Chasing the idea

Greetings to you, Habr. In this article I would like to give a few paragraphs of the text to such a relevant, today, topic as start-ups (I think the time is not far off when this very word will become synonymous with something indecent). But even this is not all. I dare to encroach on the most holy for a startup, his initial idea. I will try to understand whether it is worth at least something, and whether there is any method that is not very dependent on emotions, so that there is an opportunity to work constructively with these ideas.

Much of what I’m going to talk about will be similar to the captain’s revelations, and some statements may perhaps seem edifying to someone (although I didn’t want it in any way). I ask readers to treat the text condescendingly, because all that you read below, just a statement of the author's thoughts out loud on the topic, and nothing more.
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Literally, in every publication related to the topic of startups, it is said that the idea is worth nothing. To some extent, this is true. But I noticed that many people understand this phrase too negatively. In my opinion, here it means that “bare idea”, no matter how good it is, does not cost anything for the investor, or someone else, only in an isolated form. But it’s quite another thing when there is an idea and there are people who are ready to do everything for its realization. If there is a talented person among them, the idea can change very, very much, and if you work hard, you can find a lot of facts in world history confirming this. Agree, rather compelling reasons.

So, I hope, I was able to convince you that the idea + author, together, at least something, is worth it. Now it remains the case for small, choose among the hundreds and thousands of their own ideas one single. The one on which you can put everything, for the sake of which it is not terrible to leave work and take a loan by laying (your own!) Apartment or car. And here the problems begin.

Problem of choice

Observing at various start-ups for the performances of the children, with burning eyes telling today about the discount aggregator, which naturally has no analogues, and tomorrow, with the same eyes, about the fifth-generation social network, I thought that such a problem exists only in us . But, as it turned out, I was mistaken, surprised to read about throwing teams between ideas and a cardinal change of presentations at the last moment, before the speeches, in the exemplary Paul Graham Y-combinator. What to say about others.

Thus, we come to the important question, are there any methodologies in order to at least sort out our own ideas, based on some regularities and facts, and not just on the subject of emotions? And is it possible to use all this to finally make an important “first step” towards the implementation of the best of ideas? Based on, let it be on illusory, but still reasons for its prospects, and not rushing about every day in doubt. Actually, everything that follows below is an attempt to present one of the variants of such a system to the public.

Components of the idea

For the first time, the idea to decompose the “startup idea” into components and select the most important of them came to my mind when I read this article . Some clever guys took the concepts of two rather popular projects, Pinterest and Instagram, and put them together in one, creating their own Pinstagram.

It makes no sense to talk about assessing the success of this project. Also, let's not talk about the win-win concept of “rethinking” of Western startups, which many of our IT entrepreneurs sin on, this is not about that. It is important that the Pinstagram unexpectedly turned out to be an example of the organic synthesis of two components, let them and “a little” borrowed. What is “organic synthesis”?

For as long as I can remember, I always liked metaphors. And in this context, there are several options for how to portray the idea of ​​a startup. For example, you can portray it as a recipe for soup. There are always some basic components in the soup, without which it is impossible in principle (for example, water or broth), there are basic elements that can be very different, and there are spices, which, despite their scanty share in relation to the total mass, radically affect on the end result. And most importantly, even when adding the right ingredients (quality products), but in the wrong combination, it may turn out that no one wants to eat your soup, because she will come out tasteless.

Assuming the remoteness of the audience of this resource from the culinary theme, you can offer another metaphor, where the start-up will no longer be a cook, but a kind of experimental geneticist. He can lay in the DNA of a new organism (his future startup) various genes with certain properties (for example, the resistance gene or the virality gene). But no matter how cool the genes are laid at the beginning, they may not fit together well, and as a result, the body will not have a chance to survive.

These metaphors well show the importance of precisely deliberate connection of smaller parts from a certain set into something more. But after some thought, I decided to use an even simpler image, where the synthesis of ideas for a startup seems to be a collection of a certain puzzle. From a large number of pieces we are trying to collect a meaningful picture using various means, such as sequential search, and, in some cases, a file. Small pieces can be combined into larger fragments, however, if as a result, these fragments do not converge among themselves, they will have to be reassembled and reassembled in a new way.

