Page 104 - The Business Idea Factory: A World-Class System for Creating Successful Business Ideas

Failures are a valuable experience

One o f the g r eatest scientists o f the 20th centur y, Tho mas Ediso n, cr eated 10,000 pr o to types befo r e
pr esenting to the wo r ld a co mmer cially viable lig ht bulb. He said, “I have no t failed 10,000 times. I
have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 10,000 ways will not work. When I have
eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”

The greatest innovators know that to become successful you need to make good decisions. Good
decisions come from experience and experience comes from bad decisions. When you fail, you learn
what doesn’t work and why. This experience is the reason why you eventually succeed.

Everybody knows the Apple computer that Steve Jobs created, the light bulb that Edison invented and
the theory of relativity that Einstein developed. Few people know that these great thinkers also
implemented a large amount of ideas that didn’t succeed. In creative thinking, quality comes from
quantity and the more successful businesses you create the more failures you encounter along the
way.

The best inno vato r s fail o ften. The best inno vato r s fail eag er ly. The best inno vato r s kno w that they
are successful because they have failed more than others. The more ideas you generate and the more
of them you implement, the sooner you will create something great. If you want to become a world-
class ideas cr eato r, expect that many o f yo ur ideas will fail, so me will succeed and a few will have
potential to change the world.