Entrepreneurship

Diplomacy Disrupted

The world stands at a crossroads where traditional diplomacy has ceded ground to a more dynamic force.

Entrepreneurs have emerged as the new diplomats of our era, boldly leading where established institutions falter and distrust prevails. For centuries, diplomacy belonged exclusively to statesmen and ambassadors, their negotiations cloaked in formality and protocol. Today, that order is being profoundly reshaped by visionaries who reach across divides, not through treaties but through the universal language of solving, building, creating, and sharing.

In a fractious world marked by de-globalization and nationalism, entrepreneurship has become the great common denominator—a calling that transcends borders and unites disparate communities around shared purpose.​

EXTRA SHOT

This contribution was written by Jonathan Ortmans. Jonathan has visited 150+ countries around the world and leads the Global Entrepreneurship Network.

National boundaries, once formidable barriers to commerce and culture, have become remarkably porous to innovation and startup culture. The seamless flow of talent, capital, and ideas continues to define entrepreneurial ecosystems that connect and outperform those that isolate. This porosity represents more than economic opportunity; it embodies a fundamental shift in how value is created and distributed across the globe. Entrepreneurs operate comfortably in this fluid environment, recognizing that the greatest innovations emerge when diverse perspectives collide and collaborate. From rural villages to capital cities, startup culture spreads with viral intensity, carried by digital platforms and sustained by communities that refuse to accept geographic limitations on their ambitions.​

Yet disruption—the defining characteristic of our age—carries a paradox that demands understanding. Disruption is not destruction; rather, it is alchemy that turns uncertainty into opportunity. This transformation requires both courage and vision, qualities entrepreneurs possess in abundance. They are bold, thriving precisely where others see only chaos, spotting cracks where new possibilities emerge as governments and societies shift the rules.

Just as storms clear the air, refresh the water, and renew the land, moments of disruption force examination of old assumptions. These breakthroughs release complacency to push the boundaries of what is possible. The danger lies not in disruption itself, but in our response to it—whether we view upheaval as an ending or a beginning.​

Entrepreneurs understand that constructive rebellion is not just healthy; it is essential to keeping ecosystems vibrant and societies progressing. Without creative rebellion, without founders willing to risk failure for solutions that choose forward over left or right, stagnation becomes inevitable.

This willingness to occasionally stir up turbulence reflects an entrepreneurial mindset that questions the status quo, challenges outdated models, and refuses to accept that the way things have always been is the way they must remain.

Bold global leadership—rooted in vision, grit, and collaboration—transforms chaos into progress. Rebels who lead this progress for good deserve celebration, for in entrepreneurship as in diplomacy, the bold change our world.

Brewed From Within
#33 📖 Entrepreneurship

By Ben McDougal, ago

Momentum Mountain

From the moment we decide, a force is required—action geared to find and then maintain momentum.

Extra Shot

Everyone has a creative spirit. When an appetite for (calculated) risk is applied, the entrepreneurial spirit emboldens.

Meaningful momentum is awakened in endless ways. Early propulsion can mean showing up at an event for the first time, researching the competitive landscape, testing an early hypothesis, leaning into customer discovery, considering potential co-founders, building product, and eventually activating a launch sequence.

Once a project is launched, the need for momentum gets stronger. There are a world of examples, but growing the business, achieving milestones, and celebrating progress are all forms of momentum.

Even in later stages of a company, momentum drives activities like succession planning, navigating exit paths, and considering how your human, financial, cultural, intellectual, and network capital can be recycled back into the startup community.

If momentum is maintained long enough, the result can be a flywheel effect that feeds on itself. Most things you want to grow require attention, but with less friction, momentum delivers bonus time and valuable understanding. Space for new activity emerges and that keeps things interesting.

The tough reality is that if momentum is melting, it’s difficult to recapture. Once something melts, it’s never quite the same. These dips are moments to consider when and what to quit. If there’s enough energy to keep going, there may be a way to keep building.

The longer stagnancy lingers, the further you get from momentum. Tactics to maintain kamiwaza, even when momentum is melting, start with communication.

Honest communication spells out the pace. Reducing the weird by exposing the why also keeps different stakeholders on the same page. By reducing the tension that quietly brews in silence, teams can run at lower speeds, even during lethargic times. If left unattended, however, this can devolve into a lack of urgency that brings another set of challenges.

At lower speeds, perhaps less movement is needed to regain the sense of shared momentum? That’s true, but also lame. When it’s time to thrive, here are climbing tactics to awaken the mountains of momentum:

  • Say yes to unlock adventure.
  • Say no to create space.
  • Travel to expand the mind.
  • Share premium human time.
  • Revisit customer discovery.
  • Experiment with new ideas.
  • Onboard new customers.
  • Build a fresh feature.
  • Add to the team.
  • Consider a pivot.
  • Alter your routine.
  • Embrace continual learning.
  • Expand your engaged network.
  • Attend a new startup community event.
  • Revisit an activity you once enjoyed.
  • Stay centered on any descent.

