3 Things Entrepreneurs Should Keep in Mind
Dr. Yossi Vardi, has benefitted from years of experience within the startup industry, achieving massive success. Not only is he credited for jump-starting Israel’s startup culture, but he has also been given accolades in various publications such as The Wall Street Journal. His impressive resume is why he is the perfect person to give advice to any young entrepreneurs reading or listening to our podcast.
Throughout his extensive experience, Vardi noticed 3 main pillars that he believes leads to entrepreneurial success: stoking passion, encouraging curiosity, and staying concise. In his opinion, creating an “ecosystem” using these three principles is important to building creative and innovative companies.
Working with Passion
In his experience, Vardi said that too often he sees people driven by money. However, the real motivator that truly pushes people to accomplish their goals is passion. Instead of seeking monetary success, passionate people are driven by a desire to share their talent for the appreciation of others.
“This is the difference between incentive, which you can obtain by offering people money…and motivation. Motivation is something that comes from within.”
True passion is striving to spread your talent to the masses, creating personal value by garnering appreciation for what you have accomplished, as opposed to only seeking monetary value.
By being driven by passion, people are more likely to reach for success no matter what, ultimately overcoming whatever obstacles they may face. Vardi gives us the example of performing arts entertainers who are still performing during the Coronavirus pandemic. They are adapting to the circumstances in order to continue performing, not because they are trying to make money, but because they are deeply passionate about their work and need an outlet.
Although they may not be making as much money as they could, they are still trying to share their talents for the world to see because they thrive on the appreciation of their talent.
Conclusion:
Entrepreneurs: Remember what got you started and keep that passion alive. Monetary motivation is not enough to keep you going when times get tough.
Self-portrait |1914 Egon Schiele | Source: Met
Staying Curious
While you may be born with a certain level of curiosity, it can be built and reinforced, often through childhood. For Vardi, curiosity is key for creating new innovations since curious people tend to ignore borders and therefore create in a way that breaks barriers.
They also know how to ask questions, so they tend to know about a variety of disciplines, which they can then apply to their respective roles. It is through this intersectionality of disciplines that innovation tends to happen.
Like building teams with talent, Vardi said that a leader must understand that they both need to stimulate curiosity and import it into the company should the team be lacking.
Conclusion:
Find ways to continuously feed your curiosity. Read books, visit galleries. Learn how to merge disciplines by going to conferences and lectures, like Vardi’s Kinnernet conference. Keep chasing knowledge outside your chosen industry by expanding your social and intellectual circle.
Portrait of Paris von Gütersloh |1918 Egon Schiele | Source: Met
Stay Concise
While trying to create and explain an algorithm to better understand success and how to continuously create compelling products, Vardi developed what he calls, “The Vardi Rule, ” which states: the amount of slides you need to explain a concept has an inverse relationship to your understanding of the concept.
In other words, the more someone understands a concept, the less slides they will need to see to properly understand the information. This means that it takes less time to introduce an idea to others.
Conclusion
In the startup world, we often understand the problems we want to solve. To us, the problem statement at the core of our business is like the north star, pointing us in the direction we need to go. This includes understanding our audience and spending time sharing information that is important to them instead of reiterating what they already know. This keeps things concise and will most likely keep the audience’s attention for longer. At The Artian, we provide mentoring services for developing problem-solving techniques that utilize this concept.
To listen to more of Vardi’s advice, thoughts, and business tips, tune in to our podcast episode, “The Art of Technology.”