I have talked extensively about picking the right moment, not overextending yourself, choosing the correct path, all great advice, but all with an overarching theme. Waiting.
Waiting, picking your spot, and then running with it, is most definitely smart business advice. As the title says, haste makes waste, and the last thing you want to do is pull the trigger on something too quickly and have it fail. But, and I will admit that I have erred on this up to now, waiting too long can be just as harmful.
Shane, who wrote my Halloween article, brought the story of a friend of his to my attention. His friend (who has asked to remain nameless), is a video game developer working on what’s known as an MMORPG (Masssively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game). You may have heard of games of this type even if you aren’t one to partake, the most famous example is Blizzard Entertainment‘s World of Warcraft. Now Shane’s friend, rather than getting the ball rolling, registering trademarks, a website, and generally laying the groundwork to launch his game, decided to wait until he had something more to show people. A playable build. Something that he could take around to people and say, “This is what I have been working on.”
There was just one problem. In the time he was waiting, another company registered a trademark for the name he intended to use, specifically for use for video gaming, and MMORPGs in particular. While his existing assets are still usable with a little tweaking, his name, his concept, all of it was taken out from under him. Why? Because he waited too long.
So while I have always suggested in the past that you err on the side of caution and wait to pull the trigger on an idea until certain factors I’ve previously discussed have fallen into place, sometimes, you just have to go for it anyway. If you have a good idea, one that you feel might just be world changing
(or in the case of our example, at least fun), hesitation can cost you. It can potentially cost you quite a bit. In the provided example, a little tweaking of the existing assets would be all it’d take to get things back up and running. That may not be the case with whatever your idea may be.
With that in mind, I’d suggest if you’ve got a good, solid idea that you think is definitely worth pursuing, even if you can’t jump on it right away, at least start allocating a small amount of resources towards getting the ball rolling. Delegate a member of your team to developing the concept. Register trademarks. There are any number of things you can do. Realistically speaking, there are over 6 billion people in the world. The odds of one of them having the exact same idea as you are pretty good. Do you really want that other person to beat you to the punch?
Everything I have said on this blog up to now holds true. Don’t overextend yourself. Choose the path you feel is right for you. Time things right for maximum impact. But sometimes, for the sake of maximum PIE, you have to take a leap, or your PIE might just become someone else’s.
