A228	Actively manage and review company intellectual property
Category C
C.1	Capital Market		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
C.2	Early funding		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
C.3	Environment		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
C.4	Innovation		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
C.5	Platform		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS
C.6	Resource Combination		CORE ASSERTIONS		ELABORATING ASSERTIONS