    Momentum is crucial to playing long-term games with long-term counterparts. Find the proper pace by recognizing the momentum you’ll need to move through different stages of the quest. This awareness helps us quit chasing momentum and frees us to forge better art at a sustainable speed. Continue to multiply mass and velocity, which equates to momentum when, where, and how it’s needed to stay wild.

    Brewed From Within
    📖 Entrepreneurship

    By Ben McDougal, ago

    Feedback is Data

    Customer discovery paves the path to profitability.

    This really is the work for entrepreneurs starting a new business. Customer discovery requires trust in your early moves, obsessive curiosity, patience, thick skin, humility, an interest in being wrong, discernment, and a willingness to adapt. No problem, right?

    For many entrepreneurs, impartial feedback can be scary. Customer discovery puts ideas on the hook, and colliding new conversations may contradict past assumptions. That’s the point! Interacting with the market you seek to serve allows us to learn from no in a way that gets us to yes.

    As you collaborate with those who criticize what you’re building, learn why naysayers debate your hypotheses. Be humble. Either attack the massive lift to change the product and even the target customer or make your concept more compelling to win over those who care.

    The more you learn from others, the more you’ll recognize supply and be able to meet true demand. Collecting real-world data is human and intellectual capital that attracts more network and financial capital. 

    Beyond the psychology of it all, customer discovery can feel like a drag because it is often a protracted process. The time commitment is real. This market exploration can be slow at first and may seem less necessary as signals of traction emerge. The potential need to rethink ideas makes feedback scary too. As always, if the entrepreneurial lifestyle was easy, career nirvana would not be so fleeting. Knowing this, we can seek honest feedback that strengthens our value proposition to eventually go further in the right direction.

    When learning from the perspective of others, it’s imperative to remember that feedback is data.

    Collect, organize, and examine data from feedback like a scientist. Inference is more informed with data. Decisions that are made become more in tune with reality as you continue to collect and learn with data.

    As you translate decisions into action, you must also find your own way. Even with good intent, people who provide you with feedback are doing so based on their experience. The experience of others is based on their own past, and no feedback is likely to fully harmonize with your vision. There are many ways to navigate the idea maze. Gather feedback like power-ups in a video game and use diversified data to guide your quest toward product-market fit.

    By Ben McDougal, ago

    Table of Riffs

    Brewed From Within: Energy for the Entrepreneurial Lifestyle compiles 125 riffs into four timeless sections. Here’s a VIP snapshot tour, with a handful of riffs linked for early access!

    Imagine holding your new book. After the cosmic cover art is initially observed, we open to a title page, one blank page for personalizations from the author, and then the publisher’s copyright page. After the heartfelt dedication page and motivating preface, you’ll find the table of riffs. While the book flows from start to finish, each riff is individually numbered and includes a snapshot of Key Topics and a unique QR code that supports easy referencing and quick sharing. The Foreword from Brad Feld and the book’s Introduction prepares you for what to expect and then we dive in! The Table of Riffs below is your first look at the modern circus that’ll energize whatever you’re building. After the book becomes a new favorite, we end with the book’s closing matter. Readers can refill their mug even more in the About The Author pages, meet the 21 contributing authors, acknowledge those who brought this book to life, sneak backstage for people interested in writing a book or book marketing, play in a mini crossword puzzle, and explore more timeless resources to keep us all building… TOGETHER.

    PART ONE: ENTREPRENEURSHIP

    1. Uncharted
    2. Early Moves
    3. Maverick
    4. First in Line
    5. Ideaworks
    6. Pain Relievers vs. Vitamins
    7. Minerva
    8. Prismatic
    9. Fresh Powder (cc)
    10. Escorting Execution
    11. Slow & Fast
    12. Triangulation
    13. Real Skills
    14. Ship It
    15. Storytelling
    16. Super Sentence
    17. Isochronal
    18. Sequencing
    19. Feedback Is Data
    20. Down Under (cc)
    21. Slide Deck Design
    22. Attention Traps
    23. Captive
    24. Momentum Mountain
    25. Fructifying Fortitude
    26. Shifting Gears
    27. Echoes
    28. Breakout Valuation
    29. Head Start (cc)
    30. Not to Lose
    31. Landing
    32. Voices (cc)
    33. Diplomacy Disrupted (cc)

    PART TWO: LEADERSHIP

    34. Listen
    35. Jargon vs. Understanding
    36. Small Business Owners
    37. ArtOfficial (cc)
    38. Linchpin
    39. Significance
    40. Permeability
    41. Everyday Activism (cc)
    42. Generosity Builds Trust
    43. Atmospheric
    44. Winds of Outrage
    45. Executionist
    46. Import Knowledge
    47. Líneas Invisibles (cc)
    48. Interested Introductions (cc)
    49. Overtime
    50. Decisions
    51. Aphorism
    52. Airport Foot Massage
    53. Enchanting Events
    54. Reluctance
    55. Collide
    56. Playforce (cc)
    57. Playforce Principles
    58. Adaptability (cc)
    59. Adapttitude (cc)
    60. Extra Credit (cc)
    61. Tenured & Tired
    62. Seasonality
    63. Linear
    64. Diversified Career Portfolio
    65. Visualizing Variety
    66. Hiatus

