Great Ideas More Important Than Execution?
Is a great idea more important than execution? Some viewpoints might support the idea that doing the right things is more important than do the things right. Nevertheless, this proposition can actually be a chicken-and-egg conundrum as most of great ideas indeed come from a iterative validation. And the process of that iteration banks heavily on the execution, especially the idea innovative.
As a result, the answer to this discussion shouldn’t be binary. Rather than that, it’s more about how to allocate the resource to the right part in the right time or right phase. Hereby I would like to take Design Thinking concept as the way to explain this point. There are many variants of Design Thinking process being used today. The five-phase model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford is chosen here. The 5 phases are as follows:
Empathize (with your users) — >Define (users’ need) — >Ideate (challenging assumptions and creating ideas) — >Prototype (creating solutions) — >Test (solutions)
If the new idea or the issue we want to solve is created from an existing model or the optimization of the old solution or the application of it is in a relatively stable industry or the market, then the resource should be allocated more to the first 3 phases. But why is that? Usually this case happens more in a big company or a relatively stable industry. As a result, know-how of how to operate well and what customers want are usually clear. In this phase, strategy would play a more important role that more factors other than product should be considered in the Design Thinking process. That’s why we say more resource should be put in the first 3 phases.
However, if your product or service is quite new and innovative, then another approach would be suggested to follow. As the product itself is quite new, the users’ profile can be hard to delineate. Usually, it can even be hard for users as well to know if they need this as the product itself is too novel or innovative. Therefore, instead of just collecting the past historical information or get the direct response from the questionnaire, inviting users to try the prototype and observing the whole process would be more efficient and effective to get more insights. Seeing this from Design Thinking view, then it can be extrapolated that more resources should be allocated to the phase from prototype and test. Despite that, that doesn’t mean the previous phases are devalued. On the contrary, putting more resources on the latter two phases is for structuring a better contour of what users really wants to further make the output of the first three phases more productive and valuable.
To summary, doing the right thing in the right time is the wisdom. It’s not easy and there can be many distractions on the path to a successful product. However, nothing can’t be done with a persistent and humble heart. Keep trying and keep moving, then what we wait for should come soon.
If you continually think about your purpose, images will come to mind while you are looking at nature or people and so you will remember and take action on that purpose.
Joshua Jung
