A 0-to-1 startup is very different from a 0-to-1 project within a larger organization.
- A 0-to-1 startup is very different from a 0-to-1 project within a larger organization.[zx]
- In the latter, if the project doesn't cohere, the team still coheres.
- In that situation, you can have most resources on the team be spent on "turning the crank" to generate the main output, and 30% or so on seedlings.
- If any given seedling doesn't work, that's okay, it diffuses and the resources are reabsorbed into the larger organization, which continues chugging along as a going concern.
- This allows established, successful organizations to plant innovation seeds, any one of which can work, with no individual seedling being existential.
- A recipe for good upside and capped downside if you do it right.
- But in a startup, the singular project is everything.
- If it doesn't cohere, the whole thing evaporates.