31
I Can’t See You but I’m Not Blind
If I ask you to think of an elephant do you see an elephant in your head when you close your eyes? I don’t. Regardless of how descriptive the imagery, story or text I can’t create any pictures in m…
Steve Blank
Steve Blank, Innovation, Entrepreneurship, Stanford, I-Corps, H4D Hacking for Defense
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Visit steveblank.com → RSS feedOn Hacker News Apr 2009 – Oct 2026
Tech Industry & Business 76Startups 56Life, Learning & Writing 11Career & Management 11Society, Policy & Culture 9History & Retro Computing 4
32
Too Young to Know It Can’t be Done
The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible – and achieve it, generation after generation. Pearl S. Buck Ask people what makes entrepreneurs successf…
33
AgileFall – When Waterfall Sneaks Back into Agile
This article previously appeared in the Harvard Business Review AgileFall is an ironic term for program management where you try to be agile and lean, but you keep using waterfall development techn…
34
The no excuses culture
Getting ready for our next semester’s class, I asked my Teaching Assistant why I hadn’t seen the posters for our new class around campus. Hearing the litany of excuses that followed –“It was raini…
35
Job Titles That Can Sink Your Startup
I had coffee with an ex student earlier in the week that reminded me yet again why startups burn through so many early VP’s. And after 30 years of Venture investing we still have a hard time …
36
You Negotiate Commodities, But You Seize Opportunities
It took losing something important to understand the difference between a commodity and an opportunity. Along the way I also learned yet another way entrepreneurs see the world differently from the…
37
Be where your business is
This post previously appeared on the readwrite blog. A CEO running a B-to-B startup in needs to live in the city where their business is – or else they’ll never scale. I was having breakfast…
38
An MVP is not a Cheaper Product, It’s about Smart Learning
A minimum viable product (MVP) is not always a smaller/cheaper version of your final product. Defining the goal for a MVP can save you tons of time, money and grief. Drones over the Heartland I ran…
39
Tune In, Turn On, Drop Out – The Startup Genome Project
In April 2010 I received an email that said, “I’m an incoming Stanford student in the fall and working on a project that a number of people suggested I get in touch with you about.̶…
40
Turning on your Reality Distortion Field
I was catching up over coffee and a muffin with a student I hadn’t seen for years who’s now CEO of his own struggling startup. As I listened to him present the problems of matching lithium-ion bat…
41
Steve Blank: Relentless – The Difference Between Motion And Action
Never mistake motion for action. -Ernest Hemingway One of an entrepreneur’s greatest strengths is their relentless pursuit of a goal. But few realize how this differs from most of the population. W…
42
Watching Larry Ellison Become Larry Ellison
In Oracle’s early days Kathryn Gould was the founding VP of Marketing, working there from 1982 to 1984. When I heard that Larry Ellison was stepping down as Oracle’s CEO I asked Kathryn to think ab…
43
Nuke’em Till They Glow – Quitting My First Job
I started working when I was 14 (I lied about my age) and counting four years in the Air Force I’ve worked in 12 jobs. I left each one of them when I was bored, ready to move on, got fired, or lear…
44
How to get meetings with people too busy to see you
Asking, “Can I have coffee with you to pick your brain?” is probably the worst possible way to get a meeting with someone with a busy schedule. Here’s a better approach. —— Jason, an e…
45
Blind to Disruption – The CEOs Who Missed the Future
How did you go bankrupt?” Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.” Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises Every disruptive technology since the fire and the wheel have forced leaders to adapt or di…
46
Why the Government Isn't a Bigger Version of a Startup
This article previously appeared in War On The Rocks There was a time when much of U.S. academia was engaged in weapon systems research for the Defense Department and intelligence community. Some o…
47
Epitaph for an Entrepreneur - Balancing Family and Work
For the next few months I’ll be posting a series of posts on family, startup culture and careers. These vignettes are about how I’ve lived my life trying to make my dent in the universe and trying …
48
Startup America -- Dead on Arrival
For its first few decades Silicon Valley was content flying under the radar of Washington politics. It wasn’t until Fairchild and Intel were almost bankrupted by Japanese semiconductor manufacturer…
49
Get Out of My Building
Some of the most important business lessons are learned in the most unlikely ways. At Ardent I learned many of them with a sharp smack on the side of the head from a brilliant but abusive boss. Not…
50
To predict the future 1/3 of you need to be crazy
In a rapidly changing world those who copy the past have doomed their future. When companies or agencies search for disruptive and innovative strategies they often assemble a panel of experts to ad…
51
When It’s Darkest Men See the Stars
When It’s Darkest Men See the Stars Ralph Waldo Emerson This Thanksgiving it might seem that there’s a lot less to be thankful for. One out of ten of Americans is out of work. The common wisdom say…
52
Mapping the unknown – Steps to map any industry
A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step Lǎozi 老子 I just had lunch with Shenwei, one of my ex-students who had just taken a job in a mid-sized consulting firm. After a bit of catch…
53
A Visitor's Guide to Silicon Valley
If you’re a visiting dignitary whose country has a Gross National Product equal to or greater than the State of California, your visit to Silicon Valley consists of a lunch/dinner with some combina…
54
Entrepreneurship is hard but you can’t die
I’m posting a series of articles on family, startup culture and careers. These vignettes are about how I’ve lived my life trying to make a dent in the universe. Hoping they’ll give you a point of v…
55
The Bad Board Member
Over the last 40 years the U.S. has evolved an entrepreneurial ecosystem with two of the most unlikely partners – venture capital investors and technology entrepreneurs. This alliance has led to an…
56
The Next Bubble - Don't Get Fooled Again
My friend, Ben Horowitz, and I debate the tech bubble in The Economist. This post originally appeared as part 1 of 3 ———————————…
57
When Kodak and Polaroid went to war
This part 2 of the Secret History of Polaroid and Edwin Land. Read part 1 for context. Kodak and Polaroid, the two most famous camera companies of the 20th century, had a great partnership for 20+ …
58
No One Wins In Business Plan Competitions
Last week one of the schools I teach at invited me to judge a business plan contest. I suggested that they first might want to read my post on why business plans are a poor planning and execution t…
59
Profound Beliefs
This post previously appeared in EIX. In the early stages of a startup your hypotheses about all the parts of your business model are your profound beliefs. Think of profound beliefs as “strong opi…
60
Fear of Failure and Lack of Speed in a Large Corporation
I just spent a day working with Bob, the Chief Innovation Officer of a very smart large company I’ll call Acme Widgets. Bob summarized Acme’s impediments to innovation. “At our company we have a cu…