“Positively defined, a startup is the largest group of people you can convince of a plan to build a different future” writes Peter Thiel in ‘Zero to One: Notes on Start Ups, or How to Build the Future‘.
This vision of a different future may be more or less ambitious, and intend to touch more or less people in the world. It might be within a small specialized niche or intend to take the world by storm. However, any real startup will be built on the premise of bringing a change to the world.
Actually this criterion might be an excellent differentiator between real startups and new companies that only intend to milk a situation.
Peter Thiel continues along the same trend of thought: “A new company’s most important strength is new thinking: even more important than nimbleness, small size affords space to think”
In my experience, the quick iterations around product, marketing, and business model do mobilize a significant dose of mental power and unending discussions. And indeed, the need to create value in a commercial startup (get revenue before funding is exhausted) is a great incentive to create something that will change the world somehow.
If you want to build a different future in a context where you’ll really mobilize your thinking, creating a startup is the way to go.
