The Difference Between Innovation And Entrepreneurship

Most players in the startup ecosystem celebrate innovation. We tell entrepreneurs that they need to think out of the box. They are exhorted to be creative and original so that they can come up with a smart new idea which will solve the customer’s pain points. They then need to convert that idea into a business, and if they follow this road map, they will become successful.

Actually, this is bad advice and is in fact completely wrong. There is a big difference between innovation and entrepreneurship, and Professor Anil Gupta who runs Honeybee Network highlighted this at the recent Vibrant Gujarat Startup Summit.

Who Is An Innovator

Innovation refers to the ability to have original ideas, and we come up with all kinds of bright ideas all the time. We encounter problems in our own life and think of solutions for them.

However, just having a good idea is never enough, and most good ideas never get translated into a commercially viable business.

This is because there is a big difference between an innovator and an entrepreneur. An innovator is in love with his idea; he wants to keep on tweaking it and fine tuning it and adding new features and progressively making it better. In one sense, he really doesn’t care about going to market, or making money from his idea. He is in love with his product, and doesn’t care as much about commercialising it.

In fact, some innovators actually look down on the messy process of selling, because they think it’s below their dignity. It’s usually not their sweet spot, which means it’s not something which they’re good at.

They’re quite happy tinkering away in their laboratory and coming up with better ideas.

Who Is An Entrepreneur

An entrepreneur is completely different. He understands that every idea can be incrementally improved, but the important thing is not to make the perfect product, but to actually sell it at a profit. He’s quite okay with taking an immature imperfect product created by an innovator to market. He listens to the feedback which the customer gives, and tries to see if he can find people who are willing to pay him for using it.

Innovators and entrepreneurs have a different way of thinking, and while you may get the occasional individual who is both an innovator and an entrepreneur, in reality it can be quite difficult to get this combination in one person. This is why having a co-founder with complementary skill sets can be so useful when you want to create a successful business, and you need to be able to respect and trust each other.

There is always tension between spending time and money improving a product, versus spending time and money marketing the product.

We need to understand that both are equally important. Just like a bicycle needs two wheels to run properly, this is as true of startups as well.

[This post by Dr. Aniruddha Malpani first appeared on LinkedIn and has been reproduced with permission.]

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