I think the fire stands for value creation. My Lean MVP Flowchart post advises to always orient your strategy about what it’ll take to double the size of your current value creation. Paul Graham’s Do Things That Don’t Scale is a coarse-grained version of this advice, pointing out that doubling a small fire is qualitatively different from doubling a large fire.
I was thinking more about profit. If you create value but either 1) don’t capture it or 2) do so in a way that doesn’t exceed expenses (or maybe even 3) opportunity cost), that isn’t actually what you’re after, whereas the fire I am thinking of moreso as “the thing you’re after”, although admittedly not in a super concrete way, so I appreciate this conversation.
Great post! I agree with this analogy.
I think the fire stands for value creation. My Lean MVP Flowchart post advises to always orient your strategy about what it’ll take to double the size of your current value creation. Paul Graham’s Do Things That Don’t Scale is a coarse-grained version of this advice, pointing out that doubling a small fire is qualitatively different from doubling a large fire.
Thanks!
I was thinking more about profit. If you create value but either 1) don’t capture it or 2) do so in a way that doesn’t exceed expenses (or maybe even 3) opportunity cost), that isn’t actually what you’re after, whereas the fire I am thinking of moreso as “the thing you’re after”, although admittedly not in a super concrete way, so I appreciate this conversation.