John Mullins > Quotes

“problem‐first mindsets help entrepreneurs focus on a set of customers they seek to serve and thereby get clear about exactly who it is that has the problem.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“On the “large market trap”: It's easy to become beguiled by large and potentially attractive markets, as Tuninvest was. Nespresso, too, in its early days, eyeing the 70 percent of the coffee market served by roasted and ground coffee that it did not sell. “If I can only sell my widget to 1 percent of the people in China, I'll be rich,” some say. Market size is important, of course, as there's more room in large markets for multiple companies to be successful. But, as a starting point, I'll take a very narrow target market having a compelling problem that I can solve, and solve better than anyone else. My advice: think narrow at the outset. Moving the needle can come later, once progress is in hand.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“It is widely known that entrepreneurs tend to have an inherent bias for action and for learning by doing. “Analysis paralysis” is not a disease with which most of the successful ones have been afflicted. “Ready, fire, aim,” is more like it. They try something and see whether it works. Experimentation, of course, amounts to just that.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“One might reasonably ask, though, about the risk entailed in adopting a narrow focus, when that initial focus probably isn't going to work. Wouldn't it be better, some wonder, to have several irons in the fire? For the reasons mentioned earlier, my answer is, “No!” You'll probably have to pivot, perhaps more than once, but a preponderance of evidence suggests that pivoting to a new area of focus is much better than lacking focus at the start.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“If you're working on your own venture, rather than in a deep‐pocketed large company, you may well need to raise capital at some point. You'll raise that capital more easily, and on better terms, if you can demonstrate progress, of course. But “borrowing” the initial assets you need demonstrates something else, too. It shows that you're conscious of and serious about running a capital‐efficient business. Investors like that! A lot!”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“I'd always had profits and I always had the cash I needed to operate. I had failed to appreciate the difference between profits and cash flow. It shook me up to see the cash disappear when I started flipping the stores and adding corporate overheads.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“First, let's be clear what I mean by “ask for the cash” and “ride the float.” I mean the following: After (courageously) asking for and getting payment from your customers as early as possible (ideally before you make or deliver what they've agreed to buy) and after convincing your key suppliers to take payment from you as late as possible (perhaps 30 or 60 or 90 days after they've shipped you what you ordered), you'll find your bank account flush with cash, at least until you have to pay your suppliers. While you have that cash in hand—the “float” before you have to pay it to your suppliers—you can use it to grow your business. Buy inventory. Hire people. Buy more Google AdWords. And so on. As your business grows, you then use your future revenue to pay your suppliers and your people, just in time when their bills come due. That's exactly what 19‐year‐old Michael Dell did in 1984 to start Dell Computer. And it's mostly how he grew Dell, too.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“With innovation comes risk. Why don't big companies like risk, when innovation is so central to their future success? In my experience, risk calls to the forefront the possibility of failure. Big companies, especially those traded on public stock exchanges, are asked to deliver consistent quarter‐after‐quarter results to their shareholders. Almost by definition, big new ideas, whether new products or new ventures, with their high risk of failure that I noted in Chapter 1, simply don't fit. Why change something that seems to be working just fine?”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“There was a lot of fear on their part that they would be a famous national case if they didn't take action on something that was now very public,” Jorgensen recalls. He learned his first government‐relations lesson: The regulators enforced laws; they didn't make them or change them.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“In late 2004, countering the conventional wisdom that the outsourcing boom meant Western companies' outsourcing to Eastern resources, Bharti made front‐page headlines in the Wall Street Journal for “reverse outsourcing”—that is, by reaching agreements with IBM and three network equipment vendors, Ericsson, Nokia, and Siemens—to carry out Gupta's plan.7 Under the network equipment deals, Bharti would pay for capacity only once it had been used by customers. IBM committed to certain IT service levels and would get a percentage of revenue.