It's a million times more valuable to fail than be average
August 18th, 2010Don’t you think?
Weighing up the choice between a custom built system and open source? (assuming both are available).
It makes much more business sense to go with the open source version, that way you acquire a version that has grown off the back of failure, they’ve already made all the mistakes.
Building a custom system means it’s you that make all the mistakes and inherently pay for them.
WordPress (the engine behind this very blog) is a great example, by leveraging WordPress you tap into the collective knowledge & failiings of millions of installations.
Just a thought, open source is entirely applicable in business, especially when you realise that you’re buying the failure of millions.
Well, I do…
At least 2 – 4 times / month
However
I also learn 2 – 4 things / month that don’t work
I only recently realised that
I have become so accustomed to failure that I bounce back virtually instantaneously
Weird
but awesome! this means I am willing to give anything a go.
Chances are the cost of doing it outweigh the cost of not doing it…
plus every now and again i come up with something brilliant!
this blog being one of them ๐
so go ahead
try some crazy ideas, fail lots and win sometimes.
(believe me, you’ll soon forget the failures, learn the lessons and win overall!)
(and you’ll get better at minimising risk and limiting the downside)
(oh and once your no longer afraid of failure the world is your oyster)