business-plan, idea, young-entrepreneursI have a problem which I am sure lot of other entrepreneurs would have: I like too many idea.
Every now and then I like some product ideas and want to pursue that. How can I evaluate and stay on course of the right idea, without getting distracted?
Can someone please share their experience dealing with similar problem?
Thanks!
One element to entrepreneurship is the development of cash flow to fund other opportunities and pursue passions.
consider short listing your ideas into products that would have the least research / development / marketing and ongoing production costs with the best market space opportunity (least number of competitors) and the highest return once at market.
You might have to do a little pre research on a few ideas first to gain the real cost of set-up and ongoing.
using your existing resources is also needed to be considered for example any family, friends, existing business relationships or your own experiences and knowledge base that can help get a particular idea to market.
if your a professional wood turner with a great wood product and also have a great computer science problem solving product idea, you might find it cheaper and quicker to get the wood product to market using existing resources (then fund the research for any other ideas).
Another consideration - if pursuing many ideas(or a very short list), is keeping them closely related where you can share resources for example suppliers, knowledge base, experts, marketing channels, accountant etc.
It is possible to work on a few product ideas as the same time, imagine a company entity offering one of your products - and answer the question does any other product ideas fit into the market space the company fills?
You might end up with a company concept with 20 product ideas - then head back to step 1 - get the cheapest ideas to market first.
One method I used for my own start-up (battling the same issue of too many ideas) was commit to my own passions in the fields of socio-technology, founded the company and any ideas that fall in these areas I consider, any other ideas, I have accepted to let go, or even pass onto others that do have the resources to pursue this also becomes a valuable network building exercise.
Regarding distraction, no matter what, only you as an entrepreneur are responsible for your actions including taking responsibility for your action right now. For me nearly every minute of each day can become a distraction.
The biggest investment with the highest returns in my company, and I will always encourage others to do the same. Is accessing mentoring, life and business coaching. It is this stream of support that maintains my direct line of fire when it come to staying on track.
if there are any costs to to the above support lines then it goes directly into the business plan. Mentoring is as important as your accountant or any other staff and human resources.
There is not enough time, money, human resources - there is not enough anything to do all you can imagine. And this is good. Read "Embrace contraints" from 37signals.
What is the best technique for running? One foot in front of the other. If you want to run, don't go months researching how to run. Start doing something. If you can move an inch you can move a mile (replace for centimeters and kilometers if you are not in USA). Just start making something.
Implementations do. Read the essay about ideas for startups from Paul Graham.
Set big goals. And set smaller goals for every day. Follow your plans, do whatever you have decided to do. Put your toe in the water before jumping in the pool - test, learn, rinse, repeat. And work hard. Like really hard.
Companies are build around focus in culture and goals. There’s a big difference here with ideas: hospitals have a goal to cure people and the police has the goal to make the world a bit less criminal. A company is nothing more than a bunch of people that share those goals and culture.
Actually knowing your goals and culture and relentlessly pushing into that direction means that you will probably achieve that goal. Knowing your goals ensures you have a good story to your customers, enough energy and motivation to relentlessly pursue it (regardless if everything goes to plan) and it will help you push away things that don’t matter.
Like living beings, companies can also die. It’s pretty easy, if noone cares about your goals, or if you execute stuff badly, people won’t be willing to invest, help or buy your products. Cash flow will bleed out your company. Simply put, that means the company will die.
Now, of course your goal can be to just mess around and have a lot of fun. If you explain that goal to a potential customer, imagine how he would respond. At that point, you should consider not pursueing it as a company but as a hobby instead. Or.. you can pursue it as a company, figure out some way to translate it to your customers, knowing that it will probably not make you rich, but you will have a lot of fun - which basically means you are achieving your goals.
Why I push back on money as key motivator is that I believe that companies that have money as a goal is a recipe for disaster. Imagine how a customer feels if you tell him you just want to get X euro, because you want to get rich? Imagine telling an candidate that he’s going to have to work hard because you want to get rich? Imagine how much energy remains in your company when you’re idea isn’t selling too well? Can you imagine how many nasty political games will be played for personal gain? In all cases you’re company isn’t going anywhere.
On the other hand, if the goal of your company is to help the people in Greece by forming and executing good ideas, you’ve got yourself a great story, a model for creativity, if something doesn’t work out you will still stand strong and hiring people will be a piece of cake because everyone wants to do the right thing. Success will also get a different meaning. You’ll be succesful if you help the people, and more succesful if it’s more significant. And most important, it’s all about how to solve problems (including funding) in a creative way.
You can even have this goal to help people out by making proof-of-concepts of brilliant ideas. Idealab does this, and uses a trackrecord and some pretty good execution to make it worth the while for their ‘customers’. Again, note the distinction between goal and idea.
So, to conclude. No-one cares about your ideas. We care about the goals (potential execution) and the execution. If you intrinsically want to pursue a goal, you need all the creativity you’re going to get to get there. Distract from your goal, and you will go nowhere, and your company will die.
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