When Perfection Kills Momentum
A cautionary tale about perfection and a fax machine:
I had breakfast the other day with my father in law.
I recently left my extremely secure well paying career as a cop and he wants to make sure I’m on the right track. Can’t blame him.
During our breakfast, he told me a true story of a neighbor he had years ago that hit home on multiple fronts.
==The story==:
20+ years ago, my father in law had a neighbor (let’s call him Bob) that had a wild idea for a revolutionary fax machine.
Bob also had a full time job. But Bob wanted to go all in… who doesn’t right?!
Bobs idea for the fax machine was to make it so you sent one fax, but it could go to 25+ people all at the same time.
Brilliant right?
Bob thought so.
Bob went all in and left his job to build this glorious idea out.
My father in law (a business owner himself) would check in regularly with Bob to see how it was going. Most importantly, if Bob had customers yet.
Bob would respond that it’s going great, just have to perfect this or that.
Months would go by and my father in law would continue to check in. Each time Bob saying it was great, but not ready yet for customers. Just one more thing to do.
Then
AT&T came out with one that did the exact same thing.
Bob lost the wind in his sails
Like a punch in the gut, Bob was hit hard.
It wasn’t just a speed bump, this caused him to give up and close shop.
Come to find out, Bob ended up getting a divorce and going back to a “normal job” giving up on the entrepreneur thing all together.
==The Lessons==:
FIRST, Bob didn’t need a perfect product, he needed customers.
He needed to validate the idea and get feedback while also fueling the engine with cash flow.
SECOND, another fax machine that does what he wanted to do shouldn’t have been a cause to stop.
Instead it should have been proof of concept.
That should have told Bob that the world WANTS it. AT&T did the market research for him. He just needed to ride the coattails of what’s already working.
This might be outdated about fax machines, but the concept still remains.
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