You snooze, you lose.

“You’ll never know what you got until it’s over[1].” Unless you have experienced a deep sense of loss, you may not fully appreciate the pain of loss as described in the lyrics of James Ingram’s song.

Lack of appreciation of the value of what one has, be it love, a job, an opportunity, an innovative idea, relationship or whatever it might be, is not a problem only afflicting ungrateful people. Perennial procrastinators reflect the same spirit of lacking appreciation of the value of opportunities presented to them. An opportunity would stare at serial procrastinators begging them to seize it, yet procrastinators would naively think tomorrow is still another day to get started. Unbeknown to them, tomorrow might never come. By Nimroth Gwetsa, 28 July 2015.

Until one misses a big payout, one would never appreciate the opportunity cost of procrastination.

You snooze, you lose.

Have you ever had a novel idea you thought could solve a particular problem and ultimately make you more money only for someone else to implement a similar idea, killing it and you live to tell the tale?

You are not the only one feeling such a loss. Many have regretted missing opportunities to launch their brilliant ideas. As a result, they have been left with a deep sense of envy seeing others, probably less educated and unsophisticated as they are, having succeeded in launching similar ideas.

Some creative people suffered unrecoverable losses because of their wait for the right time and opportunity to get started. But that time never came timeously for them. It does not have to end that way for some of you with brilliant ideas yet to be implemented.

You snooze, you lose.

Some Causes of Failure

Let us explore reasons some fall short of reaping fruits of their creativity.

The benefits of life and reaching middle age are the lessons one learns over the years. Life teaches us many things especially if we are observant. We must not forget that we too would be elders if we could live long enough. Being an elder should not be a role attained simply by having lived life the longest, but by the wisdom older people could share with the younger generation. No research is better than personal observation over the years especially if that observation tries to be as objective as possible.

In my not too long and not too short life I have lived, developmental progress can best be attained when the following critical success factors (CSF) are present:

• Problem
• Concern
• Opportunity
• Action

Failure would occur if the above critical success factors are overlooked or poorly considered.

Without a problem, no opportunity would exist. Problem stems from dissatisfaction or discomfort with status quo. Dissatisfaction arises from having a sense of or witnessing or experiencing something better than the current situation. The gap between the current and envisioned situation is the potential requiring development.

A problem without concern leads to destruction. Talking about a problem or opportunity without concern is hallucination.

Being concerned, but having no opportunity to resolve the problem, is frustrating and creates instabilities.

Having the opportunity to take action, but not making the effort to resolve the problem, shows lack of wisdom.

I do not see how sustainable success could be achieved unless these success factors are well-considered.

Develop Or Not Develop The Idea?

Ideas come alive when implemented. It serves no purpose when the idea sits in one’s head.

Ideas are like seeds. They inherently have oodles of potential realised when planted.

Undeveloped ideas are easy to copy and are less valuable than when converted to a tangible product. Idea thieves might be quicker than you could be in materialising the idea. The difficulty of explaining ideas could result in weaknesses arising from having to disclose more proprietary information to get buy-in. In concept form, the idea might still have many undiscovered nuances that could significantly impact the structure or specifications of the final product.

Materialising the idea resolves inherent flaws and enables the discovery of unforeseen variants and applications of the product. It’s easier to explain the idea by showing the functions of the finished product. Demonstrations also simplify the process of getting buy-in.

Although there is increased risk in materialising the idea before its market potential could be assessed, sometimes it is better to go with your conviction, your gut despite perceived threat or risk of loss and materialise your idea.

Should fear of loss concern you, invest, at least, in the creation of a working prototype best representing your idea. A working prototype could increase the value and protection of your idea than if it were only an imagination.

Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) or Patents Route?

Although NDAs and similar agreements offer some protection, they cannot prevent ideas from being stolen. You might find it hard to prove your ownership of the idea even if the NDA or similar agreements were signed beforehand. Thieves with more resources than you have could easily claim to have worked on a similar idea before you approached them. How would you prove the origination of the idea in a dispute?

To avoid this problem, some people recommend that you send specifications of your idea to your internationally based free e-mail facility such as Gmail. Emailing them creates a timestamp for the origination of your idea. Use of e-mail timestamp and the NDA or similar agreement could increase protection of your creative work. Registering a patent might be more desirable.

Securing a patent is not a straightforward and quick process either. Much valuable time could be wasted while registering a patent. The prolonged registration process could, meanwhile, increase chances of someone launching a similar idea. Registering a patent takes time not because of the bureaucracy but the required thoroughness of ensuring rightful ownership, authenticity and uniqueness of the patent.

To effectively secure a patent, you need to prove the originality, authenticity and uniqueness of your innovation. You would need to conduct a worldwide search using as many keywords as possible to find other creations with similar themes. You might need to supplement the search by employing services of a professional legal outfit competent in the sector of your invention. Because you want to prove originality, authenticity and uniqueness of your idea, it makes no sense being sloppy or limiting keywords used in the search. It makes no sense either being lazy to thoroughly read volumes of reports from your search. Improve your search results by getting help from a professional legal outfit competent in the subject of your innovation.

