There is a common perception that ideas are hard to come by, that brainstorming is a difficult session to carry out, but really, ideas are dime a dozen. Ideas are not worth millions of dollars even though they might make you that much. It is the execution of the idea that is worth the millions of dollars.

What I am trying to say is that if you have a brilliant idea, chances are that others have thought of a similar idea if not exactly the same and might already be working on it or it may even be near completion. But I am not demeaning the need for ideas. Without ideas, you simply cannot start an innovative business.

However, we need to understand that ideas are just the start and are not the plans to put into practice for a business so do not bet on them. Ideas will still need to go through careful thought and planning before implementation. We need to see ideas as a possibility for improvement. There are many other factors that make entrepreneurship a dynamic experience.

Image from http://www.ifm.eng.cam.ac.uk/dstools/paradigm/innova.html

Here is an image of a Development Funnel where ideas are formed in the initial stage, goes through a selection stage where better ideas are selected to be further developed whether in terms of prototyping or planning and finally, one product is chosen to be released. This is typical of an entrepreneurial startup which does not have the ability to work on multiple products at once.

Therefore, being able to generate a large number of ideas can be really beneficial when you are looking for the right business to work on. It gives you the ability to choose something to work on that is in line with your team’s strength.

So how do we go about generating a decent amount of ideas?

1. Problems give rise to Ideas.

Ideas are generally created to solve problems. So essentially, in order to brainstorm for good ideas, we need to connect ourselves to problems. We will have to heighten our awareness of the world around us, constantly asking ourselves how things can be improved upon. How can things be made easier? How can things be more efficient? Can things be more enjoyable than what it is now? Keep wondering and keep imagining. Keep a log to note down your observations and your thoughts. Bring it with you all the time as you never know when you may see something that inspires you.

It is easier for people to identify problems in areas which they are directly involved in. That is also why many entrepreneurs love what they are doing. Many of them are solving problems which they personally face and that is very good motivation to make it work. So start your thinking from there. What do you like to do? What are the things you do on a daily basis? Where are the places you frequent? Are there things around you that you think can be made better by you?

It is also important for entrepreneurs to have good general knowledge as there exists a myriad of urgent problems all around the world which may or may not be directly linked to our lives, but are more humane in nature than what many of us could identify.

I applaud the will and determination of social entrepreneurs and others who go out of their way to walk in the shoes of others and work to change a world that could be very different from their own.

2. Market Surveillance

After identifying the problem, proper research of solutions that are currently on the market is crucial. Failing which, you might be working on a product or service and 3 months down the road, a friend might walk up to you and tell you that he has been using another product or service which is very similar or might even be better than what you are offering.

Are there other solutions out on the market? Are they something you would love to use and be satisfied with? Can you make it better?

Make sure proper research is done or you might end up finding out that you do not have an innovative idea after all.

3. Think of a good solution

It would be best if we had a direct link to the problem that we are solving if we wanted to create a good solution. We need to have an understanding of the customers who will be using the product/service that we will be working on. We need to know the consumer behavior. We need to know their Needs and their Wants.

Needs

Customer Needs will define the core features and in turn define the business.

Wants

Customer Wants on the other hand gives us a feel for what the customers fancy and will love as a bonus to the core product/service.

It is important not to mix up their Needs and Wants. Companies that have been able to accurately identify the customers Needs and Wants and are able to replicate them in their product/service and in the right proportions have often been the most successful.

Nintendo understood that people needed a new way to interact with their games and families wanted a family oriented console system. The Nintendo Wii was thus a runaway success. It provided a fun and interactive way to interact with games through its innovative controller which resembles a Nunchaku. It also made games which are enjoyable by families regardless of age.

For small startups, our abilities to research the market may not be extensive, but talking to your family, friends and mentors should provide enough insight into the market you are venturing into.

The solutions need not hit the spot right out of the wok. However, listening to people who use your product is important. Constant improvement based on their feedback keeps your customers happy and excited. It also allows you to better define their Needs and Wants.

4. What now?

Get on your way to change the world. Start generating great ideas today!

Grab yourself a notebook as an idea log and keep it with you all the time. Grab a pen/pencil too of course.

Observe the world around you. Make an effort to notice the things that you do, the places you go to, events that take place. Also, make it a point to observe others around you.

Read. Read about your hobbies, read about your favourite things, read about the world.

Keep thinking. Always wonder if things can be made better. And keep thinking of ways to make things better.

As Steve Jobs said in his 2005 Commencement Address to Stanford University,

“Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.”

The very first stages. The sprout. The first step. Everything starts from it. Startups are born under many different situations but most of the times, the core of it is to solve a problem.

Coming up this week will be a series of posts on the starting stages of a startup.

So stay tune for “Starting of a Startup : The Idea”

Note : SGstartups is looking for startup entrepreneurs who want to be interviewed and have their startups to be featured. Please email me or drop me a message under Contact Us if you are interested. Would really love to have a good talk with you guys over a drink. Cheers!

I actually had a post about Management that I wanted to put up last night but the Singapore PHP User Group Meetup took up pretty much half the night and interning at a startup for the whole of the earlier part of the day is causing me to zonk out earlier.

But anyhow, I would like to share with everyone a video of Paul Graham talking about how to create a successful startup. I really like this guy and I would talk about him more in a future post but this is all I have to offer right now until I get back to the comfort of home and have my own time to share more thoughts on entrepreneurship.

