Why passion counts so much in venture
The prevailing narrative in venture is that passion disproportionately counts. If building a successful startup were a recipe for making breakfast waffles, passion is the eggs, not the pinch of salt. So why is it so important?
The case against passion
It’s easy to be cynical about passion. If you take sufficiently skilled people and give them financial incentive then surely they will do whatever it takes to succeed? Money is a proxy for passion, or rather some people are passionate about money. But this isn’t what we mean by passion in startups. We mean the relentless pursuit of an ideal, goal or change in status quo. As Steve Jobs would say “to create a dent in the universe”.
Also, some startups’ passionate back-stories seem phoney. Sometimes founders start companies because they want to make a ton of money and/or because they want attention (both forms of passion I grant you). But the press, talent and therefore the investment community demand a back story. Therefore all startups have back stories that favour passionate struggle for a better world (sometimes retro-fitted) over straight forward opportunism, speculation and capitalism (truth).
But passion wins in the end
This week I was discussing a cost of customer acquisition thesis with Andy Bell. Andy had recently proven he could get the cost of customer acquisition through a particular channel for a particular product down by a factor of 10. It took him a few iterations but there he was, data in one hand, apple in the other, beaming from ear to ear about how he’d proven his thesis.
But then attention turned to a second, more speculative project that Mint was contemplating. Andy was encouraging me to do what he had done, “if you could just get the cost of acquisition down to £X then we’ll be able to prove Y and move on to Z”. Everything he said seemed plausible but I had no passion for it. I didn’t want to prove it or rather I was indifferent between the thesis being true or false.
And that makes all the difference. Passionately wanting to prove something is the thing that makes you work an extra 5 hours at night. Passionately wanting to prove something is the thing that makes you change tack over and over until you crack it. Being passionate won’t guarantee you success but it sure as heck beats the alternative.
Where this matters most
The problem of lack of passion is most acute at large companies. Intrapreneurs are often given problems to solve by others in their organisation. Sometimes people are chosen, in an almost arbitrary way to lead new product development. This is a big mistake. The person with best chance of success is the one whose hand is raised the highest.
Photo by Carl Heyerdahl on Unsplash
