It starts with Energy and not an Idea.
Hassan BinJamil ????
Founder 44NorthTech | Optimizing Inventory & Asset Visibility Multiple Items at a Time | RFID
Sometimes ideas are held on to for too long, they are perceived as prized possessions and never exposed to the outside world to be critiqued. This is a notion that makes growth and scalability inevitably impossible for entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs. Let us look at the dynamics of ideas vs execution.
The birth of an idea is never inherent, it is but a reflection of society, circumstances, culture, economics and the world around us. Pie chart below from Capshare breaks it up nicely. https://www.capshare.com/blog/startup-ideas/. Based on these facts it is conclusive to say that an open mind and a watchful eye, will always absorb ideas and a smart brain will shape and polish them. It is needless to say we should stop running like electrons around the same nucleus trying to give 'birth' to the next big idea, because there is no such thing as the 'next big idea'.
If there is nothing such as the 'next big idea' then what makes the garage startups scale, tech unicorn grow and corporations bloom into economies bigger than countries. The answer is execution. There is a lot of great articles, a simple search on google titled, 'failure of companies & ideas vs execution' will swamp your screen with failures due to lack of execution. I will thus not list them here, but touch on three factors that I feel define 'execution':
- Plan: A business plan that evolves like a log book. I know we all probably think we made a 'kick-ass' business plan the first time around. This notion is even more reinforced if that plan raises funding. But we have to remember to evolution is inevitable. Keep changing that plan, keep logging the things that worked and the things that failed. It will grow into a your own business personal manual, that will guide where memory fails, in times of pressure and in times of growth.
- Attitude: Be customer centric and be ready to take steps to prove that. Do not sell or build what you want, build or sell what the customer wants. Before you budget a big office or payroll or product packaging or marketing, setup customer service standards. Establish channels of how your customers can talk to you, give you feedback and reach you when they need you.
- Minimalism: Be ready to lose it all and strip down. It is ok if you made it to a big office and that great 'scarface' management table. But remember the goal is to survive to execute. Execute what your business manual says to stay customer centric and make money while doing it.
#innovation #management #creativity #technology #future #markets #entrepreneurship #startups #careers #venturecapital #economy #leanstartups
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5 年I love the point about minimalism. I read sometime ago that "Done is better than perfect" and I've implemented this nugget of startup advice in everything I do. Great article and I hope you keep writing more!?
Director Digital HR at Chalhoub Group I Digital HR Transformation Leader I HR Technology & Transformation Expert
5 年Nice read Hassan ????
Founder 44NorthTech | Optimizing Inventory & Asset Visibility Multiple Items at a Time | RFID
5 年Jeffrey Krause? thank you for the insightful comment, the point on 'patent-system' totally agreed. The example of jet-ski and Kawasaki is great, so if the marketing burden and a loss of 13 years was not thought of in the execution plan, or never got included into the execution plan at any time then the idea to drive a bike over water was useless. Most startups and entrepreneurs or even corporations do not do that and as a result execution is reactive rather than planned.? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jeffrey Krause VP, GizzMoVest LLC, Co-Founder, SeaBotix Inc.. 36 Years Designing Commercial Products. EVA Cases Made in the USA As a product development consultant for 37 years have learned 3 basic things: 1. On average, there is probably nothing less valuable than a new idea. 2. The most-abused and divisive idea was the patent system. 3. Perseverance is much more valuable than either one of these. Fundamentally a real need for the idea must exist. And the idea must cost 1/3rd (or less) than what it's perceived value is to the buyer. Many entrepreneurs see a more complete need/value in their idea than what the potential buyer does. This does not necessarily mean the entrepreneur is wrong. Often it simply means the potential buyers don't understand the true value; And that the marketing cost of educating the buyer may be too high. When Kawasaki was marketing the world's first truly mass-produced PWC, they almost pulled the plug on the 'Jet Ski' due to low sales in the early years. However they stuck with it anyway and eventually 13 years later Yamaha entered the same market. It is likely that Kawasaki executives were actually relieved that Yamaha had chosen to share the marketing burden (cost of buyer education). It took the marketing power of TWO multi-national corporations to raise buyer confidence to create the huge PWC industry that we know today.
Digitial Transformation | Demand Management | Applications Development | Applications Support
5 年Good read Hassan....