There is no single right answer or path forward, but there is one right way to frame the problem.
Clayton M. ChristensenRead
No idea for a new growth business ever comes fully shaped. When it emerges, it's half-baked, and it then goes through a process of becoming fully shaped.
Interpretation
New business ideas are often incomplete and require refinement over time.
This quote emphasizes that innovative business concepts are rarely perfect when they first appear. Instead, they often begin as rough ideas that need to be developed, tested, and refined through various stages until they achieve their full potential. This process highlights the importance of perseverance, adaptability, and continual improvement in the entrepreneurial journey.
In practice
During a startup pitch, use this quote to illustrate the importance of iteration in business ideas.
There is no single right answer or path forward, but there is one right way to frame the problem.
Understanding motivation is one of the most important things we can do in our lives, because it has such a bearing on why we do the things we do and whether we enjoy them or not.
Companies, in fact, are specifically organized to under-invest in disruptive innovations! This is one reason why we often suggest that companies set up separate teams or groups to commercialize disruptive innovations. When disruptive innovations have to fight with other innovations for resources, they tend to lose out.
There is no evidence that success in business will make us happy people or allow us to have happy families.
By definition, big data cannot yield complicated descriptions of causality. Especially in healthcare. Almost all of our diseases occur in the intersections of systems in the body.
The breakthrough innovations come when the tension is greatest and the resources are most limited. That's when people are actually a lot more open to rethinking the fundamental way they do business.
All business proceeds on beliefs, or judgments of probabilities, and not on certainties.
The antidote to inequality is equality. The question is how do you achieve equality? I believe that, for business, which is where I can speak, we have to shift from shareholder maximization to stakeholder maximization.
A good idea for a new business tends not to occur in isolation, and often the window of opportunity is very small. So speed is of the essence.
Starbucks is not an advertiser; people think we are a great marketing company, but in fact we spend very little money on marketing and more money on training our people than advertising.
The business world worships mediocrity. Officially we revere free enterprise, initiative and individuality. Unofficially we fear it.
My own view is that every company requires a long-term view.
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