The Opportunity Deception

Jack – you hit the nail on the head here.

I think also, that one of the primary reasons why entrepreneurial people tend to chase opportunity is that people of our ‘nature’ find it easy to allow the rationalization of wanting to get everything “just right”… or sometimes we even seek the ‘Perfect’ value offering – prior to allowing ourselves to move forward towards facing that ultimate challenge – taking our product or service to the market place.

Also – this is the unquestionable ‘rationalization’ reasoning that is dropped into the brains of people who are afraid to deal with that one day where they have to go out and meet customers and talk to them. This is a fear that is very real – but that few who are caught up in it ever fully realize. Because as long as we have a ‘justifiable’ reason why we can’t go out the door today.. or tomorrow, our brain tells us it’s okay to ‘keep working on making the project become as good as it can’ – and that way the end-customer is going to want what we have.
But reality conclusively tells us that until we put it in their hands to try out, we haven’t the slightest chance of making a sale.

So I think it might also be useful – particularly for those reading this thread – to note that Microsoft didn’t keep moving towards ‘perfection’ when they had Windows developed at it’s first level of introduction (Windows286). They took their concept and product to that point of offering a real concrete value to the public. They VASTLY improved the operating environment for computer users from the ancient DOS-based programs some of us can remember.. into the first windows environment. And the rest is history. Even now.. with the emergence of Windows 8, you can be sure they’re not going to quit pushing the envelope for performance. The thought that I think is intrinsically tied to your article is that we also need to identify and curb our inclination to add something else to add on to our offering that would make it better. That can all come another day. Not completing what we’re supposed to be focused on prevents us from income we are entitled to, since (like you said.. ) the act of completing that project that is 80-to-95% complete already, will indeed offer outstanding value to our potential clients. Once that’s done, then we can look at what the best opportunities of the day might be.

Focusing on the original goal keeps the end game within sight – whereas seeking out new opportunities and ways to improve things only serves to produce multiple new goals — which, in turn, keeps the delivery (and profitability) date well beyond our reach.

Entrepreneurs need to identify, in the beginning, what our project’s delivery objectives are, and work towards completing THOSE. Deliver that, and then move to the next stage… rather than allowing one’s entire life to become one solitary ongoing project.

How many projects right now do I have 90% completed?
I have a few.

Memory Panic!
If I backtrack, I don’t think I finished one completion of one project.
Everything I tried, ended up as something else or was abandoned.

Come Hither~~~
Just before I read your article, I was contemplating another shiny thing put before me. Then I remembered a similar thing that I forgot about from last month.

A FREE PDF? WOW!
How many PDFs I signed up for only to lose them in some folder that I have no interest in any more. To this day, never read.

You have described me
I never got to be what I wanted to be when I grew up.
There was always “this other thing” that interrupted me.

Right On Jack
Thanks for the insight,
Gene Petty