Let Others Steal Your Ideas!!

Richie Etwaru
Richie is Group Vice President Cegedim Relationship Management

Hank Frigon was on the board of one of my early startups — License Monitor, and was a mentor of sorts. He taught me a few lessons and this one I remember very well.

Richie: Hank why is it that you tend to initially refuse to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs)?

Hank: I usually eventually sign them as needed, but the initial refusal gives me an early, but very important indication about the founder (by then in his career Hank was an angel investor).

Richie: Common, you know you have to tell me what the early but important indication is.

Hank: There are two types of people in the world, people with so many ideas it is like a disease that plagues their mind, and then there are people with just one idea. The folks with thousands of ideas resting as a burden of their intellectual shoulders never force you to sign an NDA, the folks with only one idea usually force you really hard to sign an NDA.

Richie: And so you are saying … (he cuts me off)

Hank: I don’t invest in people with only one idea, no matter how good that idea is, I invest in people who are infected with the plague of thousands of ideas almost like an intellectual cancer.

Since I have learned to share my ideas willfully, almost enabling them to be stolen. Because I have am infected, with said plague.

Here is why everyone should share ideas willfully:

1. Ideas get better with feedback, and the only way to get loads of feedback is to tell the idea to others, over and over and over.
2. You do not have a finite number of ideas, the number is infinite, your subsequent ideas get better and better, so a stolen idea will never be your “best idea ever”.
3. Don’t be such a narcissist; most ideas were thought of by someone else before, there are very few ideas that are “your” ideas. You may have arrived at them independently, but it infrequently means that you were the first person on the planet to think of them.
4. People are very emotionally attached to their own ideas, most folks cannot see the brilliance of an idea from someone else, and will prefer to work on their own than steal that of another.
5. You may be surprised, but most people are decent and do not steal ideas.
6. Most ideas are crap, but are the crap bricks on a road to a really good idea; so do not assume that “this version” of the idea is so good that it must not be stolen. If someone steals your crappy idea, chances are they will make it better, and you can then build on their version after stealing it back.
7. Ideas need support, and if you do not share them folks cannot feel “partial ownership” and hence start to support them. Don’t confuse someone who wants partial ownership with someone who is going to steal the entire thing outright. Partial owners are supporters, and you need them.
8. Execution matters, very few folks execute, stealing an idea and executing on it to make billions is rare, stealing an idea to temporarily feel good about yourself is what happens most of the time.
9. People who steal ideas, will eventually owe you because the guilt inside will erode at them. And just like that, you will have eventual leverage over and around them.
10. Have a digital trail of your idea, a blog post, a slide share, or something to start with. When you “have something to show” it significantly reduces the likelihood that someone will permanently steal your idea. If you are just “talking” about it and have nothing to show, it more likely to be stolen.

So stop being such an idea hog, the world needs you and your ideas, share them.

Note: We at Inc42 take our ethics very seriously. More information about it can be found here.