There are 3 phases of an entrepreneur (3 Cs): Creator, Critic, and Crusader.
I learned this insight from Daniel Lubetzky, the founder of Kind Bars while watching Shark Tank some time ago.
The insight was so crisp and clear that it stuck with me.
Recently I shared it with a friend who’s a co-founder at a startup, so thought I should share it with a larger audience.
Let’s understand what are these 3 phases:
In the “Creative” phase, entrepreneurs are in the creative mindset – brainstorming, ideating, and then creating a solution for the problem they have been facing for a while.
In the “Critic” phase, entrepreneurs need to be the biggest critic of their idea, execution, plan, etc. They need to play devil’s advocate and try to poke holes in their vision, plan, or execution in order to create the best product and company.
IMO, this is one of the most important phases, but most entrepreneurs miss it.
And in the “Crusader” phase, entrepreneurs have a solid plan and execution, so they can be passionate crusaders of their cause to create a movement.
While this was shared in the context of entrepreneurship, I believe we can apply this perspective to pretty much all professions.
You can be an engineer, a salesperson, a marketer, or a leader – we all need to evolve through these 3 phases.
We all need to be creative to identify problems in our environment and come up with unique solutions.
We need to be the best critic of ourselves to make sure our plan and execution are strong.
And then eventually we all need to be a crusader to influence people to follow our cause and plan.
Hope this would help you identify in which phase you’re in, and it becomes a guiding post, what’s your next phase is going to be.
Aditya Kothadiya 