    PART THREE: TECHNOLOGY

    67. Pure Wonder
    68. Innovation Curves
    69. Tinker
    70. Wireframing
    71. Hybridize
    72. Time Trappers
    73. Cyberspace
    74. Producing a Podcast
    75. Dollowers
    76. Welcome to Web3
    77. Mechanized Money (cc)
    78. Woven Worlds (cc)
    79. Phygital
    80. Munch Munch
    81. Septenary
    82. Conversationalized
    83. Yin-Yang
    84. Bridges to Tomorrow
    85. Digitized Consciousness
    86. Replicants
    87. Incentivized Reality (cc)
    88. Propulsive
    89. Neon Future

    PART FOUR: LIFE & HAPPINESS

    90. Open to Next
    91. Indexing
    92. Uncertainty
    93. Anticipation
    94. Recursion
    95. Horizons
    96. Anxiety
    97. Creation vs. Consumption (cc)
    98. Waiting Rooms (cc)
    99. 1% Better
    100. Training Wheels
    101. Bloop
    102. Winterizing
    103. Santa Is Real
    104. Front & Center
    105. Pebbles
    106. Goodnight Moon
    107. Totality
    108. 13.8 Billion
    109. Dark Matter
    110. Gimmies
    111. Hole-In-One (cc)
    112. Serendipitist
    113. Bookmarks
    114. Feng Shui
    115. Sedona Sands
    116. Love Letters
    117. One & Only
    118. Wayfinders
    119. Winding Whys
    120. Oversubscribed
    121. Intrinsic
    122. Conspicuous Kindness
    123. Sharing
    124. Endowment
    125. Perpetuity

    For more details or to consider creative ways to collaborate, download the book summary, grab a book, and connect with the author to talk through more ideas.

    By Ben McDougal, ago

    Prismatic

    There are endless early moves to help avoid pushing your idea toward someday. For instance, creative wireframing requires only a pencil. With a little visualized clarity in place, a couple exploratory conversations can also help.

    First, meet with a mentor. This should feel like a supportive space but avoid rainbows and butterflies. Be realistic with exciting aspects of the idea, but also the challenges. As we learned in YDNTB, an early no is much better than a long, wrong yes. That said, playing it safe is easier than activating initiative, so don’t let early doubt slow you down. Instead, welcome it. Let curiosity uncover new understandings. Pivots are inevitable, and this exploration adds confidence as the original idea is tweaked toward product-market fit.

    After transparently talking with that trusted mentor, the next meeting is with a potential customer. This will feel too early, but it’s not. You’re actually protecting your personal bandwidth by not swinging at a bad pitch too many times.

    To optimize early innings, arrive prepared to ask good questions. Take notes and speak less so you can actively listen to how this potential early adopter is responding.

    Are you building a pain killer or vitamin? Remember, feedback is data, and this is only one data point, but let this conversation infuse reality into the idea. Show up, stand out, follow up, stay connected, find a thoughtful way to accelerate their work, and then keep building.

    The business model canvas is a tool to do so. While it’s impossible to predict the future, business model canvases help us continue to explore while curating a story that sells.

    Most early business ideas don’t have a clear story. This can make it hard to know where to start within the business model canvas. While you can use this tool in endless ways, consider an approach that is less about the entire business and more about one story at a time. Instead of trying to boil the ocean, organizing a complete story for each customer segment creates a combination of more actionable insights.

    To give it a try, use this special business model canvas. The areas are numbered to curate canvases that each highlight a customer story:

    1. Customer Segments – Start with the details of a particular type of customer. The goal isn’t to complete the Customer Segments box. It’s starting a story to follow through the rest of the canvas. Now lean into the pain as you move from box to box and watch as your solution transforms into a story.
    2. Value Propositions – What benefit(s) can you deliver?
    3. Channels – Where can you connect with this customer?
    4. Customer Relationships – Who are you working with and how will you make this customer feel?
    5. Revenue Streams – Will financial income flow? How?
    6. Key Activities – What actions make the customer care?
    7. Key Resources – What is needed to keep building, and how might needs change to maintain momentum?
    8. Key Partners – Who helps to make this sustainable?
    9. Cost Structure – What costs go into activating this customer segment? How is pricing organized to support realistic profit margins that align with a financial model?

                  By telling the story of created value for one customer segment, hypotheses can be connected with context. Next, using a separate business model canvas, visualize more stories based on different customer segments.

                  With separate business model canvases for each customer segment, merge everything into one business model canvas. To stay organized, select different colors to use for each customer segment. As everything blends together, the prismatic rainbow maps roads to reality.

                  By Ben McDougal, ago