My advice to AMPG's holders: Don’t limit your thinking with dogma
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. – Steve Jobs
Entrepreneurs can take two lessons from this quote. First, don’t believe your competitors’ press releases. Your competitors look ugly when they stand naked by the mirror, too. Out of their very nature, product press releases emphasize a product’s benefits and ignore its flaws. Similarly, the technology press rarely has the inside scoop necessary to report on the challenges that companies are really facing — the employee defections, the spaghetti code, the internal politics. They usually report the good stuff that’s fed to them. Don’t believe the dogma you read in the press.
Second, don’t look to the press to show where your next breakthrough product will be. As Wayne Gretsky said, “skate where the puck is going, not where it is.” Press releases and most news stories cover products that have been under development for at least six months, usually longer. They’re “old news.” If your product development efforts imitate what you read in the press, by the time you’re done building it you’ll be two years behind everyone.
Instead, focus on “your own inner voice;” figure out what it’s saying about the future you want to build, and then work like mad to build it better than anyone else. I’m not saying that you should stick your head in the sand and ignore your industry’s press. Stay technically informed and expect occasional sparks of inspiration from others…but remember that conventional wisdom is outdated.
