Friday, September 21, 2007
Published by: Mike Eaton
Thomas Friedman said in his book The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century that we must “understand things in order to invent beyond them.” Growing up as an entrepreneur, I had generally agreed to these terms and have thus spent much of my time trying to understand how certain industries work in order that I may be able to, as Friedman said, “invent beyond them.” After all, to me, inventing beyond sounded like big bucks. However, education and experience has taught me that sometimes you have to be the wrong person asking the right questions to really invent beyond something.
So often in the world of entrepreneurship we hear stories about how someone left their job to start their own business because they had a better idea about how to do things. Their industry-specific experience and knowledge led them to start a successful business because they understood the industry enough to invent beyond it.
As a student and young entrepreneur, this can be an intimidating concept, and there is valid reasoning behind it. Consider, for example, a student who is passionate about real estate entrepreneurship but has never worked in the industry before. When this student attempts to introduce an innovate alternative to real estate practices, it could be argued that the student lacks sufficient knowledge and experience to really dream up the next best real estate innovation. In a more extreme example, would you really trust a marketing student to envision an alternative approach to brain surgery?
The thought that one must first possess years of industry experience and knowledge before he or she can begin innovating in a particular field is discouraging, especially to students who wish to be entrepreneurs right out of the gate. It is not uncommon for a student to think, “I have a really good idea, but I don’t know enough about the industry to go through with it.” Thus their idea dies only as an idea, and they leave the innovating up to a more experienced professional in the industry. I’m willing to bet that most student entrepreneurs just don’t have the patience to wait until they are the “right” person asking the right questions, so they don’t ask any questions at all.
My personal experience, however, has taught me that sometimes it does take the wrong person to ask the right questions in order to invent beyond something. The problem with so many industries lacking innovation is that the “right” people get so caught up in how things have always been done, that a new idea is just too impossible for them to conceive. When a new idea is introduced, the immediate response is always, “No way. That’s impossible.” Sometimes it takes a person who doesn’t understand things to be the innovator, because that person’s mind isn’t hindered by the technicalities and clutter that have prevented an industry from significant innovation. The best questions can often come from the people who don’t understand things.
So if you are a student entrepreneur, or a discouraged one altogether, it is time to cast off your desire to be the right person. From here on out, try being the wrong person asking the right questions. You might just come up with the next big innovation that changes the world. Just remember, sometimes the best question is the simplest one: “Why not?”
