Three Stories Every Entrepreneur Should Know
What would you say your company does? It seems like a simple question that should have a simple answer, but that’s rarely the case.
Here’s something I’ve done over my 20+ years as an entrepreneur to keep everyone focused on the tasks at hand while also keeping an eye on the future.
Entrepreneurs usually blur the lines of what their startup is, what it will be, and what it should be. This is fine until you try to start planning around those stories. At that point, you need to be asking: What are the priorities today and how do we execute on those priorities without mortgaging the future? The reverse question is just as important: How much time do we spend working on those new things that aren’t generating revenue yet?
The Three Story Rule
Every startup should have three stories, loosely related to the three arcs most storytellers use in episodic storytelling. An easy way to think about it is a television series. When you watch an episode of a TV show, the writers are usually working on three storylines:
Story A: Story with an arc that begins and ends in this episode (or maybe a two-parter).
Story B: Story with a longer arc that lasts a few episodes or more. This current episode will advance the plot of Story B in smaller…
