Speed Wins: How Entrepreneurs and Teams Can Execute Ideas at Lightning Speed

Ever feel like your team has the potential to be great, but you’re stuck in slow motion? I’ve been there. In today’s episode, I’m sharing my story of leading a tech company that was bursting with talent but got bogged down by endless discussions, bureaucratic red tape, and a mountain of old tech debt. It was frustrating to watch our competitors launch products while we debated—and missed opportunities.

I’ll break down the common barriers that hold teams back, like “selling” ideas instead of truly assessing them, or letting the highest-paid person’s opinion dominate (a.k.a. HiPPO Syndrome). I’ll also share my approach to getting things moving again: creating a playbook that gets everyone from marketing to engineering on the same page and speeds up execution.

Tune in to hear some hard-learned lessons, real-world stories from billion-dollar corporations and nimble startups, and actionable strategies that can help turn your team into an execution powerhouse. If you want to break free from innovation paralysis and get your team’s great ideas to market faster, this episode’s for you. Let’s dive in!

Check out our Fast-Track Innovation Workshop if you'd like your team to execute faster.

Where to find Michel:
- Newsletter: Stun and Awe
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/micheljgagnon/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/michelgagnon

Chapters

• 0:00 The Hidden Challenges Holding Companies Back
• 1:13 Unlocking Innovation: What’s Really Slowing Your Team Down?
• 2:09 The Speed Factor: Creating a System to Launch Ideas Faster
• 3:15 The Innovation Killers: Common Traps That Stall Great Ideas
• 4:21 From Sales Pitches to Real Proposals: Rethinking Idea Assessment and Stakeholder Buy-In
• 9:04 Execution Gone Wrong: The Surprising Obstacles of Getting Ideas Off the Ground
• 12:41 Missing the Market: What Slow Innovation is Costing Your Business
• 17:23 Turning the Tide: How to Conquer Innovation Hurdles and Move Forward

Transcript

Introduction: Leaving Plista and Facing Challenges
---

I left Plista, a hundred employee tech company for almost eight years. I had a team of bright, talented individuals and knew the potential was there. I saw flashes of brilliance and heard great ideas in meeting, but despite the talent and potential, something was off. The team was moving extremely slowly.

And there were a couple of reasons for that. We suffered from a large technological debt accumulated over the years, especially before the company's acquisitions by WPP, which is the world's largest advertising company. On the other hand, great ideas got bugged down in endless discussions and bureaucratic red tape.

And what I saw was competitors launching products and grab market share. And I felt the pressure WPP was going through challenges, which led to significant restructuring with operating companies being shut down, others being merged and cost cutting initiatives being rolled out. So missing out on marketing opportunities and becoming less relevant to the group pretty much kept me up at night.

And I saw the industry evolving, uh, rapidly and worried that we were kind of falling behind. So every delay felt like a nail in the coffin. 


Identifying the Barriers to Innovation
---

Potential competitive edge and the real problem that I've, what I've learned with innovation is not what you think. and I'm no, I'm, I'm not alone. This is a common story among business leaders.

The excitement of innovation often gets crushed. That's under the weight of slow processes and internal roadblocks. But over the years, I've realized that it didn't have to be this way. And I've navigated these very challenges in both billion dollar corporations and more nimble startups. What I've seen firsthand is the difference between teams that just talk about innovation and those that actually deliver it.

My, my experiences and failures, to be honest, taught me a critical lesson. While great ideas are abundant, the ability to execute them swiftly is And effectively is what sets successful companies apart.


Developing a System for Swift Execution
---

So to solve this, I started looking for a method that would allow us to bring ideas to market faster.

I ended up. Building a practical approach inspired by product development methodologies and honed through real world experience. One of the key elements of this system is cross functional coordination. I know it sounds like corporate BS, but just like in sports where every player knows the playbook, And their role in executing the play.

Your company needs a common methodology for launching new products, opening new market or testing new sales channels. It's pretty much kind of a new philosophy. And by developing that shared playbook, everyone in your company, from marketing to an engineering and sales, everyone knows what is supposed to happen, how to play is constructed and how it should be executed.

And this common methodology, not only speeds up innovation, but also ensures that everyone is on the same page, it reduces miscommunication and increases collaboration. 


Common Pitfalls in Innovation
---

So what I want to talk today is, uh, exploring the common pitfalls that slow down innovation and, you know, share with you a bit.

The system that I've developed to overcome them.

You will learn how it can really transform your team into a powerhouse. It's a swift execution and constant innovation. And hopefully you'll get actionable insights and strategy to boost your team's performance and regain your competitive edge. So I want to start by. Understanding the common problems I've seen and observed with innovation.