So, in my opinion, there are 6 essential components that any idea of ​​the future super-project should contain. Consider each of them in detail.

Trends

Why did I decide to start with them? Probably because, if figuratively speaking, before starting to do anything at all, it is better to look around first. Trend is not just a fashion trend or a beautiful wrap, as many think. Trends also show the relevance of technology in the market, trends and willingness to take your decision to the audience at the initial stage. Knowledge of the main trends (and the reasons for their occurrence) can be attributed to preliminary market research, but in a more generalized form.

Probably, inspired by board games, I drew a number of cards with trends (if you are interested, I can lay out the whole set), which you can print and cut out, it is quite interesting to use, both for brainstorming in splendid isolation, and for entertainment with friends at lunchtime break.

Problem

Go ahead. The presence of a solvable problem is the most important component of a startup. It is a pity that this is so often forgotten. If there is no problem, then why would someone use your product at all? Someone will say that his product does not seem to solve any problems, but simply better than analogs, or cheaper. But the fact that it is better in some ways means that competitors are worse in some ways, which means their users already have a problem, but cannot yet formulate it. It is important that you can do it for them.

In my opinion, in the field of startups, problems should be divided according to the criterion of “pain” (user-critical). The “harder” you choose a problem, the more success your startup can expect in the future, however, for a complex problem it is not so easy to find a solution, you are not the only one so clever. And there is no definite answer, because whether the choice of a problem is correct or incorrect depends critically on the quality of the solution received, on your competence and resources (for more details, see p. solution).

I will also write a few words about the features of a “technical mentality”, or why, in my opinion, the leading part of successful startups is created and managed by former techies. What is so special about the technical way of thinking? I think the point is not even that such thinking is more subordinate to logic, but that techies are taught to solve problems all their lives by the method of analysis (decomposition) and synthesis (association). With this approach, unsolvable problems do not exist in principle, I seriously, because Any global problem can be divided into smaller components, and already work with them. And in order to avoid possible meaningless holivars, I would note that in terms of communication and other social interactions, where logic is more important than empathy, i.e. susceptibility to other people's emotions, the humanist will make a techie like a kitten (alas). And this, by the way, depends not so much on the sphere of education, but simply on the dominant type of thinking, logical or emotional.

I digress from the topic. Why, in fact, I started talking about the types of thinking? Moreover, when searching and researching problems, there is nothing more important than analysis, i.e., as mentioned above, decomposition into smaller components. Of course, bright insights light up most often unexpectedly (for example, as the appearance of “relationship status” was shown for facebook in the notorious movie “Fincher’s Social Network”), but certainly not from scratch.

I think that a good training in the ability to analyze problems, for laying into the initial idea of ​​a startup, will be an attempt to analyze problems solved or not by well-known companies. As well as their components. Here are a couple of the roughest examples in the form of a simplified piece of mindndap.



A little more about the Path , Pair , Airtime , Badoo , Color .

Decision

From the analysis of the problem and taking into account the current current trends in the world, it is logical to follow one or several solutions. Most likely, the decision will be preliminary first. Over time and in the process of working on the implementation, it may change beyond recognition, become simpler and more elegant, or, on the contrary, more complicated and confusing.

It is also worth noting such an important parameter of any decision as its “fullness”, which shows the degree of usefulness of the solution to the “pain” of the user. After that, you can roughly estimate the ratio: the importance of the problem is the completeness of the solution. And it can often come out that a complete solution to the problem of sorting collections of photos with cats will turn out to be more viable and better for business than, say, a very superficial solution of such global problems as the global economic crisis or frailty of human life.

It is also important when looking for a solution to clearly represent your target audience, its interests and desires. Whether they want to use your decision, whether it is well suited for them, how much your virtual thinking model of a potential target audience corresponds to the real thinking of the audience. Different smart marketers advise to conduct all sorts of polls and focus groups from representatives of Central Asia, although they also say that trusting the results is also not particularly worth it. In any case, I think it will not hurt to get a few representatives of potential users in their environment, to describe to them their own solution to their problem and find out what they think about it.

