Another question in e-mail today that I can’t resist sharing, along with my answer. Here’s the question:
I believe that I have ideas that can make great money in the hands of real entrepreneurs. I do not want to be the one who spends my whole life applying them, writing the business plan, looking for money, finding the right team, etc. How can I sell business ideas or investment ideas without becoming an entrepreneur myself?
… and my answer:
Forget it. The idea has no value. If it’s worth anything, a thousand other people have the same idea.
You don’t believe me? OK, prove it. Prove me wrong. Make your idea work. Find a management team, write a business plan, get the funding, and–whoops–you just became an entrepreneur.
I could go on, I suppose (actually I did in the real e-mail), but this is a better answer. Right to the point. And I have posted on the value of the idea before on this blog, in Ideas are Easy, Doing Stuff is Hard and a couple other posts, and on bplans.com I posted an article in the same general mode called Protect Your Idea.
Tim Berry is the founder and chairman of Palo Alto Software and Bplans.com. Follow him on Twitter @Timberry.