Keywords used in the search must be comprehensive. You might have to sift through large piles of reports to confirm the uniqueness of your invention. Months could go by conducting the search and reviewing material received before any other tangible work of registering your patent could begin.

Not only could valuable time be lost, but the process could be costly as well.

DIY or Get Development Services?

If you can invest in skills to help you materialise or at least develop the prototype to reveal your idea, do so as soon as possible. Not only would you gain intimate knowledge of your idea and material product, but you would be able to explain your idea better to get buy-in. Common-sense tells me that you would not want someone else knowing intricacies of your product more than you do.

A developed product offers more protection of your idea especially if you have not yet registered for a patent.

Consider for a moment issues at stake when getting development services for your innovation:

You are likely to waste valuable time trying to agree on confidentiality and ownership of the final product with the developer. In that time, nothing concrete would have been developed. You are likely to waste further valuable time trying to explain or agree on specifications, costs and other issues concerning the development of your innovation. Those who experienced frustrations with IT Projects could attest to such hair-raising moments.

With most local development, be it in manufacturing or IT development having been swamped by internationally cheaper players, finding good-quality development skills at value for money might prove a huge challenge.

Eventually if you are not careful enough, you could lose and have thieves running away with your idea quicker than you could document the specifications.

What Is To Be Done?

Fear should not result in no action being taken. Threats should be acknowledged and where possible mitigated, but progress should be attained.

• Be the driver of change:

Investing in some essential skills to help you Do It Yourself offers better prospects for success. Firstly, if you cannot keep your secret, no one could. Building a working prototype of your idea yourself could offer best strategies for protecting your idea and increasing your understanding of the unforeseen nuances that could derail the success of your invention, much less securing a patent for it.

Not much formal training might be needed to acquire those basic skills needed to develop a working prototype. The Internet is abounding with information you could use to improve your knowledge and skills. Patiently sift through an array of useless information you might find on the Internet until you get what you are looking for. Thereafter get started building your product or sample of the working version. The product built need not be perfect, but should demonstrate the core functions of your innovation.

• Understand the problem:

Do not worry much about whether your creation could make you money or not. Concern yourself more about the problems it could solve and your expressiveness in creating the solution. The more problems it could solve, the greater the chances of the solution being demanded. The greater the demand for the solution, the greater the reward you could derive from its supply.

Sometimes material rewards are delayed. Like work of some artists, the value of their creative work is appreciated more in their passing than when alive. Your innovation might be the legacy you could leave for your dependents. Meanwhile, try to derive joy from seeing your idea coming to fruition and having some relevance in solving some problems, than worrying about money you could make from it.

• Make them see it to believe it:

Once developed and protected by something legal and stronger, you would have options to discuss it with investors, retailers or customers even if it is a limited pilot. You would be in a more reassuring commanding position than you would be if your concept was still an imagination. A tangible product would raise barriers to copying entry. You would also not have to fully disclose detailed workings of your innovation.

In this fast-paced social-media craze era we live in, where news is consumed in chunks of 140 characters, seeing the product in action could offer the best visual explanation of its relevance than words could.

• Weigh your materialisation options:

Some think open source is the best approach for developing ideas. In everything, there are benefits and limitations of pursuing a proprietary or open system. You should consider circumstances and the environment you operate in to finalise your choice of approach. I liken such decisions to a political choice, with options being communism, socialism, capitalism or other variations. Like a good economist, I’ll cop out and avoid disclosing my preference by saying: “it depends.”

In your case, what does your choice depend on?

Conclusion

The lesson here is that ideas seem alive and are looking for carriers to expand and thrive. At best, we could say there is an invisible Deity somewhere, revealing all these wonderful ideas to anyone caring enough to want to do something about them. If you snooze, the life of those ideas would seem threatened, or that the Deity would want to see the end of problems afflicting the helpless, hence revealing those ideas to others wanting more blessings than you do and willing to materialise them. In the interest of self-preservation or based on the will of the Deity, those ideas would quickly look for another agent to bring them to life.

Depicting ideas as living might be anthropomorphic for some. But to a more discerning heart, it creates a sense of urgency needed to seize the opportunity to materialise ideas and to derive benefits from the creativity. Living things do all they could to survive or risk becoming extinct.

Ideas must be developed and implemented as soon as they are imagined. If undeveloped, you risk losing out to others entrepreneurial enough and possibly less sophisticated than you are.

Scripture says “nothing is new under the sun.” If you believe it, we are clearly not creators or inventors, but discoverers of new applications of old knowledge and wisdom. Simply put, we leverage knowledge in new applications.

Go forth and be productive so you could multiply and prosper.

You snooze, you lose.

[1] James Ingram, You Never Know What You Got, 1993