Seeing the country for the forests
“…we were struggling to make sense of the bubble and its aftermath, what it meant for technology and what it meant for venture capital.”
-Fred Wilson
This quote from a recent Fred Wilson blog post reminded me of something I’ve been going through lately.
I’m out in the world. I have a “neat idea.” I talk to a lot of people about it. I get lots of wide eyes and “whoas” and great feedback. After months of searching for a great idea, it’s easy for Jonathan and I to rest on our laurels and think “well that was hard, but we worked hard and talked to a lot of people and did a lot of research and we finally got it.”
Not so fast.
Now that we have a product, Jonathan and I have to figure out what it really means in the grander context. Where does it go? What is the future of the product and the brand? These are questions similar to what Fred was talking about in his blog post: what do we go from here?
When I first saw Square, I thought to myself: “Thank you, Jack!” But I also thought to myself “hrm that’s nice… buuut is that it?” I wondered what would be next for them. What’s next for them is Card Case, and while the fantastic design of Card Case is a shining example of seeing the forest for the trees, the evolution of the Square payment platform from ‘just’ Square to Square + Card Case is a level higher: it’s seeing the country for the forests.
Square is not just building a product. They’re building a company with a greater hunger and vision. That’s something I am looking forward to doing with FourthSegment. I’m looking forward to reminding myself constantly to never stop thinking about the bigger picture; to never stop seeing the country for the forests.
Now hopefully this blog post will do its job and help me remember that ;)
