Backwards Walk
This is a straightforward idea, but one that’s easy to let slip — I call it the “Backwards Walk,” after one of my favorite songs by one of my favorite bands.
The early days of a startup are overwhelming because the paths you could take are endless - customers, problems, business models, products. There are tons of things you could be working on and it’s not always clear which is the best use of your time.
This manifests in two ways:
Jumping lines at the Grocery Store - Founders working on one thing then jumping to another and another, like jumping to a shorter line at the grocery store
Staying in the Weeds - Founders never step back to evaluate where, exactly, they’re trying to go, because that feels like a waste of time when there’s so much else to do
Both of these lead to one giant problem — you underestimate what it’ll actually take to get anywhere interesting.
So, I recommend a weekly exercise called the Backwards Walk. Instead of living on the left side of the overwhelming graph above, pick one of the endpoints on the right side and work backwards to build out the path that’ll help you reach it.
For example — you might say “in one month, I want to be in a place where I have chosen an initial SOM to run some intent tests with.”
Now, work backwards. What’ll it take to be confident in a SOM?
Most importantly, it’ll take context.
So, maybe you’ll want to start with 25 conversations with people from a few different potential SOMs. Then, maybe 5 deeper conversations with people in a SOM you get excited about after the first broad set of conversations.
This might require a few different channel tests, since it’s unlikely we’ll find the perfect combination of channel + message right off the bat.
It’ll also require reaching out to ~250 or so total people, understanding that you might get a hit rate of 10%.
So, when you work backwards, the path might look like this:
And, if you need even more structure, build out a playbook to get those 250 people. Start creating a system you can follow. It might look something like this:
This becomes the first draft of your “playbook” for getting interviews. As you circle back to it, you can improve on it.
Here’s the overall process:
Pick a meaningful goal or a moment you’d like to reach that’s a few weeks out.
Work backwards to today, predicting the steps it’ll take to get there with success likelihood (ex: getting 25 interviews will take 250 cold emails).
Build out a playbook to execute on each step - one you’ll iterate on each time you need to execute on this in the future
The systems you build to reach certain types of goals will eventually scale and become your business.
Whenever you feel overwhelmed, do this. It’s helpful, motivating, and will give you clear direction.
The whole album is great, by the way. Awesome for a beautiful day.