Classic Advice for entrepreneurs/ innovators

From: http://www.burningdoor.com/askthewizard/2007/03/too_many_companies.html

On a psychological level, I think a lot of people confuse fear of failure with not having enough confidence in the ultimate success of their idea. They thus conclude that they aren't confident enough in their idea or their strategy because it seems to have holes and flaws for which they don't have answers. This is a tremendous mistake. While I won't pretend to speak for the entrepreneurs I mentioned above, I bet if you asked them if they were confident on day 1 that they had a winner with each of their previous successes, they would look at you sideways and say "of course not". Speaking for myself, I can say that my cofounders and I try to find a market opportunity that seems like it will need to be addressed and for which we think we have some angle and then we just pull out shovels and start digging and figure other things out as we go.

Personally, I know going into any new company that there is a 90% chance we have the business model wrong on day 1. I also know that I have a historically poor track record for understanding what will and won't attract customers or defeat competition (I didn't get Twitter when Obvious Corp first launched it without an "e" in the name, I thought eBay would be out of business in six months after Amazon launched auctions, and I was certain Netscape would crush Microsoft in the browser wars because Netscape was more nimble). But the opposite of 'fear of failure' isn't confidence. The opposite of 'fear of failure' is just not bothering to think about failure (BIG difference between this and thinking about risk profile for your idea/company)...

The key is to just get on the bike, and the key to getting on the bike is not the confidence in knowing you will be successful if you do x,y,z. The key to getting on the bike is to stop thinking about "there are a bunch of reasons i might fall off" and just hop on and peddle the damned thing. You can pick up a map, a tire pump, and better footwear along the way.