I often tell my students that it’s a lot easier to grow, than it is to manage growth. Business graveyards are littered with the corporate corpses of what used to be good ideas and poorlyexecuted plans. I recently heard that innovation and strategy is more about execution, than technology, or a fancy slide deck. I completely agree.
A professional acquaintance, a lady I admire, raised over $5 million from venture capitalists. Her burn-rate? Over $130,000 a month – and she has been at it for a while. As soon as the money came in, she hired high paid consultants, and high paid employees. Today, most of those expenses have been cut, the people are gone, and she is in survival mode.
When is it enough to accept failure and move on? I think that’s where we fail our students. They turn out brilliant decks, but lack the insight to stop chasing the mirage, and tell the difference between growth and managing growth. As educators, the burden of that failure rests squarely on our shoulders.Walking away from a losing proposition, can be a good thing.
About Hemant Rustogi