The Art of the Pivot
Your willingness to pivot, or to abandon an idea that isn’t working and shift course is the key to finding product-market fit
Hi! Kathryn here. This month, we’re discussing the art of the pivot and how you can use it to turn your great idea into a viable business.
You’re an entrepreneur! Awesome!
You’ve taken a great idea and transformed it into a business. However, something isn’t quite working. Potential customers like your product (or at least say they do), but the sales data doesn’t reflect the enthusiasm. A deeper dive into the market shows that your competitors are building your product better, faster, and cheaper than you. Or a key supplier has gone out of business, taking your product down with it.
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What do you do?
You pivot.
Your willingness to pivot, or to abandon an idea that isn’t working and shift course toward something that shows more promise, is the key to finding product-market fit, aka finding the product that your customers want to buy at scale.
A great example is Starbucks’ shift from selling espresso makers to being the makers of espresso. The company started in 1971 selling espresso makers and coffee beans to coffee enthusiasts. In 1987, inspired by cafes in Italy, former CEO Howard Schultz reinvented the company as a “third place”, a place where people gather outside of home and work (and, of course, get a cup of coffee). This pivot led the company to grow from $1.3 million in sales in 1987 to $22 billion in 2016.
The business world is full of other companies that have pivoted from their original product. Twitter started as a podcasting platform called Odeo that changed direction after Apple released iTunes. Nintendo was originally a playing card company. Flickr began as an online role-playing game that included a photo-sharing feature.
For more wisdom on building your business, be sure to check out my bestselling book, Build the Damn Thing, on Amazon.
Coming to terms with having to pivot isn’t always easy. You’ve invested time, passion, and money into your brainchild. It can be easy to see abandoning your idea as a sign of failure.
However, pivoting is key to having what Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck calls a “growth mindset,” seeing challenges as opportunities to learn rather than signs of failure. A key way to incorporate a growth mindset is to think BIG by focusing on building a company, rather than building a single product. By doing this, any changes you make to your product become a part of the process of growing your company.
Build the Damn Thing Podcast: Get Season 3 in Your Ears Now!
Season 3 of the Build The Damn Thing podcast, based on my bestselling book, is on Apple Podcasts, Audible, and Spotify! In the Season 3 finale, The Art of Leaving, Darlene Gillard-Jones and I have a candid conversation about how to leave any significant chapter of your life–whether it’s exiting a company or ending a marriage. We’ll talk about how to gracefully manage transitions and leave a mark without leaving destruction behind.
In next month’s newsletter, we’ll be talking about the role mindfulness has in growing your company.
Keep Building the Damn Thing!
