When you start a new business you can fall into one of two categories. You can operate on the premise that you must be right first time or that you will rarely be right fist time, but you will use your initial decision as a marker dart for incremental improvement. This is the fundamental paradigm of strategic construction for start-ups. This is the DNA which your planning is built on.
There are so many factors in determining which category entrepreneurs fall into. Social and educational backgrounds are important along with personal philosophy. Another major factor is culture bleed from an entrepreneur’s previous workplace. This is perfectly natural, but in the context of new start-ups can be damaging. A culture that has evolved in the ecosystem of a multinational company will most likely be sub optimal in a start-up setting. It’s like a fish out of water.
A fundamental difficulty with the “right first time mentality” is that there is a significant danger of paralysis by analysis. In today’s fast moving world an over emphasis is placed on stand alone scientific market research. However, in some cases where the purchase of expensive stock or when there is a requirement for a large initial capital investment such research is indeed needed. Conversely, in the context of web based/software development start-ups if you have the coding skills in house you can develop and promote you product and do market research hand in hand. This is known as Organic Market research.
Making incremental improvements is an essential function of start-ups. In my opinion, it’s by far a better approach to strategic planning. You cannot learn from failure fast enough with the “right first time” approach. You are likely to give up too soon. However, if you accept that you will probably need to make a number of iterations for each of your decisions before they work, you have scope to learn from specific failures and build them into you future decision making process.
You can only truly learn by letting your decisions play out in the real world. Therefore, the best way to develop as a business owner is to adopt the incremental improvement philosophy.
Remember, you are not compartmentalized. Your product development, operations and marketing are all integrated.
Find out in more detail how you can undertake organic market research while simultaneously developing and promoting your product here. It’s important to remember that as a start-up entrepreneur your time and resources are limited. So therefore, you must focus on the most effective methods of getting results. You can achieve success by making incremental improvements over time with the added benefit of having a head start in the traction race on competitors that may be following the “right first time” approach.