I believe that Paul Graham has hit the spot. I think he got it right that companies that are successful made something that people want to use. And it really doesn’t matter how much you make in the beginning as long as you have enough to tide you past the development stage and the stage where it starts spreading. From there on, the product will do everything else itself and you and your team will then be responsible to continue giving users what they want through the product.

Spare some time for the video. It is worth it. Let it stream awhile though, or it will get choppy.

Entrepreneurs have much to risk in an affluent country like Singapore where stable jobs are the norm. Banking and finance is the industry to enter if you hope to achieve at least a 6 figure salary. Dreams will remain dreams. But chances of branching away from the usual path of life are increasing as society begins to open up to new ideas and culture. However, it still takes a substantial amount of motivation to pull yourself away from the inertia of a stable income and plunge yourself into the hectic world of your own business, your own startup.

So, what is it that drives you towards such a decision?

Here is a list of 5 reasons that drags and drops people into the world of Entrepreneurship :

1. Money aka Cash

Financial freedom. Millionaire. Billionaire. Many dream of being rich, leading an extravagant lifestyle. Money is always a great motivational factor and that is why sales is such an important part of every business. It is the basis of a business. It is the reason why investors dump in up to millions of dollars of funding to a group of young prodigies working on a new product. It is also the reason why these youngsters are willing to step away from cubicles to create their own empire.

There are many ways to make money. Successful people have increased their wealth through trading, climbing the corporate ladders to the top, investing, inheritance and starting their own businesses. Looking at the Top 10 Richest Americans of Forbes 400, 5 of them made it to the elite list by starting up a tech business. They are the founders of Microsoft, Oracle, Google and Dell. Sergey and Larry of Google are both in the Top 10 list. However, in the list of Singapore’s Top 40, companies are focused mainly on the finance and investments industry. There is no doubt a difference in culture between the two countries. America definitely presents more hopes for entrepreneurs to fulfill their dreams.

However, trends can change. Tech companies in the States are still young. Entrepreneurship in Singapore is also an emerging trend among the youth, even though it is not yet running rampant. Can tech companies in Singapore join the Top 40s? Yes they can. And I hope to build a community of peers who believe as I do.

2. To become Somebody

To be the Next Big Thing. You want to be the next Bill Gates (Microsoft), the next Steve Jobs (Apple), the next Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook). You want to be a name to be remembered.

This could be a big motivation for some as well. Especially for those with vision and a dream. A dream and vision so great also requires a great person to transform the dream into reality and in doing so, become a name well known all around the world.

It will be hard work and it will be trying times as an entrepreneur. But that is what differentiates Somebody from Anybody.

3. To be in charge

It may be that you are tired of doing work for others and want control over what you do and your life in general. Entrepreneurship is your chance at it. You get to make the decisions that you have always wanted to make. You get to be in charge of what you do everyday. You get to answer to yourself and no one else in particular, other than your fellow founders in the case of your startup.

4. To do something they love doing

Entrepreneurship can be really exciting and fulfilling because more often than not, these entrepreneurs are doing what they love and building a business out of it. The best job you can have is really something that you are interested in and love doing.

Here is an excerpt of how Paul Graham of Y-Combinator puts it in his article “How To Do What You Love” -

With such powerful forces leading us astray, it’s not surprising we find it so hard to discover what we like to work on. Most people are doomed in childhood by accepting the axiom that work = pain. Those who escape this are nearly all lured onto the rocks by prestige or money. How many even discover something they love to work on? A few hundred thousand, perhaps, out of billions.

It’s hard to find work you love; it must be, if so few do. So don’t underestimate this task. And don’t feel bad if you haven’t succeeded yet. In fact, if you admit to yourself that you’re discontented, you’re a step ahead of most people, who are still in denial. If you’re surrounded by colleagues who claim to enjoy work that you find contemptible, odds are they’re lying to themselves. Not necessarily, but probably.

Although doing great work takes less discipline than people think—because the way to do great work is to find something you like so much that you don’t have to force yourself to do it—finding work you love does usually require discipline. Some people are lucky enough to know what they want to do when they’re 12, and just glide along as if they were on railroad tracks. But this seems the exception. More often people who do great things have careers with the trajectory of a ping-pong ball. They go to school to study A, drop out and get a job doing B, and then become famous for C after taking it up on the side.

I have to say that this article is a really good read to get people started on entrepreneurship as it gives people the courage to sound out to themselves that they could be doing something they actually love doing and start making big bucks out of it.

5. To change the world

All of the above are great motivations for a person to start their own businesses. But that couldn’t be all could it? There has to be something more novel than the self. Money, being somebody, being in charge and doing something you love. They are all self-centric. And if that was it to entrepreneurship, then the entrepreneurs would never truly become great people.

So, in Steve Job’s words to John Sculley when he was recruiting from Pepsi to be Apple’s CEO,

“Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?“

Guy Kawasaki is also a great guy who is an evangelist of changing the world. Take a look at his blog. His blog is also named “How to Change the World”.

And that really is what defines entrepreneurship other than reasons associated with self. It is about changing the world, making it a better place for everyone through innovative means.

It is a chance for us to make human lives more efficient and fast forward us into the future. We are living in an age of rapid technological advancements that improves the humankind so quickly we could easily lose track of ourselves. And this age provides us with so many opportunities and ideas. Entrepreneurs have to grab on to the possibilities and unleash their creativity and innovate.

There is no time nor are there opportunities to waste. It is time to play your part to change the world.