Great idea.

G

You’ve got a great idea for your website. An outstanding idea. An idea that will grab visitors by their eyeballs, seize control of their brains, and make them SCREAM WITH DESIRE to buy your product. It’s a nifty idea.

You take your idea and put it down on paper. In a memo. Great memo. Brilliant memo. Show it to your boss. Boss loves it. Gets excited. Starts to wiggle. Sends several emails. Calls a meeting for the next day. Wants you to present the idea to the team.

You put the idea into PowerPoint. Make some slides. Informative slides. Clear slides. Put in some sales projections. Show it at the meeting. Smash hit. Salivation all around. Revolutionary idea; sales will go through the roof; bonuses to be had by all; promotion coming your way. Boss whispers “VP material” as you leave the room.

Sitting in your cube. IT guy walks by. Call him over, show him the slides. Explain the idea. Explain the potential. Explain how this idea is going to put your company on the map.

IT guy looks. Blinks once. Twice. Asks some questions. Distracted by cricket in the corner of cubicle. What do you think, you ask. Can we do it, you ask. IT guy gets dodgy. Difficult to implement, he explains. Complicated technology. Problems galore.

Cold shiver down your spine. What kind of problems, you ask? Something I need to change in the plan? I can change it. I’ll do anything. Want to make this idea work.

No, no, much too difficult, IT guy says, getting warmed up. Not practical. Don’t want to mess with .NET. Likely to be ODBC problems, he says delightedly. SSL needed, sensitive data. PCI DSS concerns. Starts to turn red. Getting agitated. Completely impossible. Bad idea. Too much work. Pie in the sky. Forget about it. IT guy wanders on down the aisle.

You slump in your chair. Open up PowerPoint. Review your notes. Reflect on your idea. A sound idea. A compelling idea. As of this moment, a dead idea.

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Sam Romero By Sam Romero

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