You Don't Need a Vision to Succeed
Why most successful founders started with a direction, not a vision.
Hey everyone,
Remember the first business book you read? I always have to smile because every book tells us the same thing: you need a vision. A bold, world-changing north star that guides everything and creates subliminal pressure on everyone who has started a company but hasn’t figured theirs out yet.
I’ve worked with dozens of founders inside startups - as a freelancer, employee, marketing lead, and now from the outside while working at an accelerator. And I can tell you this: very rarely does a founder have a strong, clear vision.
Starting a company is mostly opportunistic (or driven by passion). In the end, it’s always about making money. But having a vision that changes the future? Nope. Not at all.
But since everyone keeps preaching that you need a vision, the question is: do you actually need one to succeed?
The short answer: no. You can still be successful.
The longer answer: it’s a bit more nuanced.
What you need in order to succeed is a clear positioning.
And that’s where the real problem starts. Many businesses not only struggle to define a clear vision, but also fail to establish a clear positioning. Very few can confidently answer questions like: “Who are we?”, “Who is our ICP?”, and “What makes us different?”
No wonder having a vision feels even more out of reach.
But here’s my take:
Most people start a company with a goal. In the beginning, they have an ideal customer in mind, a clear picture of what the product looks like, and how it helps that customer. But over time, founders often get distracted by a lot of opportunities left and right. They start chasing every shiny object that comes their way, and suddenly there’s no longer a clear answer to the questions above.
They get lost, even though they had all the answers in the beginning.
But what they had wasn’t a vision, and it wasn’t positioning either. I’d call it direction.
And in the end, that’s all you really need to be successful. Your positioning - and how you want to be perceived in the market - naturally grows out of that direction.
As long as you’re clear about that, having a vision is optional.
AJ
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By Andreas Just