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>there is no point in asking the customer what they need because they wouldn’t know until it is given to them. Although I understand the sentiment, I have to disagree with it. The mindset that people are either: uninformed, misinformed, or unaware of what they need is a kind of idea that pushes one towards a sort of syndrome that assumes: 1) The public, as a whole, is too stupid to think for themselves 2) The public, as a whole, needs YOU to show them how "forward thinking" (smart) you are (and how stupid they are) If we draw out that line of thinking a bit further, it also seems to hint at this tedious Western idea that, "If I don't do this, no one else will". In my view, that is not so much an entrepreneurial mindset, and moreso sheer, unrestrained arrogance. It is a roundabout way of saying, "No one else will ever do this, because only I CAN do this." It assumes that you are the defacto - the ONLY - creator of new things. I dislike that because although there surely are stupid people in the world, however, we are also PART of that public. This mindset works more to separate us from "the horde" and throws us into this "put upon" position, that it is only by our own doing that any progress can possibly be made. This is illogical and irrational. There are surely thousands upon thousands of others who are willing, able, and trying to achieve the same goals. Of those many thousands, surely there are hundreds among them that could design and implement it far better than ourselves. The only differentiating factor then, is: 1) Marketing 2) Market dominance 3) Profitability TL;DR people know what sucks in life. They know this instinctively because they live their life every single day. They know what could be done better. Thinking that "only I can show it to them" in a fancy little package leads to an overwhelming amount of arrogance. It ignores competitors. It ignores that we are a PART of the public. This kind of mindset is detrimental, if not outright counter to its own goals. The focus must instead be on improving implementation, design, and ease of use. |