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“While thinking narrowly is not going to guarantee the success of whatever opportunity you next pursue, it's going to enhance the depth of your understanding of what your customer wants and will pay for. It will give you a fighting chance of building a successful first platform, even if it's a small one. You can then grow from there. Among the break‐the‐rules mindsets that skilled entrepreneurs adopt, this mindset might be the most important of all.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“I often hear entrepreneurs say they require seed funding to build their initial prototype. I always respond, “Not so!” In my first entrepreneurial venture, I convinced a high school metal shop teacher to have his students undertake, as a class project, building the prototype I needed, for free. It was win‐win for the students and for me.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“The result of all this thinking and of the bureaucratic cholesterol that often accompanies it, in many established companies, is threefold: There are lots of people, processes, and perspectives that can say “no” to a new initiative. There are few who have the authority to say “yes.” And, whatever the verdict, it rarely arrives quickly. Often, however, the pursuit of opportunity requires acting quickly,”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“problem‐first thinkers must ascertain the extent to which the supposed problems they are tackling are sufficiently meaningful to encourage their target customers to change their buying behavior—no small feat!”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Focusing narrowly, whether on a narrow market or a narrow product line, brings important benefits. Whether for entrepreneurs writing their first business plan or those toiling inside a large company, these benefits can be material. They: Limit the resources—human, financial, and otherwise—required to move forward Aid in understanding the target market's unique and perhaps unmet wants and needs Enhance speed to market Get everyone rowing the boat in the same direction”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Thus, contrary to the folklore, entrepreneurs don't much like risk either. They use these six mindsets to mitigate it. Or manage it. Or off‐load it onto others. “Isn't your idea risky?” they will be asked. Of course, it's risky! There's market risk: Will customers buy (They bought from the outset at Budgetplaces.com; but not so fast at Nespresso.)? There's technology risk: Will the new‐fangled product actually work (Would Elon Musk figure out how to build electric vehicles with enough range?)? There's execution risk: Will the team be able to deliver what it sets out to deliver (Simon Cohen's 2 a.m. wake‐ups stole a day on his competitors.)? And more. Working counter‐conventionally, they all put one or more of the six mindsets into action.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“If you don't have a big problem, you don't have a big opportunity. Nobody will pay you to solve a non-problem.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Sort the problems categorically: Our lives, at least for most of us, can be divided into different buckets or categories, in various ways: Work vs. leisure. Activities we do solo vs. those we do with others. Family vs. friends, sports vs. music, and so on. Once each month, look at your bug list and sort it into categories that are meaningful to you. Doing so is likely to stimulate your curiosity.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Whether you get the cash you need—and whether it's to get started or to grow—from customers who pay early or from suppliers you can pay late, or from other unconventional or counter‐conventional sources, the sheer beauty of all of this kind of finance is what it costs you—nothing! You don't have to pay it back with interest, like a bank loan. You don't have to give up a stake in your business to a possibly rapacious or unhelpful investor.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“It's Musk's view that if you've built something that customers simply have to have, they will queue up to get it and pay deposits in advance to secure their place in the queue. That cash, paid well in advance at multiple points in Tesla's journey, was used to hire automotive engineers, to build new factories, and to do what was necessary to keep Tesla on the road to survival and more.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Bezos's second key organizing principle, as we saw in the Kindle project, is that the responsibility for something new is not embedded within the existing organizational structure. It's managed by an entirely separate organization. In Bezos's view, that was the only way to get single‐minded attention”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Or, just maybe, you are the leader and you've been charged with or taken on the daunting task of getting your slow‐growing company out of its rut. What you probably need is get a few brave people onto your bus, as Jim Collins puts it, to start breaking some of the conventional rules! I suggest you give them this book, or at least Chapters 3 through 6, and let them get on with it!”