Execution triumphs ideas, but by how much?

The past several months I’ve been absorbing quite a lot of content on startups, business ideas and innovation. Lots of books, podcasts, youtube videos, etc. on subjects anywhere from practical advises on how to perform certain tasks (e.g. legal, marketing, fundraising) to abstract thoughts or philosophical views on the future of innovation.

Most founders have probably heard the argument of ideas being cheap, which is generally used to emphasize the importance of execution. But are great ideas cheap? What does it take? Are the founders that execute on great ideas just lucky they found them, or is it significant amount of time spent on understanding how technology is evolving and forming a definite view of the future (i.e. thinking for yourself)?

What I found compelling is how aligned the general message many of the great leaders of the technology industry have for founders. Leaders such as Ben Horowitz, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and more (see a few quotes below). While they phrase their message in their own terms, a lot of it actually boils down to the same thing; Thinking for yourself. Furthermore, how great business ideas tend to originate from founders that think for themselves.

I absolutely agree that execution triumphs ideas, but are we underestimating the effort behind the creation of great ideas?

Let me know what you think.

Vignir.

Examples from great leaders

Ben Horowitz at 2015 Columbia University Commencement Address.

“Don’t listen to your friends. The more generalized case of that is: Think for yourself. It sounds both simple and trivial, but in reality it’s extremely difficult and profound. And here’s why. As human beings we want to be liked. It’s anthropological. If people didn’t like you in caveman days, they would just eat you. So you really have a natural built instinct to want to be liked, and the easiest way to do that is to tell people what they want to hear. You know what everybody wants to hear? What they already believe to be true. The last thing they want to hear is an original idea that contradicts their belief system. But those are the only things, things that you belief that everybody around you doesn’t believe, when you’re right, that create real value in the world. Everything else people already know and there is no value in creating it. So it’s so important to think for yourself.”

Elon Musk on work ethics, principles, attitude, failure.

“It’s important to reason from first principles, rather than by analogy. The normal way that we conduct our lives is that we reason by analogy. We are doing this because it’s like something else that was done, or like what other people are doing. For example, slight iterations on a theme. It’s mentally easier to reason by analogy rather then first principles. First principles are kind of the physics way of looking at the world. What that means is, you boil things down to the most fundamental truths and say: ‘Ok, what are we sure is true, or as sure as possible is true’ and then reason up from there. That takes a lot more mental energy.”

Peter Thiel on thinking ahead 5–10 years.

“We are always focused on very short time horizons. You have to figure out how you are going to go through the next month, next quarter, get some customers, etc. But it is always worth thinking ahead 5–10 years. Why will this be a valuable business in 5–10 years? How’s the competitive landscape going to develop, how’s technology going to develop, how’s the world going to develop. These are hard questions. But the great entrepreneurs I know always have a perspective on it, and might be wrong. So, you have a plan. A bad plan is always better than no plan. Have a plan. You can always change it. Don’t pretend that you have no clue about what is going to happen and everything in the future is random. If you say everything is random, that’s how you set yourself up for failure.”

Sam Altman at the first class of “How to start a startup” at Stanford.

“I myself used to believe ideas didn’t matter that much, but I’m very sure that’s wrong now… Long-term thinking is so rare anywhere, but especially in startups. There is a huge advantage if you do it. Remember that the idea will expand and become more ambitious as you go. You certainly don’t need to have everything figured out in your path to world domination, but you really want a nice kernel to start with. You want something that can develop in interesting ways.”

Steve Jobs at 2005 Stanford Commencement Address.

“Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true. Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

Marc Andreessen on big breakthrough ideas and courageous entrepreneurs.

The really, really breakthrough ideas often seem nuts the first time you see them. And it’s the fact that they seem nuts that can be a very positive signal because 1) that can explain why it already isn’t being done by an existing big company, because it’s just considered too strange. And 2) if it works, if the bit flips at some point and it goes from nuts to a good idea, those are the companies that can just explode and become gigantically huge. The PC seemed nuts, the internet seemed nuts, AirBnB seemed nuts, Uber seemed nuts, Bitcoin today seems nuts..”