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Not Sticking to the Plan

Written by Evan Duke | Dec 31, 2025 1:00:00 PM

One of the beauties of the Start Up phase is the sheer abundance of possibilities. Unlike other phases of the business cycle where you are pretty much set in what you can and cannot do moving forward, the Startup is a much freer, less regimented part of the business cycle. You need an abundance of creativity, especially as different people wear different hats.

The problem is that at some point, this cannot keep up. If you keep trying to find creative ways to grow, you will very quickly begin to become counterproductive. Initiatives that you had launched several months ago cannot be completed due to these new initiatives, while other initiatives that are incoming are completely contradictory with what had been done previously.

As is the case with much in life, balance is required. Creativity is necessary, but once a plan has taken shape, make sure that everything aligns with it. Even when things do not go according to plan, make sure that your creative solutions can align with your existing plan that you have in place. This way, even though you have creative solutions in play, you can make sure that your solutions are not train wrecking your plans further down the road.

The problem of not sticking to the plan is something that I have seen happen on quite a few occasions in business of different sizes and stages of development. At the end of the day, it comes down to a combination of carelessness, empowering poor governance practices, and embarking on projects without properly finishing existing ones. In one organization, I remember working with an individual (they were an idea factory with many ideas that never passed quality control inspections). In addition to rarely completing the project, this person never hesitated to delegate completion of the idea to someone else. In another organization, I worked with an employer who would get a new idea every few months. While they were good ideas, within a matter of weeks, the initiative was gone, usually without informing anyone about it.

You might look at me and ask if the organizations that tolerated this type of behavior no longer exist because of it. That is not the case. However, the bigger problem is that when one looks at it, one could hardly be inspired to be a part of it, since the results are at best mediocre. Scaling in such circumstances is impossible, and while there is enough competence to likely keep the organization from failing, that is about all. The organization might not be at risk of folding, but at the same time, it is equally not at risk of becoming anything bigger.

In a situation like this, ask yourself the following question: how do you expect to attract top level talent in a situation such as this? The answer is that it is impossible. Certainly, you will more than likely be able to attract talent looking for a job. However, you will have a rather firm ceiling when it comes to talent retention as well as success. 

To be clear, the reason for the above failures has nothing to do with any of the ideas. In every company that I have been a part of and witnessed this. Many of the ideas (with proper development and planning) would have been immensely successful. Had time been taken to ensure that they aligned properly (and seamlessly) with current initiatives, there is a good chance that they could have been incredibly successful, even revolutionary for the company.

At the end of the day, it comes down to how you do it. Granted, you need to be able to execute quickly, and too much planning at the end of the day might be really a mask intended to cover laziness. However, shooting from the hip and not making any effort to plan or to fully flesh things out are equally destructive. If you make no attempt to have a master plan and align your creativity so that all of your initiatives align properly with everything else, be prepared for your results to be mired in mediocrity.