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“The audacity of Elon Musk to ask for $100,000 to reserve a yet‐to‐be built Roadster, or a more modest sum for a new Model 3. The courage of John Erceg to keep spending every spare euro to buy more AdWords. The personal conviction of both that they were on sound paths. The trust that Jay Gupta built with his suppliers. The self‐belief of all three that, in the end, they would do what it takes to survive and succeed, no matter the prior odds. It's your own personal attributes—your mindset—that make this kind of “ask for the cash” funding possible. These attributes—audacity, courage, trustworthiness, faith in oneself—are not part of everyone's personality, to be sure. Setting forth on an entrepreneurial path, whether from your garage or within an established business, is not for everyone, either. But if the entrepreneurial path is one you wish to pursue, in one way or another, there's no better or more hospitable way to finance your journey than by finding a need that's so compelling for your customers that they'll pay you up front, and finding suppliers that will take payment later, if only because they trust you and they believe you'll bring value to their business, too.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman puts it this way: There's a bunch of things that, structurally, start‐ups have as advantages over big companies. One is speed across all levels. It's not just speed at raw execution. But it's also speed of hiring, speed of decisioning, speed of learning, speed of judgment of product‐market fit, etc… . They [big companies] have a group consensus process, so that if they're going to take a risk, somebody who's in a managerial or executive role will question that risk. So it's hard for them to do, hard to move quickly.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“At the end of the day, starting something new, whether at a kitchen table, in a co‐working space, or deep inside an established business almost always initiates a learning journey. But that journey is not only about what the customers want and will pay for. It's also about how best to get them to pay as far in advance as you can.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Silverglide's Jon Thorne learned that having a proprietary technology that solved a real problem—sticking tissue—was a perhaps necessary but insufficient ingredient in building a successful company. Doing so at Silverglide meant pivoting away from the surgical probe toward another surgical instrument, bipolar forceps, that was the bread‐and‐butter tool of choice for many surgeons. In my experience, it takes a pivot or two—sometimes more!—to match a new technology with an appropriate and genuine customer problem.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“Is the venture legal? Are there regulations that might limit or forbid it? Are there risks, including some perhaps previously unseen, that should be considered? Fortunately, in such companies, there are committees of all kinds and armies of lawyers whose main job is to protect the company from those unseen risks, avoid potential lawsuits, and keep its executives out of jail. Why? Many companies' leaders, at their core, don't like risk very much. They prefer as much certainty as they can get their hands on. If the company is listed on a stock exchange, they feel obliged to deliver the earnings that investors expect and deliver them consistently, quarter to quarter. No down quarters, please.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“On the value of exclusivity: GoApe!'s 26‐year exclusive deal with the UK Forestry Commission would not have happened without Tristram Mayhew having thought ahead about how best to build a business whose business model could grow and how to maintain attractive profit margins. Keeping prospective competitors from bidding against him for future Forest Commission sites was a stroke of genius. You should try to do likewise whenever you can. It will help you keep competition at bay!”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“While large process‐driven companies are applying stage‐gate methodology to determine whether a new product idea will be substantial enough to “move the needle,” many entrepreneurs adopt an entirely different mindset. They find a very narrow target market whose unique needs or problems they know and understand intimately, and they set out to address those needs or problems, with little regard for how large the opportunity actually is. They figure that once they've built success in serving the initial (albeit small) market, they will have learned some things that will enable them to move on to adjacent market segments or develop additional products for the segment in which they started. This mindset—thinking narrowly, not broadly—is exactly where Knight and Bowerman began their journey, which eventually exceeded almost anyone's wildest expectations. Think narrowly at the outset, learn as you go, and a broader market is likely to eventually come your way.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World

“It is also often the case that, in Jon Thorne's words, “Winning a large share of a narrow target market is easier than winning a small share of a wider market.”35 That's because you can more easily understand that narrow segment's unique problems or needs, as we'll explore more deeply in Chapter 4, and then tailor your product accordingly.”
― John Mullins, Break the Rules!: The Six Counter-Conventional Mindsets of Entrepreneurs That Can Help Anyone Change the World