Archive for December 5th, 2007
The Startup’s Foggy Journey
It’s super foggy here in Silicon Valley today. I really mean it. It was "super" foggy in the morning. While driving to the office, I couldn’t even see what’s ahead of 0.1 mile. You just won’t know what’s coming to you next – is it a left turn, or a stop sign or a traffic light. I was sure about the destination I wanted to reach, but the path was blurry and foggy. The good part was that, the road to my office was known to me. So I could take necessary precautions based on daily experience of driving on that road. All I focussed on every next 0.1 mile. And step by step, I reached to the office.
This reminded me a classic situation – A first time entrepreneur’s startup journey. Isn’t it also a Super Foggy journey?
You know where you want to land up, or what you want to become or what you want to build as a long term product. In short, you know your destination. But you are totally clueless about the journey. It’s blurry. Sometimes you don’t know what’s coming to you – a U turn, a stop sign, an ultimate dead end or bright sun rays. Anything is possible.
The tricky part for first time entrepreneurs is that, the path to their startup’s success is not well traveled as well, like it was for me in my driving situation. For them, journey becomes more challenging, and probably more exciting.
So all it remains in our hand is, to focus on next 0.1 mile. Drive step by step. On every step, look, plan and work for the next step’s destination. And ultimately, reach to the final destination. That’s how I will travel on this path.
What do you think? Do you think the startup’s journey is a foggy one? What approach you would use to travel it then? Your thoughts will be useful to make a first timer’s startup journey a successful one.
