This is a guest post from friend and creative entrepreneur, Scott Bishop. He’s the owner of Crave Engine, a digital branding company for small businesses and startups. Scott can be found on Twitter as @thescottbishop or over on his marketing blog RealTimeMarketer.com.
I’ve wanted to be a business owner, an entrepreneur since I was little. It’s really the only thing I’ve ever wanted to do. Some kids dreamed of being big sports stars, I wanted to be the kid who owned the league. My dreams have always been big, and therein lies the problem.
Big Ideas are easy. It’s safe to say most of us have that million dollar idea that if we just got going all of our problems would go away. If we just created them we’d be on the cover of Fast Company and keynote speaker at the hottest conferences. So if big ideas are easy, then why aren’t we all working on them? The problem is that our ideas are often so big, they are impossible to move on right now. The execution on these ideas is next to impossible in our current state. It’s not that we don’t want to work on them, it’s that we don’t even know how or where to start…so we freeze.
We don’t have the capacity, the financing, the team, or most importantly the experience or know how to build on these big ideas right now. So we sit and we wait, and we wait, and nothing happens. Our ideas are so big and grandiose, that we wait for the perfect time to get moving on them…and that time never comes.
Your big ideas are paralyzing you from moving forward, on anything.
It makes sense. Our minds are ingrained from the time we are little: go for the gold…go big or go home. We want and expect everything to be home runs. We’re a culture now expecting everything from a happy hour to a blog post to be “Epic”. Idols aren’t built on small ideas, and we’re a culture that only values success to idols.
So what do you do?
Most books or other blog posts will suggest moving on that big idea right now. They’ll offer some tips on how to get organized and how to write a business plan. But is this really your problem? I say no. Not being organized enough is not your problem. Not reading enough entrepreneur books or blogs is not your problem. The problem is that your ideas are so big they paralyze you. Your ideas are so big that they’ll never be more than ideas.
So I’m asking for something a little different. But what I’m asking will actually help. Put your big idea on the back burner. Defeat the paralysis of your big idea by moving on to something small, and start today. The only catch I’ll add is just make sure you get paid for it.
Small Ideas:
- Are Achievable:
These small projects will show others and more importantly prove to yourself that you can start and finish an idea. Right now this is a lesson that’s important to prove to yourself. This small step builds confidence for the future, confidence you’ll need for bigger things.
- Are Practice for Bigger Things:
The lessons we learn from these little projects (they don’t even have to be full scale businesses) teach you many things you had no idea you didn’t know. You’ll learn how to scale and find resources, how to market products, and how to fail and fix mistakes. You’ll be amazed at how much you’ll learn from these small ideas or projects. Consider them practice for your future big businesses.
- Lead to Bigger and Greater Things:
Small projects at least let people know you’re working on something. They let people know that you’re more than just smart, that you’re more than an “evangelist”, that you’re a doer. People want to surround themselves with those who do. You’ll be amazed at the emails and contacts you’ll receive from people either asking to help or asking for you to team up on something new. These new relationships you hadn’t had previously will put you in a space you didn’t even realize existed.
- Teach You How To Make Money:
The most valuable lesson an entrepreneur can learn is how to turn an idea into money. This is an invaluable lesson you’ll need for anything you want to start, and starting small achieves that quickly.
So keep your big dreams in front of you…but if you want to eventually achieve them, get started by starting small and moving on something today.
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