Usability Views Article Details  home | timeline | recent | popular | e-reports | userati | books | about  How to pitch an idea (01 Feb 2005) The classic mistake of would be idea pitchers is to pitch the idea well before its ready. When most people find an interesting idea, they’re quickly seduced by their egos into doing silly and non productive things, like annoying the pants off of everyone they come into contact with by telling them how amazing their new idea is. The thrill of being clever is so strong that they forget the fact that there are 100 interesting ideas bouncing around for every single truly good idea. By (my) definition, an interesting idea takes a novel or creative approach to doing something, whereas a good idea is not just creative, but actually improves on a meaningful quality or attribute, in a way that can be practically applied to the world (or the project). Good ideas include some thinking about execution and delivery. Saying “we should build cars that go 1000 mph and get 100mpg and easily fold to fit in your back pocket” or “We should make a children’s movie that is very funny and intelligent for parents and children, but also has a deep positive spiritual and moral message” count as interesting ideas. They’re good starts. But they won’t be good ideas, in the sense of pitch-work, until there’s both some logic for how to make it real within reasonable limitations, and some level of detail in how the convert the abstract idea (build a breakthrough automobile) into tangible plans (the trans warp drive I’ve designed improves gasoline efficiency tenfold). Article URL: http://www.scottberkun.com/essays/essay38.htm Read 46 more articles from Scott Berkun sorted by date, popularity, or title. Next Article: JavaScript Triggers     This site is a labour of love built by Chris McEvoy