If I hear the often quoted, “nine out of ten new businesses fail” phrase one more time, I think I’ll snap. We love to generalize, but in this case business failure is more than a statistic.
Why do ninety percent of businesses fail? Two reasons:
- Vision
- Execution
These two reasons are not mutually exclusive. You can have a great vision, but no execution. You can have great execution, but no vision. However, you can’t have success without both great vision and execution. Visionaries who lack execution are one of my greatest pet peeves. Another would be the purveyors of wisdom through generalization such as the basis for this post.
If you only have vision, find someone who can execute for you and vice versa. Some of the greatest advice I’ve ever received came via an interview with the founder of Level 3. He was talking about how he started the company. He brought the vision and when asked how he was going to pull off the execution he said, “by finding people who are a lot smarter than me.” If you’re weak in one area, fill the gap with someone who is not.
The truth is, you will fail if you can’t execute your vision. Now, hopefully within that vision lies a business model that makes sense. Oh, and you might want to add in a good measure of passion.
Can you really explain to a fish what it’s like to walk on land? One day on land is worth a thousand years of talking about it, and one day running a business has exactly the same kind of value.
- Warren Buffett
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