Competence

Now you can talk about the three components, inextricably linked with the personality of the author Ideas. It is because of the presence of these components, a naked idea is worth nothing, and most likely, therefore, no one will steal it (or even, in the case of theft, it simply zafeit).

Let's start with the competence. Most often, this concept means only experience in the chosen professional field. But, in my opinion, this is not quite the correct definition. Imagine a person who has worked for 20 years in the banking sector, in an office he hated, but at the same time, from his very childhood in his spare time collecting model aircraft of the Second World War. In which area is his competence and knowledge more? In the field, which he worked for a long time, but which he does not like and is not interested in, or in his favorite hobby? Of course, the ideal option is when the professional sphere and the sphere of interests coincide, but this happens less often. And in general, the sphere of interests is most often broader than professional.

In other words, I mean that it is more logical to invent a startup in those areas that you are interested in, and an ideal option in which you also understand well that partly (and sometimes strongly) already imposes restrictions on the areas for finding problems and available making.

Also, besides the formal definition of the area of ​​your interests and knowledge of skills in the profile specialty, it would be good to think in advance what roles you can take on when implementing the chosen idea, especially at the initial stage. And the more you hold your “multiclass”, the better. The more the idea of ​​a chance to survive and turn into something more.

Resources

Resources are not only free cash on your card, although they, of course, also. In this case, resources mean generally everything that you have and that can be useful for the implementation of the chosen idea.

Are there a couple of familiar programmers or a designer, ready to help with a prototype for friendship or for a beer? Or maybe there is a free room, which at first can be used as an office? A familiar banker, connections with important people, a couple of unnecessary computers, and a router, mother, ready to sit with children, if they exist, and feed your employees ... All this is a valuable resource. Finally, a couple of the most important ones are your free time and your skills.

The above things are meant as positive resources, but do not forget that there are resources with a minus sign, and they should also be taken into account. Payments on a mortgage ten years in advance or a loan for a new car will not give you, just like that, quit the main job and plunge headlong into the realization of your dream. As well as payment for rental housing or alimony ex-wife. Poor health and stenocardia will not allow you to work non-stop for 18 hours for a long time, and children running around will not allow you to concentrate if you work at home.

With what sign will be the result of adding “having free time for a project” and “having a money resource from working in an office”? Most often, the answer will be individual, for each specific case.

Thus, assessing the available resources, you can make adjustments to the plan for the implementation of the idea, including the decision itself. Having no experience in attracting large investments, you should not count on them. So, ideas like: “We are building a spacecraft, flying to planet X, collecting diamond blocks there, going back to Earth, Profit!”, Immediately fall away.

What do I want?

And here we got to the last paragraph with a strange wording. But he is the last, not because unimportant. On the contrary, I would say that he is the most important of all. The only problem is that the right answer is quite difficult to find, and in some cases it may be more difficult than even launching a successful startup.

In principle, you can start the implementation without this item, limiting (for the time being) to the classic: “I want to be rich and famous”. The only request on my part to think, perhaps, this phrase will sound better in the formulation: “I want people like me to be rich and famous”. Agree, because the meaning of the original wording is 100% contained in the new version. But plus to this, now here contains something else, perhaps, more important.

In general, in fact, the ideal formulation of the last component of the Idea (and the first in importance) should sound: “What do I want to change in the world?”. So it turns out that any our action, every accidentally abandoned word, changes the world, in one direction or another. Whether we like it or not. The difference is only in scale. But, if we want to build something really big and global, it would be good to understand in advance why we build this big.

If you still do not be lazy and, having rummaged well in yourself, you will really find the answer to this question for yourself, I guarantee you will not regret the time spent. This, like, unexpectedly found on the road, armor of the A-class, like, free buff of maximum level and long action, like ... well, you understand :) For a person who knows what he wants, there are no failures or failures, but only corrections in terms of and valuable experience points.

I have it all. I wish everyone good luck in implementing their own mega-projects. And in conclusion, I note only that in reality it is not difficult to change the world. It is more difficult to change it so that later it would not be a shame. Remember this.