The first thing is that innovation is seen as the lifeblood of a company's growth and competitiveness. I mean, that's what, you know, governments talk about. How can we make our markets and our, our companies more competitive? If you're a startup or an SME, you always have to, you know, keep up with what's going on and make sure that you're ahead.

But the, the journey from idea to market is full of obstacles and I want to cover some of the most common ones that I've observed are faced. 


Flawed Idea Assessment and Stakeholder Dynamics
---

the first category is what I call flawed idea assessment. In most companies, people present new ideas as a sales pitch rather than as a, an objective, well thought out proposals.

They try to convince stakeholders rather than critically evaluate the ideas merits. And I'm sure you've already seen a team spend weeks. Working on a compelling presentation to sell their idea. I know I've done it myself. You know, you use flashy slides and persuasive language without gathering enough data to support the feasibility of the whole concept.

The problem is that they tackle innovation with the wrong intention. This is what I called the sales pitch mentality. The second point is the stakeholder buy in pre meetings in larger organizations, or if your smaller organization tends to be quite political, it's common to have pre meetings to build coalitions and gain buy in from, you know, the, the big shots or the key stakeholders before presenting An idea formally.

Some people call this politics. While it's smart to think about the broader team, this can also lead to group think and the premature dismissal of potentially valuable ideas that have not had the chance to be properly evaluated. I've seen this firsthand at Bombardier, Where the management and the board decided to launch three new billion dollar aircraft programs simultaneously.

It's a strategy that even Boeing and Airbus, the competitors that are, there were 10 times larger, wouldn't even dare to attempt. this ambitious strategy ultimately led to, you know, the company having to sell off many business units at a pretty cheap price. So with a pre buy in approach promising new product idea often get quietly shelved because it does not align with the personal interests of some of the big shots that you.

First place. So that's the second part. The third point is the hypo syndrome or the highest paid person's opinion. So the hypo syndrome refers to the tendency for the highest paid person's opinion to dominate discussions and decision making processes. And this can stifle innovation because ideas are evaluated.

Based on who is suggesting them rather than the actual merit of the idea. I've been a boss for a while. I have plenty of ideas. Many of them, if not, most are not great. So you don't want it to limit your companies and your team's innovative power to your own brain. David Pereira, an experienced product leader and CEO of Omoco told me in a podcast interview that he faced a similar problem in the past.

He mentioned that he had to be careful in meetings because a simple statement coming from him could sometimes inadvertently become a formal request. So to avoid this, David now uses questions instead of statements to encourage open discussions and critical thinking.

So this helps ensure that ideas are assessed on their own merits rather than on being automatically prioritized because they came from the top. Number four, over reliance on anecdotal evidence. The decisions often get made based on limited or anecdotal evidence. And, you know, just close your eyes and try to visualize a couple of past meetings that you've had at your own company.

I'm sure you Can remember the, I heard this or a client wants that. I feel that it would be a game changer, a lot of opinions, a lot of anecdotal opinions, and too frequently a single customer's feedback will be overemphasized leading to a pretty skewed perspective on what the broader market needs. And I'm sure you've seen this before a sales team returns from a meeting with an important client.

Who suggests that adding a particular feature would double their spending on, you know, your product. Matt Wallach and I discussed that exact problem in a previous podcast interview Without broader market validation, this single piece of feedback can disproportionately influence the direction of your product roadmap and potentially diverting resources from more viable opportunities. So that's the first part, how new ideas are presented. In your company, the other big problem is on the implementation side. 


Implementation Challenges and Biased Business Cases
---

And one key problem is what I call biased business cases. So this, the next set of problems arises. frequently the same team that sold the idea started building a business case.

if you're a normal human being with all of our cognitive biases, and you put a lot of energy into selling the idea of. In the first place, you might end up tweaking your financial model just a little bit to make sure that you get the go ahead to launch the project.

And this leads to overly optimistic forecasts that don't accurately reflect the true potential or risks associated with an idea more often than not, the forecast would be full of unrealistic expectations, Although using a more data driven approach makes sense.

And everybody is saying that they make data driven decision. You'd be surprised at how many times I've seen this plays out, even in billion dollar companies, full of MBAs. The second point is the waterfall mode. Once the business plan is approved, the team moves into project planning mode. although planning is important teams Usually adopt by default, a delivery or, or waterfall approach.

And this assumes a high enough level of confidence in the promise and feasibility of the idea to invest resources and energy in it. And the problem with this is that it results in missed opportunities and slow response rates. So more often than not, the. The level of confidence in the new initiative rests more on personal convictions than on evidence.

So finding the right balance between planning and action is crucial for maintaining momentum, being agile, and making sure you don't put all your eggs in the same basket.

