Idea and Actors around you

A useful starting point is to identify the relevant social actors you need to onboard once you have narrowed down on the venture idea you are interested in and have a tentative idea of the resources you require.

The commuting problem we discussed earlier – if you choose to go with developing a satellite office model as the solution to the long commute time, you will need space for employees of various companies to work. Here too, you have a few choices to make. One way is to think of the following means to execute – you could find the relevant spaces from builders, negotiate a rental agreement, and create separate seating and office space for employees of different companies. An alternate is to think of partnering with existing co-working spaces for infrastructure, which they would have anyway invested in it, isn’t it? And you focus on providing the secure underlying network to enable the feeling of working from these distributed offices almost seamlessly!

In the two approaches, the nature of actors you needed to onboard were different. In one case, the builders were the vendors to ensure that the interiors, the power backups, etc. are all taken care of. In the other approach, you have partnered with co-working spaces. The effort is simply directed towards on-boarding interested companies, selling them the value.  At the same time, the issues of infrastructure are negotiated with someone who is already in the space, and the existing asset is used within limits, if not with any customization.

It is thus useful to look at the idea in the light of the various social actors you intend to onboard. First, brainstorming about the various options by considering different combinations of actors would highlight alternatives that are possible paths to reach the same end goal of developing the business. Additionally, you can go a step further and establish connections to those social actors you do not have a direct link to. Still, by asking your existing set of connections, you might be able to reach them.

Speaking with this variety of actors will also make it possible to identify and break the resource access issues in a more granular manner. This allows you to potentially stitch together what other social actors are willing to give as an affordable loss and eventually build your business!

Ask yourself:

Have I identified the different social actors who may help me build the venture?

Is there an alternate set of social actors who may help me achieve the same result as I want?

What is it that each social actor is willing to commit without overthinking?

Can I stitch together these commitments from the social actors to accomplish the goal? Is it possible to gain indirect access to these social actors if I don’t have direct access?