Perspiration and Cookies all in One Post

I can't vouch for everywhere in the world, but if you grew up in the US I guarantee that you have heard the following quote:

"Success is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration" - Thomas Edison

Let me start by saying that this statement is completely factual as has been demonstrated to me on numerous occasions over the course of REbound's first year. However, it recently occurred to me that this quote also sums up how we erroneously think about new technology and startups in general. We tend to focus more on the capability of a team to perspire instead of inspire. In other words "can this team accomplish this work" instead of "is this a good idea in the first place". This can be dangerous because when you get down to actually developing a technology, bad ideas take just as much effort to develop as good ones. That is, until they fail.

The issue with a 90% perspiration philosophy is that it greatly discounts inspiration by taking an effort based accounting approach. It suggests that we can squeak by with an A- if we just work very hard. Yes, the amount of time and effort it takes to be inspired and to create a good idea may only take a fraction of the time and effort it takes to create a new technology and bring it to market, but the real thing we all care about is not the effort, but the impact on success. Is the ability of a team to work very hard 9 times more important to success?

As usual it comes down to the technology and the space. For cleantech, the answer is no. That is because cleantech is an area governed my unforgiving physical laws and entrenched markets with established costs and payback periods. If your idea lacks inspiration (is terrible) then no amount of perspiration will get you to a successful outcome.

Here is an analogy. From an effort perspective, baking is probably about 10% looking at the recipe and 90% mixing things together. But from an impact on success perspective it is likely the exact opposite. Here, take these two recipes for chocolate chip cookies, try to figure out which will make the best cookies based solely on the amount of effort it will take to mix the batter.

Recipe #1
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed light-brown sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Recipe #2
2 1/4 cups sand
1/2 teaspoon sand
1 cup mud
1/2 cup sand
1 cup sand
1 teaspoon sand
2 teaspoons mud
2 large handfulls of bog slime
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Imagine mixing up both. Even though Recipe #2 is clearly going to make some terrible cookies, it is still going to take just as much effort to mix up. So judging the process by effort is actually not a very useful way to decide what cookies to make. But this is just what we do. We look at the folks making the cookies and we ask ourselves "can these people work hard enough to get this made into batter?" When we should be asking "who here has the better recipe" as well.

At the end of the day it needs to be about a balance. Startups are hard. Not only is it a lot of work, but its a lot of work in an isolated environment with very few people who honestly want to or can help you. But at the end of the day, putting in all that work is not a guarantee you will squeak by with 90%.  The unfortunate truth is that it is just as hard to develop a bad technology as a good technology so the ability to work hard, while absolutely critical to success, is not something by which we can judge the chance of success.