After that, there is a lot of what I call slow time to action. The rhythm of scheduled meetings often will dictate the pace of decision making. So if you were in charge of a new feature launched or a new initiative, you may be tempted to set weekly bi weekly meetings.

You know, with key stakeholders to make sure that, you know, you're reporting back and that you're going in the right direction. And this will slow down your execution and innovation process because decisions are deferred until the next meeting, which cause unnecessary delays. How often have you been in a meeting and you know, when you cannot make a call on something, you say, okay, let's revisit that next week, right?

So it becomes your rhythm and it slows down your time to action. So if you have a promising project. It might get stalled because key decisions are postponed week after week, waiting for the next scheduled meeting. your decision making process and increasing the frequency, let's say of check ins can help. keep a faster pace in your innovation and execution. And these common problems highlight the need for what I call it more structured and systematic approach to innovation. when you recognize and address these obstacles, you can create an environment where new ideas can flourish and be brought to market a lot quicker and more effectively.

If you don't do that, if you have a sluggish innovation process and you're slow to bringing new things to market, it's going to hurt you, it's going to hurt your market position, your financials, your team morale. And I've experienced that myself. And also it creates a lot of frustration. And here are some of the most significant consequences.

Let's say of. Not being great at that process. 


Consequences of Slow Innovation
---

The first one is missing market trends. there's a big hype around AI these days. So slow innovation means that you're going to miss out on, you know, key market trends and customer needs. If your team takes too long to develop and launch a new product.

You'll find competitors have already filled a gap and you are, you know, you'll position yourself as somebody who's trying to catch up or by the time your product hits the market, it might be updated or redundant. A classic example is how Kodak, which was a giant in the photography industry, Failed to really capitalize on the digital revolution.

Right. By the time they attempted to catch up, the market had already moved on and, you know, leaving them behind

in, you know, fast moving industries, timing is also everything. I remember when I joined the advertising or the ad tech world, I realized quite early that executing fast was the strategy, it was the competitive edge. Of course, everybody. Talks about execution, but it's a lot harder to implement than just to say it.

if your innovation cycle is slow, if you take too long to bring ideas to market, you will be reacting simply too late The delay will lead to missed partnerships, lost customers, a diminished brand presence. I

I don't know if you've seen the movie about BlackBerry, but their slow response to the rise of touchscreen. Smartphones allowed Apple and Google, uh, which were no names like to be honest in the, in the smartphone industry to really dominate the market and led to a significant decline, almost the complete end of the BlackBerry company.

Another important point is thatLengthy untested projects are full of risks. The longer it takes to bring an idea to market, the greater, the chances that something will go wrong, that you'll build something customers don't want or no longer want market conditions can change. Competitors can release similar products or customer needs can evolve or.

There's a new technology like AI, for instance, that pops up. I think, Microsoft's windows Vista faced multiple delays and when it finally launched, it was. Plagued with issues and couldn't really meet user expectations, which led to a costly and a reputation damaging failure and a couple of memes as well.

So that's what happened a little bit with us at Plista when we tried to launch our platform in Canada, it took us so long that when we were ready. Uh, leadership changes in our sister company in Canada basically killed the project. We were just too slow at rolling it out. It created a lot of, frustration for myself, for the team and also for, you know, the team in Canada.

The other point is that slow innovation will lead to a significant wastage of resources, time, money, and effort spent on ideas that may not work out. So the longer you invest in a project without testing and validating the higher the song costs, if it fails, and this will demoralize your team and strain your budget.

I A good example is, uh, Google's, uh, glass, right? Which despite significant investment fail really to gain traction in the consumer market. Same thing with methods, investment in the metaverse. So when, once you're committing significant resources, you want to have a higher level of confidence to make sure that you're working on the right things.

If you're slow at bringing new ideas to market, the financial impact can be significant. Let's say if you're a startup with a burn rate of 50 K per month, like over a few months, you could easily be spending 200, 300 K on an idea that fails to take off. And if you lead a bigger company, let's say you're making 20 million in revenue and you have a staff cost ratio of, you know, around 30%,

your cost of pursuing an untested new idea could quickly add up to 200 K or a half a million. These financial drains can be devastating, particularly if you're smaller companies or startup and you don't have an extensive cash reserve.

pebble the smartwatch pioneer, despite their early success struggle with slow innovation, Lendi product cycles, and that led to significant financial difficulties and eventually being acquired by Fitbit.

So by addressing the root causes of slow innovation. 


Conclusion: Overcoming Innovation Hurdles
---

You can seriously minimize these risks and ensure that your company stays competitive, agile, and ahead of the curve.

if you want to avoid all of those problems with innovation, And make sure that your team executes faster and bring new ideas to the market a lot quicker.

I encourage you to have a look at our fast track innovation workshop on our website. I've put the link in the show notes. Thanks.