As some of you might know my PhD research is also all about tech startups. As part of it I talk to and interview a lot of founders all over the world. A lot of people know that most parts of a startup including a lot of the ideas change quite significantly, especially in the first years of business. However, often times there’s a core idea or vision that always stays the same. This vision is what guides the startup through the ups and downs of the real world and what keeps it on track, while dynamically ite
On my trip to Silicon Valley in May, I realized that there’s a lot more people there that, even if they are still just working on a small first product, have a big vision behind their startup. This vision is the core of their startup and it is the core of what they are passionate about. It is what motivates them day to day and it is what people will see and feel when talking to them. The vision of an entrepreneur is their “reality distortion field”, it is what convinces their cofounders, employees, advisors
Here in Germany, however, I often see early stage startups with decent ideas, but lacking big visions behind them. Some founders might have lots of ideas or lots of “functionality” that they want to add to their products, but often there’s no real big goal in terms of “we want to make a dent in people’s lives”. The lack of a strong core idea is one of the reasons these startups might fail. When they get to the limits of their idea and the market doesn’t accept it like they thought it would, these startups s