Incubators, accelerators, innovation centers and launch platforms, are all names for trying to take a dream from head and heart to the bank.
If we ask 20 leaders what will determine success, we may get 100 different answers.
For years the answer was “have a great business plan with a strong financial model and that will get you funding.” Funding gets the capital to hire “A” players and “A” players focused on executing that great business plan all but assures success.
When that did not create the expected success, the world decided highly structured business plans need innovation. Classes, books, and business models sprung up to institutionalize innovation to inspire the front end of the business plan. Some creative teams combined business plans, innovation, and agile tools to cover all the bases.
With those additions, the results were pretty much the same. Some companies were successful and most were not.
Today, the solution for failing entrepreneurs is to “pivot”. Every week we read or talk to those in incubators or accelerators who are struggling and they declare that the struggle is over and they are on the edge of success based on their planned pivot.
This pivot is the result of the lack of success, which declares there is a new direction required and with additional funding this direction will certainly bring success. But if it doesn’t, it will surely lead to another pivot, which will point to the final steps to success.
In almost all cases, those that survive with a chance to succeed over the long-term, exhibit a focused discipline that solves a specific customer problem. This focus on a specific customer problem allows them to apply a continuous improvement discipline that charts the constantly changing course to success.
There can be no continuous improvement discipline without a fixed focus, which is the customer problem in need of solution. That focused discipline takes advantage of the learnings from the market, the technology, and the business conditions.
Not only does that discipline support the entrepreneur’s survival and growth, but in today’s fast changing world that is the key to long-term success for all businesses.
Certainly, some entrepreneurs say pivot and mean continuous improvement but most mean:
I didn’t have a customer problem to solve, but I had a great idea for a product (first shiny object) that I was sure someone would buy. But no one wanted to buy that so I am going to pivot to a new cool product (second shiny object) that someone will buy.
Customers are the only valid metrics of business ideas, which entrepreneurs only consider after the Bright Shiny Object (if at all). When customers do pivot to a bright shiny object, they don’t stay long since there is little or no value behind the shine.
How about we all stop “pivoting” to a new shiny object and we do the one thing that will let new or old companies succeed. How about we focus on solving customer problems and continuously improving how we do that?
That is what I am going to do – how about you?
Upcoming Revenue Science™ Certification Classes:
Coming in the Fall of 2017